Spain Sucks

To qualify for his non EU wife’s residency a retired Briton on a state pension now has to show evidence of a continuous €4,000 balance in a Spanish bank. He also has to prove a guaranteed income of €1,000 each month. Excuse me! She has her own homes and total healthcare cover so why five grand in the bank?

Ostensibly it is to ensure his wife is not a drain on the state. Pretty rich coming from a rigid and heartless qualifying system. Its functionaries will leave you lying under a truck if they cannot find a SIP card in your rifled pockets.

The truth is they want only big spenders who will compensate for Spain’s begging bowl economy and failings in fiscal management. It looks likely that the couple will relocate to the UK; there to more easily obtain a UK passport.

One can only generalise but after years of living and working in Spain I think the Spanish take non-Spanish investment for granted. Civil servants treat foreigners (and Spaniards) with contempt. A business staffed by local government functionaries would be bankrupted in 24 hours.

Contemptuous of European law and opinion they are notorious for corruption, especially in property development. My region and perhaps yours too is reasonably prosperous. If it were not for Spain’s EU membership and their sucking the tits of Northern Europeans it would perhaps revert to a donkey economy of fishing villages and citrus fruit groves.

There can hardly be a Spaniard who doesn’t benefit from the incomes of northern Europeans. I am offended when they constantly bite the hand that feeds it. Without such investment millions more would be unemployed; if it goes into reverse they will be.

Ouch! Feeling a little bitter today, Mike?

By the way, brilliant piece, and couldn't agree more - hope this gets published everywhere! 

There you go..... and yes, it is shameless wealth-apartheid. I do not think Spain, with its record of corruption and its dismissive attitude towards EU laws (except when shaking the begging bowl) should be in the EU.  Probably was better under the Moors.

http://www.typicallyspanish.com/spain-news/opinion/The_Mexico_of_Europe.shtml

I found Spain very welcoming when I brought my Filipino wife to Spain 6 years ago.  It cost me 30 euros for the visa and then a small amount on paperwork fees when she was here.

Spain, unlike UK, has signed an EU Directive that families should not be separated.   When I asked at the embassy in Manila if my wife would be allowed to live with me in Spain if we got married, they said, “Where else would she live except with you ? “  The British embassy were unpleasant and unhelpful at every turn, so much so, that I made a formal complaint against the Consul.

Amongst our Filipino friends and their EU spouses I don’t know anyone who thinks they have been unfairly treated in Spain.  Of course the law may have changed, making it more difficult, as it has for EU citizens,  but compared it with the UK requirements and you will find Spain so much better.

This message was last edited by johnzx on 27/09/2013.

The term you use 'bite the hand that feeds it' does perfectly sum up Spain and the Spanish people. It's a term that comes to my mind on a regular basis but I'm not sure many Spanish people even realise how much they rely on the money of others to keep themselves and their economy afloat (sort of afloat).

Can't speak for Spain but a friend has been trying to get the paperwork to get his Japanese fiancee into the UK and is meeting a lot of obstacles.  It is also very expensive.   He is self employed so finding it hard to prove he has the minimum income required to get her visa.   He is very young and does not make a lot, but I think the minimum you have to demonstrate is around £19000 a year?

This clip says it all; I never tire of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0xY5nzHvKE

I've seen that clip before...its brilliant! :-)

Great post and great video! Brilliant!

Brilliant post couldn't agree more

I do not know the percentages of non-Spanish who reside in Spain but I am sure they are NOT the majority or major contributor to the Spanish economy especially as many work on the fiddle and pay zero taxes etc. and most live on the costas

I am sure many Spanish try and fiddle the system but they are also in the minority as many do pay taxes etc

Yes Spain may be bureaucratic and make people jump through unnecessary hoops to get what they want. Personally I would prefer that to the hand out state we have in the UK.

Tadd.....Missing the point since 1966

Sain sucks so i prefer to live here  lol

" Its functionaries will leave you lying under a truck if they cannot find a SIP card in your rifled pockets."

That is certainly not my experience and frankly I consider this a ridiculous statement,. If Spain is that bad why don't you leave. You have obviously made a decent living here for a few years otherwise you would have left before now.

There is a lot about Spain that is not perfect but there is also a lot to like.I certainly would not consider moving back to the U.K. neither would the many people I have had this discussion with.Most of the whingers seem to have been here a while and remember great exchange rates etc and times when it was easy to make easy money here,now they complain because things are harder. Many of these people, and I know a few, have been fiddling the system ,avoiding tax etc. ( not suggesting you are one of them) yet they are the first to critisise the country.If you think there is no corrution in the Uk and better health care and a more justice go back and sample it. I know where I would rather be .

I have spent 2 days of my life trying to pay my imputed income tax.  The Hacienda has had my cheque since December 2012, and just sat on it.  The jobsworths have refused to acknowledge there is anything wrong with their system - par for the course.  As I have said before, the Spanish Civil Service exists for its own benefit and no one else's.

My complaint to Brussels about the discrimination in Inheritance Taxes has resulted in a half-hearted and unsatisfactory attempt by the SpanishGovernment to remedy the situation, and will now go before the European Court later this year.

Good luck with that. Must admit I have never had any problems paying tax or with beauocrasy in general.Residencia, NIE,taxes, health system etc have all very smoothly. Guess I have been lucky.

On the other hand the local council in the UK managed to "lose" my application for planning permission which caused a delay of 3 months and cost me 20K plus as the recesssion kicked in the week they finally got it right, the aaaaaaaUK tax office also managed to "lose" my paperwork when changing to Spanish Tax ( but strangely they had my Spanish address that was on the lost paperwork) and a similar thing happened with the Pensions office so I guess you just never know when the beaurocRATS are going to bite.

I am sure many Spanish try and fiddle the system but they are also in the minority as many do pay taxes etc

Tadd1966, I think you're being a bit naive here.  Fiddling the system in Spain is a national passtime and is widespread.  I know a lot of Spaniards and they all fiddle the system to different degrees.  It's one of the reasons the country is in such a mess...

As people have come to realise the implications of the tax situation in Spain, many have chosen to spend less than 183 days here in order to avoid the horrendous IHT which creates a burden for their families, and CGT on their lump sums, insurances, savings plans, proceeds from house sales in UK .Many have gone back to the UK purely for this reason.It's all very well to go on about sun, fiestas  and menu del dias, but at the end of the day, understandably, people want to protect their hard earned savings and assets from the greedy grip of the Spanish taxman.Spain is then missing out on a lot of money. If they want to attract people to retire here full time, and benefit from  the resultant spending on consumer goods and services etc, they must make their tax regime more attractive and less punitive.

Absolutely. Only time will tell how much revenue Spain has lost as a result of the ill-thought out 720. On top of that, there are increasing instances being reported of foreigners being charged at public hospitals (either when using their EHIC or Spanish SS card) Here's a copy of a post I made on another thread:

There's an interesting point of view expressed by a Spanish tax consultant in this week's Sur in English - I can't reproduce it here but it can be read on page 9 of the pdf version here http://services.surinenglish.com/virtual/20130927/

He argues for making Spain more attractive to foreigners, specifically from a tax point of view, because (in his opinion) Spain needs foreigners like never before.

I doubt if his argument will be heard by those in power though.

Thinking about doing business in Spain? 
DON'T! 
Doing in business in Spain is not a nightmare, because you can wake up from a nightmare. 

This is the worst country that you can imagine when it comes to running a business. From getting a phone line, to banking and dealing with the government - all is a Byzantine disaster where no one will every try to solve a problem. 

I am quite sure problem resolution is defined by most Spanish companies as "Piss the client off long enough so that they will eventually go away so that the customer service agent can get back to sitting on their ass in peace all with the knowledge that it is nearly impossible to fire them! Customer service can be summed up simply as a big "F*CK YOU to the client.