The US federal tax law requires Envato to collect tax information from our authors. While we cannot provide you with tax advice, we have put together this article to help you through the process. This has the caveat that you should always seek advice from a professional accountant / tax advisor because we not authorised to advise about your specific tax situation, including filling out your specific tax form.
Your situation will determine which tax form you need to fill out.
US persons are required to fill out a W9 form. Non US individuals will need to fill out a W8BEN form, and non US-organisations will need to fill out a W8BENE form. This article is about the W9 form, we have equivalent articles for W8-BEN and W-BEN-E.
Part I
The first section of the form asks you for your personal details. In this section, please provide details including your name, country, and postal address. Please ensure that you provide a complete address because we will use this address to send you a hard copy of your Form 1099, which is your US earnings summary for the year.
You’re also asked to fill out your tax ID type (SSN or EIN) and tax ID number. Please make sure you provide the correct SSN or EIN number as the IRS may impose penalties for incorrect SSN or EIN.
Part II
In the next part of the form you need to certify that the information you’ve provided is correct.
Please make sure you understand all the items under this section. The purpose of the Form W9 is to establish your identity and status as a US. person. It is important to note that providing false information is subject to penalties under perjury.
You will also need to acknowledge the certification and provide your name as an electronic signature.
Once you’ve submitted your information look out for the success message at the top of your screen. If you don’t see this there might be an error in your information that you’ll need to fix before submitting again.
If you have any questions about this process please don’t hesitate to contact us at taxinfo@envato.com.