*UPDATE 25 May 2015
You may no longer need an EIN if you’re an Australian publishing on Amazon. It seems the tax treaty between the US and Australia changed last year and that 30% tax has been canned! Yay! So, if you’re an Australian resident and publishing on Amazon you will only need to add in your personal tax details and Amazon will only deduct 5% for the IRS. Make sure you double check to ensure this matches your personal circumstances!

You’ve written your book, created a cover that grabs your readers attention, your manuscript has been proofread, copyedited and formatted to fit Amazon KDP requirements, Smashwords and CreateSpace, you’ve hit publish and thanks to your savvy marketing efforts you’ve even managed to sell a few thousand copies.

Then you sit patiently waiting for your royalty cheque. You open your mail excited, you see the number and your shoulders droop and you are ready to scream, “WTF!”

So, Amazon has taken their cut, 30% or 70% depending on how you’ve priced your book, and the US tax department has grabbed another 30%. You’re standing there mouth agape with a big fat nothing and your neighbours are wondering if they need to call for help.

Ok, so maybe I’m dramatising. They can go back inside unless of course they want details of where to buy your book. This can all be easily fixed with an EIN.

If you’re not a US citizen or live in the US, you probably do not have the EIN. It’s a tax identification number and it’s seriously the easy thing I have ever obtained. And Hollywood makes the IRS look so scary.

After dialling +1 267 941 1099 and being put on hold for twenty minutes (thanks Vodafone for 300 minutes worth of free international calls!), during this time I did some research on EINs, I was having trouble finding stuff in relation to Aussie authors publishing through Amazon, I finally got through to a human.

She called me Mrs Radzka. I might be married but by no means am I Mrs Radzka. That’s my mum. I just haven’t changed my surname to match my husband’s. It’s the twenty-first century and really not a priority in the grand scheme of things. But anyway…

After telling her what I needed, she took me through a quick questionnaire, and after another 15 minutes or so, she dictated my EIN and told me I’d get some mail in the next 2-4 weeks. OMG how simple was that? I have no idea why I was putting it off for weeks.

If you want a step by step guide check out Catherine Ryan Howard’s post. She explains it brilliantly so I don’t need to regurgitate it here.

So, while I haven’t published my novel yet, (only a couple weeks to go!), I’m all set to set my Amazon KDP account and ensure that I don’t get hit with a 30% tax from the US should I sell a few books. I feel like I’m finally making progress.