How to handle payment when providing services?

freebird101

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For example:

You provide a marketing service for a company/small business. Lets say it's digital marketing. You use pirate software for the bulk of your work. And maybe you take a tad bit too much pay.

What you do is not illegal, but maybe there would be issues with complaints, tax, refund, ect.

How would you go about handling the payments? Would you start an official business or just keep it simple with paypal/other? Considering you only do services the freelancing way.

The reason i ask is because I'm planning on doing this myself. But as an uber-noob, I have no clue on how to deal with the administrative side of things.

*edit: The issue here is that you want to look professional, and not raise red flags and so on. But at the same time you don't want the full responsibility of a "real" business. Hope you get what i mean.
 
Form a company somewhere offshore and where you can hide your name. Get an account for this company and a stealth PayPal. Now start making money!
 
Form a company somewhere offshore and where you can hide your name. Get an account for this company and a stealth PayPal. Now start making money!

Thanks for the advice man. That sounds pretty complicated considering I'm planning to do this in my country. I will def. consider it. Is it expensive?
 
set up a business paypal account - free. its just like regular paypal. but when doing payments, it shows "your business name" instead of "john smith".
when it comes to pay, use paypal to create invoice/payment links. all the stuff to do that is built into a pp biz account. or you can set up an e-commerce shop for your leads to buy items on your site like....
Code:
-seo package a/b/c
-hosting package a/b/c
-web development 1hr/2hr/3hr/etc
wordpress with woocommerce is free and relatively easy way to achieve that. everything plugs into your paypal. leads can pay with their credit card or pp account.
you may want to look into registering a business LLC if you're going legit. costs around $100. (assuming you're in usa)
if still in doubt, look at your competitors. act like a lead and see how they do payments.
 
One thing to keep in mind with paypal is that there can always be the chance of refunds, but it sounds like you are more concerned with being anonymous.
 
One thing to keep in mind with paypal is that there can always be the chance of refunds, but it sounds like you are more concerned with being anonymous.

I'm not entirely sure how anonymous i want to be. Because right now i don't know how strict the rules are here in Sweden. I'm researching it atm ^^
 
I'm not entirely sure how anonymous i want to be. Because right now i don't know how strict the rules are here in Sweden. I'm researching it atm ^^
If you want to setup this thing correct and with as little liabilities possible you need to have a registered company, I doubt a company in Sweden will protect you. I would look into something in the Seychelles, Costa Rica or even Hong Kong the first two jurisdiction will protect you and are relatively cheap and fast to setup! For PayPal you for sure want to use a stealth account and not at all something with your name anywhere! So you need a second PP account to withdraw money etc. all in all it's a bigger setup if you want to get protected and make it right.. question is, do you have the budget for it :) Otherwise do as most others do, just start it, see how much money you can make and gamble with the risk involved!
 
Because right now i don't know how strict the rules are here in Sweden. I'm researching it atm ^^

Save yourself the pain and find a consultant who can answer your questions. Even if you don't incorporate it'll at least give you a better idea of what your options are.
 
Save yourself the pain and find a consultant who can answer your questions. Even if you don't incorporate it'll at least give you a better idea of what your options are.

Good point man. Specially considering country specific rules ect.
 
If what you are doing is not illegal and you are going to make plenty of money by selling your services to small businesses, why would you risk using pirated software? Just buy the software and calculate it as an expense, which is tax deductible. If the software can be used for multiple clients, then make the investment since the beginning, it will pay off later. Really, there is no reason to set up an offshore company if you do everything the right way before you even start. If you want to avoid taxes, that's another matter entirely.
 
If what you are doing is not illegal and you are going to make plenty of money by selling your services to small businesses, why would you risk using pirated software? Just buy the software and calculate it as an expense, which is tax deductible. If the software can be used for multiple clients, then make the investment since the beginning, it will pay off later. Really, there is no reason to set up an offshore company if you do everything the right way before you even start. If you want to avoid taxes, that's another matter entirely.

Yeah that is def what i would do. The problem right now is that I'm not sure whether if i can use these paid tools as a service by itself, without certificates ect. I guess i could start out with pirated and move on to legit if it pays off.
 
Yeah that is def what i would do. The problem right now is that I'm not sure whether if i can use these paid tools as a service by itself, without certificates ect. I guess i could start out with pirated and move on to legit if it pays off.

99% you can if you are offering digital marketing services and the tool is just a "means to an end", meaning that you don't just resell the software to your client as a service and that's it. For example, if you are offering SEO services and you use SB, GSA or any other tool to help you rank your clients' websites, it's perfectly fine. After all, this is part of your ranking strategy.

But, if you resell to your client just the software so they can use it on their own, then you need reseller rights or a developer license from the software developer otherwise you are in trouble!
 
99% you can if you are offering digital marketing services and the tool is just a "means to an end", meaning that you don't just resell the software to your client as a service and that's it. For example, if you are offering SEO services and you use SB, GSA or any other tool to help you rank your clients' websites, it's perfectly fine. After all, this is part of your ranking strategy.

But, if you resell to your client just the software so they can use it on their own, then you need reseller rights or a developer license from the software developer otherwise you are in trouble!

Yea, that makes sense man. Thank you.
 
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