Wendle

I am a British citizen, my husband (of 8 years) is a USC who has been a permanent resident in the UK for 18 years. My kids (1 & 3) both have UK & US passports. We want to move to the US for 12 months (possibly longer). We want to go 6 months from now.

Should we apply for the I-130 for me here in the UK before we go?

We are both self employed, & will continue our UK businesses whilst we are in the US. Does anyone know where we file taxes? What if we expand our businesses to the US - will we be paying taxes in both countries?

My husband has not filed a US tax return for 18 years (since he last lived permanently or worked in the US) - will he need to backdate any tax returns?

Thank you so much for any help!

ian-mstm

Your husband can file the I-130 in London... it'll take 4 - 6 months to process. Once you have a visa in your passport, then you can go!


You will be required to file a tax return in both countries, but you will pay tax only once - either in the US or the UK. There is a US/UK tax treaty that helps to avoid double taxation.


By US law, he is required to file a US tax return regardless of where he lives and how much his worldwide income (unless his worldwide income is very low, in which case he's not required to file). That said, he must file a return for the past 3 years in order to satisfy the requirements of the I-864 (Affidavit of Support) prior to submitting the I-130.

Ian

Rete

I moved your thread to the appropriate forum.

You can do that but you may and may not be able to do that 6 months from now. Depends on how long it takes for the US Consulate to adjudicate your I-130.

Yes and you cannot immigrant to the US until it has been adjudicated and approved.

As a USC your husband must file a US tax return every year regardless of where on the planet he is living and no matter where he is earning income.

He must file, at minimum, the last three years tax forms at the division of the IRS based in London. They will assist him in completing the forms if need be.

As for taxes there is a tax treaty in place with the UK so he might or might not owe money to the IRS if he paid taxes on the monies in the UK and it is under a certain amount. Not 100% sure but it is around $80-85,000.

See above. Why are you only planning on coming for 12 months? Does your husband have UK Citizenship? If not, it is better for him to obtain it now before leaving the UK to return to the US. Also wiser if you were to remain in the US for the required amount of time to get your US citizenship so visas for either of you will be a thing of the past. For you, your eligibility to file for naturalization in the US would be 3 years less 90 days from the date you become a permanent resident.

BTW your husband must prove that he is attempting to re-establish the US as his principle domicile.

Wendle

Thank you so much for your help!

The 12 month plan is very flexible - we simply would like to try living in the US for a change & because his parents are very old & not very well - so we want to take our kids out there now while their US grandparents are still around...

We may want to stay longer... possibly even the 3 years for naturalization.

My husband is a UK citizen as well - he has both passports.

So he will contact the IRS in london immediately & file last 3 years tax returns. he will also submit the I-130.

If it hasn't come through before we go (Jan 09 but not booked yet) can I still go & simply tell the immigration officer it is being processed, or does it have to be completed before i go?

meauxna

No, you must wait for the visa.

Get the petition going NOW, and plan on a solid 4-6 months for an interview/visa issuance. You have a lot of studying to do, documents to gather etc.

Here's your crash course:

Filing your I-130 abroad - Direct Consular Filing (DCF)

Instructions for Filing an I-130 & I-360 with the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services office in London

There are many other pages at the consular website that you'll want to use, but start with the petition.
If you download the I-130 from uscis.gov instead of from London, you will get all of the instructions with it.
You MUST use the checklist on the London site, and follow their specific instructions.

Then get to those tax returns.. have fun!

BritishGuy36

Yeah get the ball rolling on the I-130 if you want to be there in 6 months. You will make it if you start NOW.

The tax returns aren't required for the I-130 filing, you can get to that while the I-130 is processing.

Brodders

How did you manage to get US passports for your kids? I didn't realise there was a way in which you could get US passports for them (unless they were born there or born outside US but the USC parent had to be resident there)?

ian-mstm

To be a US citizen from birth, a child born abroad has to have at least one USC parent who lived in the US for at least 5 years with 2 of those years after his/her 14th birthday. It's quite simple really!

Ian

Brodders

I thought it was something like that that's why I was wondering how Wendle managed to arrange passports for her kids as I see the USC spouse has been a permanent resident in the UK for 18 years.

Brodders

Sorry! I understand now. I thought the 5 year requirement had to relate to the time that the child is born, but apparently not.

JAJ

In the situations where the child is not a U.S. citizen automatically there are two other ways to get the child citizenship, but both must be completed before child is 18.

Wendle

Hi there sorry only just seen this question. It was quite a hassle to get the passports for the kids because my husband hasn't lived there permanently for so long. however the 5 years requirement does not have to be be cumulative. He was sent to public school over here from a young age (his mother was british & father in the US army so moved around a lot). We had to go to the embassy in London (with the baby!) with documented proof that my husband could add up 5 years of residency in total since he was 14 - this was made up of school breaks & various breaks as a student. We needed medical records from the US to prove some periods of time as they didn't always stamp the passports in & out in the 70's & 80's!
Once we had the info for the first child, it was much easier for the second.
The other thing to remember is that apparently you mustn't take a child (even a baby) in on a UK or other passport, & then expect to apply for a US one later. We were told that if we had done that, they would have somehow surrendered their claim to a US one later. So we did it when they both tiny before taking them.

Wendle

Do you mean we must say throughout this process that we intend to make a permanent move to the US (even if we don't have definite plans for this yet & may return to the UK at some point)?

Also, can you help on how we go about filing these tax returns? Where do we get the forms & help with filling them out?

Thank you so much!

BritishGuy36

Permanence is a relative term. In this kind of case you should take it to read "for the foreseeable future". Of course you can come back to the UK if you want in future. But for the purpose of a visa you are intending to me the US your home.

The IRS office in London is very helpful, and their number is not an 09 rip-off number like the immigration misinformation line. Here is a good place to start:

http://www.usembassy.org.uk/irs/index.htm

You will likely need to file forms 1040 and 2555, if the USC is self employed he will need to file a Schedule C as well.

Brodders

I recently went through the onerous task of submitting the 3 years tax returns. It initially seems overwhelming, but once you start and work through one form at a time, it's actually not that difficult especially if you only had employment income. If your salary income exceeds the annual exclusion (which was $80,000 for 2005, $82,400 for 2006 and $85,700 for 2007) you can still claim the foreign tax you paid as a credit (on Form 1116). But if you had any other types of income it would probably be best to ask the IRS office for assistance.

I posted my returns about 2 weeks ago. Does anyone know what happens now and how long they'll take to process these returns?