BEA Survey Questions

International organizations (such as the United Nations, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund) are, according to balance of payments conventions, considered foreign entities, even if they are headquartered in the United States. Transactions with these organizations should be reported on the BE-185. Enter “Int’l Org” under “Other – Specify country” on Schedules A or B, and enter the data for each service type for which you had transactions.

No. We collect data by country, not by region.

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No. Please report on a gross value basis. Receipts are reported on Schedule A and payments are reported on Schedule B of the BE-185 form.

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Report purchases or sales in the periods when they occur or are charged (that is, in the period when the provider of the service recognizes or performs the service), whether expensed by the purchaser of the service in that accounting period, amortized over several accounting periods, or included in expenses in a subsequent accounting period.

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No. Your transaction is with a U.S. affiliate of that German company. This would be considered a domestic transaction and therefore not applicable to the BE-185.

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Since your transaction was with a German entity, you should report this as a transaction with Germany. Where the money actually goes is irrelevant, even if you were to send your payments to a bank in the United States as a matter of convenience.

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No. A single submission, whether by mail, fax, or E-file, is sufficient.

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Yes, you may file electronically at http://www.bea.gov/efile.

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You can obtain a MS Excel version of the BE-185 by sending an email to be-185@bea.gov. This is an automated system, and it will automatically send you an .xls version.

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We discourage reporters from sending their completed surveys via email because of concerns about confidentiality. Your email is not necessarily secure against interception by a third party.

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