I was wondering about this as well. Should I just keep a record of how much time I've worked per week in an excel sheet? I'll be freelancing for foreign clients.
Freelance with Student Permit
- Thread starter betteka
- Start date
I am an international student and in the same position. I wonder If I gain money from such platforms like youtube or streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music (I'm working as a musician and producer/songwriter). Is this still count as a freelance work? or it is counted as a self-employed job?. If it is a freelance job, then how can I keep track the total hours I was working? Thank you!
Freelance or self employed you must count the hours you work and deduct it from your part time job. For example, if you write a script for an hour, and this script is made into a song which you profit from professionally. Then one hour should be deducted from your 20 hours a week. Same goes for anything else related to your professional work.
Freelance and self employed work is a real grey area when it comes to taxes and hours, while being a student.
Thank you for answering, I find it's really hard to prove how much hours I worked because I'm doing these works all by myself without any supervisors. I mean, there's a flaw when it comes to claim how many hours I worked (which I am the only person know exactly)
This would be more of a good faith thing, they would trust that you are working within 20 hours as there is no way to check. If they start asking question, you would have to have proof which is impossible.
Just not worth the hassle, unless your revenue is more that what you would get working a part time job.
Just keep a record in an Excel sheet of how much you're working per week. From what I understand, it's highly unlikely anyone will ask you for actual proof unless they suspect you're earning more than one would in a 20 hour per week job.
I'm in the same boat. I've been running my own online service business for the last 3 years and just now applied for a study permit related to my online work. So I want to keep up with the business while I'm studying. Problem is I never complete a task in one sitting and multitask with other personal, distracting things, etc...And things like social media and my membership sites are part my business/part personal in community building. I will find it really difficult to keep an excel sheet with all my hours. I'm also unclear on the taxes. I live in India, but as a US citizen have to pay taxes in the US for all foreign work. Will I continue to pay taxes in Canada, since my business is registered in the US? Or will I have to pay Canadian taxes on that income? I wish they could give us all a bit more clarity on this situation. It is becoming more and more a reality these days.
You will have to pay both US and Canadian taxes. You will have to pay Canadian tax because you will become a resident, and you have to pay US taxes because Uncle Sam said so.
There is a good video playlist on youtube by the Canadian Revenue Agency specifically for International students. It's a bit dry but informative.
good answerWhoa whoa you can pull your bitter horses back to where they came from.
I have legal grounds to work as a student and try not to breach the Canadian law by asking in this forum. You are definitely not helping at all, so next person in line please?
Hey, I see the posts before this one. I've been searching for the answer for a long while and people have different answers on the idea of online work. Everybody gives a different answers when asked if I can or cannot work online as an international student. Some answers in here say yes I can. IRCC on Twitter says the same. My question though, does it matter where the company is? What if the company is in US? Can I still work for them online?
Yes, I guess you can work easily online for 20 working hours for any client even outside of Canada, location should not be a constraint.
Canada doesn't care where you work as a student, only that you maintain the hours as stated on your study permit. The only issue is that as a business unless you bill clients based on the hours you work there is no way to prove that you worked for 20 hours or 25 or 30 hours, which is why it is a bit of a risk and a gray area, especially when it comes to gig work as these rules were not formulated with these jobs in mind. There is no detector in the IRCC office that detects when you crossed your hours, but you can and will be questioned now or in the future if it comes to their knowledge that you breached the hour limit and the consequences will be severe.