vickyandrob

Hi, was just wondering if anyone has moved over to Australia but continued to work for their UK company?

My OH may be able to continue working remotely (he works in IT) temporarily until he finds something over there which appears to be a great idea, and one less thing to stress about!

I am aware the awful exchange rate is a negative, but are there any other negatives you can think of?

Thanks
Vicky

Alfresco

If it's full time for him, that's great. Do it, because job hunting here is slow at the mo, well in Brisbane anyway.

My wife is doing the same thing but only half time. The problem now is she can't commit to full time employment here yet.

You will need to get Tax File Numbers and declare all income etc...

I think it's a positive. Staying employed is good.

vickyandrob

Yes it is full time, doing same job, but they said it will probably only be temporarily. But it means we could come out in Jan/Feb as we had initially ruled this out due to the job market being slower at this time.

Thanks for your reply

Alfresco

No worries.

A very useful thing would be to get a written contract to that effect stating that he will still be employed by his UK employer i.e. is employed.

This will allow you get mobile phones on contract for example, broadband etc... and open lots of other financial doors.

Good luck!

vickyandrob

Yes, thanks for the tip

jimbo_d

Get paid in AUD or you will lose out a big chunk of the money, it will not be worth it unless he's on 100k GBP or more with all the exchange losses and relative higher cost of living to money earnt

vickyandrob

Hi Jimbo, thanks for your reply. He doesn't earn £100,000! He wouldn't have a change to his salary as they will be just continuing as things are - same salary. I am aware the exchange rate is not favourable, but surely it is better to have this salary temporarily than none at all, until he finds something?

Bermudashorts

I agree with you, cannot imagine that a UK employer would change the salary into AUD. I think you are in a fortunate position, shame about FX rate but that's life, it is a real bonus that you can do this to tide you over. The tax could be a bit messy, especially if he stays on UK PAYE but nothing that cannot be dealt with.

freebo

Yes, its better to be earning something rather than nothing - a word of caution though - I would like to move to Brisbane as I used to live there however I'm finding that there is very little work in my line of IT specialism in QLD and heaps of it in NSW and VIC.

It obviously depends on what your OH does, but make sure he checks the local market.

vickyandrob

Thanks everyone for your replies. I feel quite relieved that he will not be stressed looking for work initially, so feel it will be good in the short term.

Bermudashorts, I'll get him to query PAYE when he gets definate confirmation, thanks for your input.

Freebo, yes been watching vacancies for a while and definately more in Melbourne and Sydney, but he has a good friend in Perth who is trying to get his cv passed around, you never know! He's a developer - Oracle if that means anything to you? Are you going to move to Melbourne or Sydney then?

freebo

I've been in Sydney for nearly 6 months now and work with a bunch of Oracle guys. To me it seems most large companies head offices are in Melbourne or Sydney and if your OH is into large scale systems most of them are in these two cities too, right now if I chose to change jobs I think I could find something else quickly in Melb or Syd, not in Bris and certainly not in Perth.

derson

I'm in exactly the same situation, working for my old UK employer until the end of the year, getting paid in pounds.

Aside from the ex-rate the only downside has been when trying to get finance on a car and proving income. A contract in GBP for 3 months just won't cut it - no worries, have bought a cheaper car outright for now.

Try and get your Tax File Number sorted asap when you get here and remember to declare your worldwide income when you do your taxes!

Oh and I work in IT too (SAP, Citrix, etc) and working from a laptop in the back garden in the sunshine with a tinny ROCKS. Offsets any x-rate worries! ;-)

vickyandrob

Thanks for that, hopefully I will be working so any phone contracts, rent etc will have to go in my name

Wish I could sit in the sun doing my job, may have to retrain in IT!

Freebo - I always fancied Melbourne but OH wants to give Perth a try first as he has got a few friends here! If we are unhappy in Perth we have an agreement that we will try Melbourne. This would apply too if he cannot find work.

neil248

Regarding getting finance on foreign earnings when we applied for our mortgage they said they could not take my foreign earnings into account. I then pointed out that the ATO were happy to tax me on those earnings so surely they were valid and this being Australia the bank said OK then fair enough.

freebo

Fair enough - but be aware of this - http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=650616