How to fill the Part II, line 10 in W-8BEN

[LoiDiep]

Hello,
Thank you very much for reading and replying to me. I appreciate all the help
I'm a designer from Poland 🇵🇱 that earn royalty from my art designs on Zazzle. To get my royalty, I have to fill in Part II, line 10 of W-8BEN form but it's really difficult for me 😥. 
Does anyone know the exact number or letter I have to fill in? I'm very grateful for any answers ❤️☀️😘❤️

[Roberta]

Hi @LoiDiep 

I am sorry to hear that this is an issue for you. I have flagged this with the team now and they will reach out to you directly via email. Hope you will have an update soon. 🙂

Roberta 🌷

[LoiDiep]

Thank you very much. Nice day ❤️

[Fiorenzo · Accepted solution]

Hello there and welcome to Zazzle. I wrote a post on this exact issue, explaining all the steps, where you find the information, and what to write within the form. I can find it in the following link. This should solve your problem. If you still have questions, feel free to ask and I'll help if I can. Good luck, and greetings from Italy.

https://community.zazzle.com/t5/share-your-tips-tricks/w-8ben-links-to-irs-documents-and-tips-for-fo... 

[LoiDiep]

Thank you very much. I've sent and receive many email but this is the first time I receive a helpful link from your answer. All emails that I received before only gave me a meaningless link about counting royalty

[Fiorenzo]

My pleasure, always glad to help. I hope, the instructions are understandable. Sometimes the articles in the treaties are difficult to understand/interpret. If you have difficulties finding out the correct article and paragraph and % rate, just ask and I'll have a look myself. For the rest, if you fill in the form as described there should be no problems. I'm a designer, btw, welcome to the creative club 🙂 Have a great day!

[LoiDiep]

Thank you so so so much ! 😍 You are very kind and your post is so clear and easy to understand. I did it your way. I am from Poland so in part 10 I have filled in 13(1) and rate is 0% . Then I filled out the same as you instructed ( "Royalties for the use of artistic work" and then "Creation of artistic works (designs) sold on Zazzle online web stores on a range of goods")
However I'm still not sure because Polish (in English) writing is a bit different from IT and UK , so could you please read Poland's irs and tell me if I did it right.
Here is link official IRS of Poland: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-trty/poland.pdf
I'm very grateful, but I haven't pressed the button "ACCEPT AS SOLUTION" yet because I'm afraid that once there is a solution, my question post will be closed while I still don't know if they accept my W-8BEN form this time.
Warm hugs from Poland 

[Fiorenzo]

Hi again. Checked. Unfortunately, in your case article 13(2) applies and the applicable tax rate is 10%. As you can see in 13(3), royalties for artistic works are included in (2) and there is no separate exemption like in the agreement with Italy (which is 0% for artistic works). To be safe, I have searched for alternate sources and found a comprehensive listing for artistic royalties at the following link, that confirms the 10%: https://your.yale.edu/sites/default/files/income_tax_treaties_for_royalty.pdf 

The rest is fine.

Sorry for the bad news. All my best back!

[LoiDiep]

Thanks very much. Twice from multiple times (at least 5 times) I've filled out the form and sent it to them before, I wrote   13(2) and 10% (but without line explaining "Copyright to use the artwork" and " Creative artwork (design) is sold on the Zazzle online web store with a wide range of merchandise." - hopefully that's the problem)
At first, when I confidently filled in 13(2) and 10%  after finding the link myself, read it myself. However, they all send me (quite similar) answers that are very unclear and repeat the link which is not helpful (only for calculating the royalty %.) With their answers, I lost more and more confidence.
I send here pictures one of my emails to them and their reply. I am so sorry for keeping you in this post. Now I will try to solve the problem myself. Sending these pictures to complain is not good just because it drives me crazy so I'm so sorry to bother you 

[Fiorenzo]

No worries, you don't bother me at all! Yes, that was exactly your problem: "(but without line explaining "Copyright to use the artwork" and " Creative artwork (design) is sold on the Zazzle online web store with a wide range of merchandise." - hopefully that's the problem)" It was the exact same problem when mine got rejected at my first attempt, I spent a few hours on the web to find out. The rate and article were correct. You'll see, it will work this time. If it doesn't pls tell me. Good luck!

[LoiDiep]

Thank you so much, I'm doing this time hopefully. Don't want to say again but have to say that you are very kind 👍🌞😍🌷❤️😇👍✌️

[Fiorenzo]

Always glad to help, and got helped a lot, too, myself, when I started. zazzle has a lovely and helpful community, mods included. You will feel at home, I'm sure. That being said, it's nothing compared with the kindness and heart the Polish people have shown since Feb of last year.

Again, welcome to Zazzle. It was a joy to meet you. Happy designing and best of luck and success!

[LoiDiep]

Thank you for your kind words to the Poles. I think people from other countries will do the same as us.
Wish you happy and success ❤️

[LoiDiep]

Dear Fiorenzo and all friends! Happy that today I received their answer: "Your form now looks to have all the correct information necessary for it to be processed under the agreed Treaty rate between your Country and the US. We have now sent it forward to be processed by our finance team. We will be in touch when the form is processed and applied to your account or if we have any questions.....". Thanks to everyone who helped me with this and hope everyone who has the same problem as me can solve it quickly. Wishing you all success and happiness

[Fiorenzo]

HALLELUJAH!
Can you please write down the two phrases you used so I can update the tips-and-tricks post? Thanks! Glad it worked out in the end. Happy designing and best of luck, and remember, the forum is your best friend when you're stuck with something and things start slowly on Zazzle, so don't despair and keep going, improving, and promoting yourself - the more you sell, the higher your designs will rank and the more you will sell. See you!

[LoiDiep]

I didn't do anything but write reply angrily and in attachment I sent again the old scan which was attached in last email to them (its photo is in my previous reply). Here I post photo of my angry email and also the scan I sent).

[Fiorenzo]

Well, I'm not surprised it went through, otherwise it wouldn't have worked in my case, either. Who knows what happened on the other end, it may also depend on who is handling it. Oh well, let's look at it the positive way - we had some lovely chit-chat and met each other, and it worked out. All's well that ends well 😄

Have a great day, and, again, good luck! 

[LoiDiep]

Yes! but I think but I think it is not only " we had some lovely chit-chat and met each other" but you really helped me get to the bottom of it in a clear, sure way to solve the problem.  Thanks again

[LoiDiep]

Hi, I've sent the last form that filled follow your advice ( attachment is picture of my form) but their answer today made me quite upset. I send here picture of my filled form, could you please take a look on it to see what is wrong. Thank you very much

[waterart]

You need to state that they are "copyright royalties" in the part where it says "specify type of income". 

[Fiorenzo]

Jesus, we're owned by bureaucracy. And it seems, it's pretty random what is accepted and what not. Let's try it again.

The exact paragraphs in Article 13 of the Polish treaty state:

(2) Royalties may be taxed in the Contracting State where they arise, and according to the
law of that State, but the tax so charged shall not exceed 10 percent of the gross amount of the
royalty.

(3) The term “royalties” as used in this Article means-
(a) Payments of any kind received as consideration for the use of, or the right to
use, any copyright of a literary, artistic or scientific work, including copyrights of motion
picture films or radio or television broadcasting tapes, any patent, trademark, design or
model, plan, secret formula or process, or for information concerning industrial,
commercial, or scientific experience or skill (know-how)...

Let's try it this way:

Article/paragraph: paragraph 2 defines the royalty tax rate of 10% while paragraph 3 is just a further definition of the term "royalties". According to the IRS tax table, the "Treaty Article Citation" is 13(2), so we are correct on that one. The 10% are also correct.

Type of income: As suggested by waterart, let's try to replace "Royalties for the use of artistic work" with "Copyright royalties for the use of artistic work"

Additional explanation: This is the tricky one, because you hardly find examples, and the ones found may or may not work out for Zazzle. I spent quite a lot of time finding out what to enter here and my "Creation of artistic works (designs) sold on Zazzle online webstores on a range of goods." worked. You may slightly change it, perhaps to "Copyright royalty payments for artistic work (designs) printed on a range of goods sold on Zazzle online web stores."

I hope this works.

[LoiDiep]

Thanks a lot, tomorrow I will follow your advice not today because I 'm tired and bored to contact them. I have written them about 10 times so far and their replies are the same, manytimes the reason is the same as in email that I show here, sometimes it says because the picture is low resolution and they can't see anything.
Nice day to you 🌄

[Fiorenzo]

Good luck, let's hope for the best. BTW. If you sent them the same picture as you've posted here, it's more than large and clear enough to be printed at regular size.

[LoiDiep]

And here is picture their email tghat I received today

[TMGEE]

In fact, in this email they are really trying to help you pay less taxes 😉  I find people from Zazzle Customer Care are helpful as much as they can, and quite patient. Trying to figure out this part can be indeed very frustrating. I've sent them my form several times, correcting parts, but I'm still not sure I did it right because I haven't heard from them for days. I wish they had the same system as KDP (Amazon Publishing) where you answer the questions online, and depending on your country of residence, it's automatic. I've never had to answer those specific questions for my KDP W8 form. It would be much less of a hassle both for the Customer Care employees, and the designers community.

[waterart]

I have nothing but praise for customer service at zazzle but for some reason they are not allowed to come right out and say what it is zazzle wants on the form and it turns into a game of charades. By the way they only respond back if the form is not filled correctly, so if you haven't heard anything your form was probably accepted

[JocelynMB]

Yes, they cannot advise what to fill out on this tax form, for us.

[LoiDiep]

Yes, they are not allowed to advise us what to write. They replied such when I asked them for help, I understood and found it reasonable. However, all the email that I already filled the part II line 10 ( sometime corectly) I got the answers as if they didn't see what I had filled out. They all send me (quite similar) answers that are very unclear and repeatly give me an helpless link that only for calculating the royalty % . Sometimes they seem to be more creative by answering : "the picture you sent is too low resolution to see anything"

[LoiDiep]

Hi Jocelyn, nice to see you here. Hopefully your w-8ben will be accepted soon

[LoiDiep]

They sent me identical answers saying that I need to fill out part II, line 10 to get a lower tax rate while I have filled it out completely and correctly (this is certain because I have consulted many times from many source, especially after following an attentive guidance of very kind colleague in this post). A few other times they replied me that the image of form I submitted was low resolution making it impossible for them to read anything when in fact the image I submitted was always a scan that was clear enough to read easily ( I work with photos a lot, so I always pay attention to how my scans look.)
I have sent and received emails in this regard probably 10 times or so. I feel like I'm being teased

[LoiDiep]

They sent me identical answers saying that I need to fill out part II, line 10 to get a lower tax rate while I have filled it out completely and correctly (this is certain because I have consulted many times from many source, especially after following an attentive guidance of very kind colleague in this post). A few other times they replied me that the image of form I submitted was low resolution making it impossible for them to read anything when in fact the image I submitted was always a scan that was clear enough to read easily ( I work with photos a lot, so I always pay attention to how my scans look.) I have sent and received emails in this regard probably 10 times or so. I feel like I'm being teased

[waterart]

Sorry you are having these problems, most of us international sellers had the exact same problem when zazzle started requiring this form from us. You just have to keep trying.

Try this and use the exact same wording, for type of income write copyright royalties, for why you meet the conditions write beneficial owner is a resident and citizen of Poland receiving copyright royalties for artistic works.

[JocelynMB]

I am also in this same situation, having to replace my Canadian W-8BEN for an address change, having had my 2015 one accepted when this stuff all started being required of us, by Zazzle, outside the US, to not have 30% removed from our earnings paid out.
The 2 emails I've received, have tried to help me figure out what to enter on the form. I realize they are not allowed to Advise us what to write.

[waterart]

I'm in Canada too, this is what got mine accepted, Income Type: "copyright royalties"  Reason why you meet the terms: Beneficial owner is a resident of Canada earning copyright royalties for use of artwork and not subject to tax under US/Canada tax treaty terms of 0% withholding rate for art related copyright royalties.

The article and paragraph number is now 12(2) You can confirm at https://eezycontributors.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360040283911-What-is-the-Withholding-Rate-For...

[JocelynMB]

Thank you so much!!!

[waterart]

You are welcome, let us know how it goes.

[JocelynMB]

I cannot get mine accepted 😞 and I know in Canada we do not owe 30% tax, but I cannot seem to fill it out correctly no matter what. Ugh. If by Dec 31st I still am having it rejected, guess I have to accept that I will lose 30% of the accumulated royalties I've earned.

[LoiDiep]

Don't give up! have you filled it out correctly according to the advice of @waterart  have you? he/she is in Canada just like you ( He/she wrote : "The article and paragraph number is now 12(2). Did you fill in 0% and 12(2) correctly? If you did but receive the same email as I received, you should reply to them in a different tone, clearly listing the sections you filled out. Please see the pictures of emails between me and them

[JocelynMB]

I did, yes.
I have a major painting to complete this week, then I'll look at all this again and try submitting again,
Thank you.

[Fiorenzo]

Take a deeeeeeeeep breath and show us a screenshot of this infamous section of your form (black out your personal info). No need to lose 30% of your income; we'll get it right.