Expat tax - how do they know you in the UK?

[jinkster]

Whilst I am not wanting to break any tax laws. How does the HMRC know your in the UK for more than 90days in 1 year? Passport is scanned on entry but not scanned on the way out - any ideas?

[GT03ROB]

jinkster said:

Whilst I am not wanting to break any tax laws. How does the HMRC know your in the UK for more than 90days in 1 year? Passport is scanned on entry but not scanned on the way out - any ideas?

They don't. However if they have any doubt they will assume you were in the UK for more than 90 days & ask you to prove you weren't.

[After_Shock]

GT03ROB said:

They don't. However if they have any doubt they will assume you were in the UK for more than 90 days & ask you to prove you weren't.

As above, ive known people get away with it for years but when they do eventually start asking questions people suddenly vanishing on extremely long holidays or having to re-arrange plans to avoid it is not much fun.

[Pit Pony]

My son's girlfriend's family always seem to have very exotic holiday destinations, and I've come to the conclusion that this is because of her dad's tax situation. He works in Chad for an oil company, so I assume that he'll do anything to see his grown up kids, as long as wasting his 90 UK days isn't involved.

Obviously cheaper to fly them all out to an exotic far east holiday destination, than pay uk income tax.

[GT03ROB]

Pit Pony said:

My son's girlfriend's family always seem to have very exotic holiday destinations, and I've come to the conclusion that this is because of her dad's tax situation. He works in Chad for an oil company, so I assume that he'll do anything to see his grown up kids, as long as wasting his 90 UK days isn't involved.

Obviously cheaper to fly them all out to an exotic far east holiday destination, than pay uk income tax.

It is. He pays little or no tax, so can afford nice holidays!! Nothing to do with number of days in UK, unless he's working 28/28!!

[Du1point8]

I thought the UK rule was that if your main residence was in the UK then the 90 day rule doesn't count?

If not it definitely explains my parents taking 5/6 holidays a year, most of the time he's in some god awful country with an oil company and when home they are off on holiday.

[shirt]

Pit Pony said:

My son's girlfriend's family always seem to have very exotic holiday destinations, and I've come to the conclusion that this is because of her dad's tax situation. He works in Chad for an oil company, so I assume that he'll do anything to see his grown up kids, as long as wasting his 90 UK days isn't involved.

Obviously cheaper to fly them all out to an exotic far east holiday destination, than pay uk income tax.

if he has to work in chad then i can fully condone any and all of his tax avoidance practices. worst place in the world.

[jinkster]

OK, thats understandble.

Thank you for your help.

[GT03ROB]

Just as an aside. I've just noticed your occupation.

HMRC did a big tighten up of the rules on non-residency a couple of years back as a result of flight crews. There was a significant case bought against a pilot which caused this to happen. Its fair to say they will watch flight crew a bit more carefully than others. Make sure you keep good records & don;t chance it.

[jinkster]

Thanks for the help. I did hear about a British guy working for British Airways at Heathrow and living in Spain.

[James72911]

As commented above, it is your responsibly to declare, and HMRC will rule that you are guilty and you need to prove otherwise. The rules for residence have changed, the statutory residence test is used to determine whether you are resident or not.

I wrote an article for the National last year - here is the link - http://www.thenational.ae/blogs/your-money/how-the...

Hope this doesn't break any rules by posting.