Author Topic: has anyone from the USA hired a VIRTUAL ASSISTANT? shopify  (Read 968 times)

doctaandrew

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has anyone from the USA hired a VIRTUAL ASSISTANT? shopify
« on: November 21, 2017, 10:05:15 PM »
hey everyone !
new member here,
im hiring my first VA and was wondering if anyone knows of the tax implications/ beneficial deduction and writeoffs at the end of the year.
i heard using upwork i dont have to file a 1099, but can i still deduct the cost of the VA as a business expense.
or can i choose to pay via paypal good and services ? because if i go through paypal would the IRS characterize over 600$ a year as an employee or independent character if the VA is from overseas.
confused about the taxes, please help, lol

alwayssummer

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Re: has anyone from the USA hired a VIRTUAL ASSISTANT? shopify
« Reply #1 on: November 23, 2017, 01:08:18 AM »
I cannot really comment on the tax implications, but I hired a VA from GetFriday several years ago and the experience was horrendous.

I did not find any tasks that could be assigned to my VA that I did not spend more time explaining precisely what I wanted than I would have spent just doing the job myself.

Example: I asked them to do some product research. The results were effectively a google search pasted into a word document. When I eplained to them that I wanted analysis on the options, the time required to complete the task rose so much that it no longer made sense to ask them to research it. The analysis was still effectively useless.

After significant training I got them set up to do some basic transaction downloading for my finances, but they were completely ignorant with respect to security. For example, if they had issues accessing my account they would email my password in plain text. Anyone who managed to hack that email would have complete access to my bank accounts. I had to change passwords multiple times over the course of a few months. Then Mint made that task completely pointless to hire out.

Eventually I got to the point where I couldn't find enough tasks for 10 hours of my subsription and cancelled.

I'm willing to consider that maybe I just never figured out a smart way to ask my questions or use the service. I hope you have a better experience than I did and I would love to hear how it goes.

doctaandrew

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Re: has anyone from the USA hired a VIRTUAL ASSISTANT? shopify
« Reply #2 on: November 23, 2017, 05:11:17 PM »
nevermind. i got a couple answers on reddit, from people who said they are tax pros saying there are new laws that say hiring anyone overseas does not require a 1099, even if they are payed over 600$ and upwork is pretty cool, they give ratings and the employers rate them on the task, and the employees can take competency tests on almost all subjects that get displayed on their profile.