Leaving Czechia: Final Tax Return, Health Insurance and What to Cancel

Most problems after leaving come from three things: public health insurance that keeps running, a tax return nobody filed, and letters that go to a Czech address or data box nobody reads. This checklist goes through them in order.

Your tax residency in the year you leave

If you only had your home here, your Czech tax residency ends the day you give it up. If you spent 183 days or more in the Czech Republic in that calendar year, Czech law treats you as resident for the whole year, and the double tax treaty with your new country decides which country taxes what after the move. Keep proof of your departure date: the end of your lease, your new lease or job abroad, travel records. See tax residency.

Your final Czech tax return

Employees: ask your employer for the income statement (potvrzení o zdanitelných příjmech) for the months you worked. With only that Czech salary you are not obliged to file, but a return often brings a refund: the taxpayer credit of 30,840 CZK is a full year's amount even if you only worked here part of the year. With other income, for example from a new job abroad in a year you are still Czech resident, you must file.
Deadline: the normal one, in the following year: 1 April on paper, 1 May electronically, or 1 July when a tax advisor files it. There is no special early "exit return" for individuals.
Refunds: give a bank account that will still exist; a Czech account is simplest, a foreign IBAN works too.
Self-employed: close or pause your trade license and file the final tax return with the social and health overviews. See changes and fixing issues on tradelicense.cz.

Public health insurance: stop it the right way

Czech public health insurance does not end by itself when you leave. If you are not employed here and simply move away, you keep owing the monthly self-payer premium until you tell your insurer, and it adds up with penalties.

Moving to work in another EU country (or Serbia, North Macedonia, Montenegro or Turkey): you become insured there, even for a short job. Deregister from your Czech insurer and show the proof.
Moving elsewhere for more than 6 months: you can stop Czech insurance only if the stay abroad is continuous and longer than 6 months, you have health insurance abroad for the whole time, and you hand in a written declaration of a long-term stay abroad before you go. It cannot be done retroactively: premiums stop from the date in the declaration, but never earlier than the day after the insurer receives it.
Return your insurance card (průkaz pojištěnce) within 8 days of leaving.
Coming back within 6 months? Then the exemption does not apply and you pay the premiums for the whole period anyway.
Employees: your employer deregisters you when the employment ends; you only have to act if you stay unemployed in the Czech system for a while.

Your Czech pension insurance periods stay on record. Within the EU and in countries with a social security agreement with the Czech Republic, they count towards your pension later, and each country pays its own part when you retire. Before you leave, check that your record (the insurance record from ČSSZ) is complete; it is easier to fix while you are still here. Supplementary pension savings (penzijní spoření) have their own rules for early withdrawal; read the conditions of your fund before you cancel it.

Property and income that stays in the Czech Republic

Renting out your flat: the rent remains taxable here. As a non-resident you file a Czech return for it every year. See renting out your apartment.
Property tax continues every year, payable by 31 May, wherever you live. See property tax.
Selling Czech property later: the income may be taxable here even as a non-resident, depending on how long you owned and lived in it.
Your s.r.o.: a company can be run from abroad, but it keeps all its Czech duties, and a non-resident director has its own tax rules. See closing or pausing an s.r.o. and non-resident company directors.

Letters, data box and your address

A personal data box (datová schránka) stays active after you leave. Messages count as delivered 10 days after they arrive, read or not. Keep access, or hand it to someone you trust.
Give the tax office, insurer and bank an address where post reaches you, or give your accountant a power of attorney to receive it.
Keep at least one Czech bank account open until refunds and final bills are settled.

Residence permit

Non-EU citizens: a long-term visa or residence permit has its own rules for reporting that you leave, and leaving can matter for permanent residence later. See the visa and residence guide. EU citizens with a temporary residence certificate can report the end of their stay to the Ministry of the Interior.

Checklist

Note your departure date and keep proof of it.
Get the income statement from your Czech employer.
Stop or move your public health insurance: EU job deregistration, or the long-term stay declaration before you leave.
Close or pause a trade license; decide about your s.r.o.
Arrange a non-resident return for Czech rent, and keep paying property tax.
Keep a Czech bank account and access to your data box, or give someone a power of attorney.
Ask the Czech tax office for a certificate of tax residency if your new country wants proof of the years you lived here.
File your final Czech tax return next spring.

Quick general questions: ask Taxbot. We file final returns as part of our personal income tax return service.

This guide is general information, not advice on your own situation.

Official sources: Act No. 586/1992 Coll. on income taxes, §§ 2 and 38g; Acts No. 48/1997 and 592/1992 Coll. on public health insurance and its premiums; VZP, long-term stay abroad; Act No. 300/2008 Coll. on electronic acts (data boxes).