US dividends
US dividends: 15 percent at source and 4 in Poland — or 30 and nothing to reclaim here
Tax on an American dividend is taken by the broker before the money reaches you. How much of it you may credit in Poland is decided by one form filed with that broker.
What the treaty and the statute say
- Polish tax: 19 percent
- Art. 30a ust. 1 pkt 4 ustawy o PIT — a flat rate on the gross dividend.
- Credit for foreign tax
- Art. 30a ust. 9: tax paid abroad is deducted from the Polish tax, but never beyond the Polish tax on that same income.
- The PL-US treaty: 15 percent
- That is the ceiling on what the United States may take from a Polish resident’s dividend. So at most 15 points are creditable in Poland — the rest is reclaimed in the US, not here.
How we compute it
- Credit capped at the treaty rate
- The broker withheld 30 percent — we credit 15. Entering the full 30 would understate the tax due, and the difference has to be reclaimed on the American side anyway.
- The limit is computed per country
- Excess tax from one country does not cover a shortfall from another. One shared pot would give a credit larger than any single treaty allows.
- Country from the ISIN, not the currency
- A share quoted in dollars is sometimes Irish or Dutch, and then a different treaty applies. We take the country from the first two letters of the ISIN.
Where people get it wrong
- No W-8BEN, so 30 percent instead of 15
- Without that form the broker withholds the penalty rate. Those fifteen extra points are not creditable in Poland — they must be reclaimed from the US tax authority, which on small amounts costs more than it returns. The form expires every three years.
- The net amount entered instead of the gross
- The base is the dividend before withholding. Entering what landed on the account understates the base and forfeits the credit at the same time.
- Dividends filed in section C/D with the trades
- A gain on disposal is art. 30b, a dividend is art. 30a. Different sections, different credit rules — trading losses do not reduce dividends.
- An Irish ETF taken for an American one
- Popular S&P 500 trackers are often Irish (ISIN starting IE). Then the PL-IE treaty applies rather than PL-US, and the numbers come out differently.
Run this once
claude mcp add --transport http taxroam https://taxroam.com/mcp --header "Authorization: Bearer $TAXROAM_KEY"Brokers where this comes up
Questions about dividends
The broker withheld 15 percent. What do I pay in Poland?
The difference up to 19 percent — roughly 4 points of the gross. Due with the rest of PIT-38 by 30 April.
The broker withheld 30 percent. Am I done in Poland?
Only 15 points are creditable, so the top-up to 19 still applies. The overwithheld 15 are reclaimed in the US — there is no route to it from here.
I have no sales, only dividends. Do I still file PIT-38?
Yes. Foreign dividends are self-reported — nobody files them for you.