Changing your main residence?

riffmongous

Hello everyone, I've been living in Austria for the past year and a few weeks ago I tried to get a phone contract, but the company said I need to have had my 'main residence' here in Austria for at least 3 months. Now back when I registered over here last year they asked me if my main residence was Ireland and I said yes so they registered me in Austria as my secondary residence but this was all done through German and at the time my German was quite poor so I never really understood what it was and quickly forgot about it.

So now I am just wondering what exactly having having your 'main residence' somewhere means, I can't seem to find out anything through google, only that it is used for tax purposes, I as hoping someone here might be able to point me towards something that fully explains it and what it applies to, and if possible how to change it.

5unflower

I can only speak from my own experience of matters of residency in Germany (might be similar to Austria or totally different...) and Ireland. My understanding of this would be, while it does have some significance in Germany (and seemingly so in Austria) where your "main" residence (Hauptwohnsitz?) is and where you may have a secondary one (Zweitwohnsitz?), it seems to be less important in Ireland. One of the reasons for this seems to be the registration system in Germany/Austria, which is simply more stringent and meticulous about the need to define every citizen's status.

It obviously depends totally on your circumstances, but if you intend to stay in Austria long-term, if you work there i.e. pay tax there etc. (tax matters are honestly not my field of expertise at all) etc. and spend most of your time there I think it makes sense to regard this as your main residence?

Personally, whenever I moved country, whether I lived in Germany, Ireland or the UK, I always regarded the respective place as my main residence for the time I was actively working and living there and stated so on any official forms of any kind.

I would think that in your case, if you want to change it, this would have to be done at the registration office where you registered in the first place.

riffmongous

Thanks for the reply 5unflower, from what you say of Germany it seems quite similar to the system over here. I'm guessing it is just a Germo-Austrian thing since it only seems to apply over here (as in it doesnt look like you need to 'unregister' from Ireland first before you can make Austria you main residence) so I don't think there is any downside to changing it.

fasttalkerchat

riffmongous wrote: »

Thanks for the reply 5unflower, from what you say of Germany it seems quite similar to the system over here. I'm guessing it is just a Germo-Austrian thing since it only seems to apply over here (as in it doesnt look like you need to 'unregister' from Ireland first before you can make Austria you main residence) so I don't think there is any downside to changing it.

Possibly there is a difference when it comes to tax. Maybe you should look into that.

donadoni

Hi riffmongous.

I can also only talk for Germany (I am German). But, while I am not quite sure about it, I believe that the system in Austria is pretty much the same.

Sunflower has pointed out the difference between main and secondary residence very well already.
I just would like to add, that it should be possible to change your state of residence retrospectively, if you really need that phone contract. It's a bit of a hassle, but I had a similar problem recently (I didn't cancel my residency in Germany when moving to Ireland, but when I had to get a new passport, it caused some problems) and they were very helpful and changed it for me retrospectively, even though I was 10 years late.
Whoever dealt with your registration a year ago should really have been more helpful, as in explaining the difference between main and secondary residency to you somewhat better. Good Luck!