Tax & Accounting Made Simple for English-Speaking Freelancers

Lars Siegert's wife became a freelancer in 2020. They started with an Excel sheet, made mistakes, wrote letters to the tax office after each one, and slowly built a system they both still use. Lars, founder of German Business Buddy, passes it on in plain English. It is for freelancers and small trades in Germany who use cash-basis accounting and stay under 80,000 € profit or 800,000 € revenue a year.

What the talk covers

He starts with three myths: you need a tax advisor by law, you need an accounting background, and one mistake ruins everything. Then five building blocks:

• Bank accounts: 1 plus 2. One private account, one business account, and a second business account as tax reserve. Into the reserve go the VAT you collect, about 30 percent for income tax and 15 to 20 percent for health insurance.
• Invoices. Invoices up to 250 € gross can be simplified. For EU business clients, both VAT IDs belong on the invoice, or your client can't deduct the VAT.
• Taxes. Only profit is taxed, not revenue. The small-business rule is not a tax-saving scheme: you don't charge VAT, but you can't reclaim the VAT on your purchases either.
• Deadlines. VAT returns are due on the 10th after the period, the annual returns in July. Do them early.
• Digital setup. One folder per year with an inbox folder, files named by date, counterparty, type and description, cloud storage, a phone scanner and an accounting app made for freelancers.

Your monthly routine

1. Drop every invoice and receipt into the inbox folder as it comes in.
2. On a fixed date, download your bank statement and find a document for every transaction. No booking without a record.
3. Rename each file with the payment date, book it and move it to the revenue or expense folder.

A tax advisor makes sense with several income streams, international or private clients, e-commerce or big life changes. The thresholds and rates are the ones he quoted in June 2026; rules change, so check the current figures.

Who it's for

Beginners in Germany who want to do their own accounting.