15peter20

Hello everyone,

I'm sorry if I'm posting this in multiple forums but it's a general issue and I don't know where to go.

I've been searching everywhere for advice on this situation but to no avail.

I moved to Thailand 6 years ago to work, but my parents still live in England and travel back and forth. We are all registered as living in the UK because of my parents' home there. I'm not likely to go back to live in the UK as I've settled here. This leaves us in a difficult dilemma as to what to do with our home in the UK.

From what I've read, despite past NI contributions, you must remain ordinarily resident in the UK i.e. have a permanent address where you live, in order to:

1. qualify for a state pension that goes up in line with inflation (unless of course you went to live in EEA countries or those with special arrangements)

2. be eligible for free NHS treatment
3. have a UK bank account

My parents are getting old and we want to let out our house to get some income. The problem is, it's our only UK home so we don't have any other property to live in that would allow us to qualify as resident. Also, we would need to keep a UK account to stockpile rent and pay bills.

Some other people we've spoken to have let out their home and transferred their postal address to a trustworthy relative living in the UK so that they can still qualify for these things. Unfortunately we don't have any family we can trust and we don't want to burden friends and neighbours.

It's particularly important as my dad has to go to hospital frequently. If we sell up, that means we cut all ties with the UK and therefore lose out, even though my parents have been paying tax and NI all their lives.

I've heard it might be possible to have a permanent redirected mail setup with the Post Office, where you keep the same address (your home that you're renting out). They send on post to another address. Alternatively, could the letting agent collect it for you?

In other words: is there any way to keep your UK resident status if you let out your only home in the UK? After all, you still have to pay tax on your rental income. I don't think we could afford to buy a second property and we don't want the hassle of maintenance.

This has been bothering us for years and we would greatly appreciate any advice. Thank you very much for your help in advance.

dunroving

Recommend you start your own thread as your questions aren't really about the NHS.

15peter20

OK thanks. I've posted on the Welcome Inn forum as well.

Sue

Hi 15peter20,

Welcome to BE.

I can't help with your query, but I've moved your posts into a thread of its own.

Mummy in the foothills

You can't qualify as a UK resident unless you live there and spend a set amount of time there each year. Living in Thailand and wanting access to free healthcare and resident status is trying to have your cake and eat it too.
Theres another poster on here that lived in Thailand in retirement and has moved back with his spouse to his UK home due to UK pensions not rising and the exchange rate getting worse. Look out for Don (DontheTurner his name is similar to that)

Welcome to BE. it's a great forum.

robin1234

Hi 15peter20, no beating about the bush here; ordinarily resident in the UK means that you actually live in the UK. Not own a home, maintain a residence, have a postal address, have a historical record of paying tax or NI conts there. You actually have to be living there. There really is no way around it, or you run into the danger of being a Daily Mail style "NHS Tourist!"

holly_1948

True, but actually living there could be as little as two weeks each year. As long as the house is kept otherwise empty, or with only employed caretaker servants present and the owner returns regularly [regularly as in British usage which is equivalent to the term periodically in American usage].

See http://www.ukcisa.org.uk/files/pdf/i...nary_print.pdf

Bermudashorts

Possibly things have changed since those cases in the 1800's.

I agree with the rest of the posters, owning a house in UK and having some post sent there perhaps does not make one resident!

Pistolpete2

Surely this is throwing the baby out with the bath-water. Nobody wants to be ordinarily resident for UK tax purposes unless they absolutely have to be and being deemed ordinarily resident in order to get indexation for one's state pension and NHS doctor's surgery access seems a serious conflict. If you are ordinarily resident but not domiciled then you will be UK taxed on your world income unless you elect to be taxed on a remittance basis and you can only do this for so long before you have to pay a substantial fee for the right. You also lose all of the personal allowances and this could be costly if you have any Uk source income, such as property income.

There is an alternative short-term measure which could be considered if your finances can cover you. Take a Uk* sabbatical for several years coming up to UK state pension age and defer your pension if you can afford to live off other income or capital when in the UK. You will receive a 1% uptick on the state pension, for every five weeks that you defer. You also of course get regular indexation. You must be resident in order to get this deferral and it is of course most beneficial for those that end up leading a long healthy life post pensionable age. It is possible that you have other pensions under other country bilateral agreements and these will also get the indexation during this UK sojourn. You will also of course only be losing the net UK pension after tax and if you then post-deferral leave the UK you will not then suffer tax on the up-ticked pension. Some healthcare insurance coverages expire at age 65 so the access to the NHS at this time could be useful. Just a thought for those actuarially inclined.

*So long as you satisfy the Uk authorities that you are resident in the Uk at this time you can also spend time in the EEA to count towards this period of residency

Victor Meldrew

Some responses/ideas:

- you can have your mail sent to your UK home address and redirected but I think there is a limit of ?? years you can do this for. After this you could ask tenants to post on, or ask rental agency collect.
-Alternatively rent out a couple of rooms (income isnt much less than renting whole house), then you can still use the house when you come back for holidays. spareroom.co.uk is a site which you can do this through
-pay voluntary NI contributions, costs around £12 a month and after 30 yrs payments you get your pension. You can do this from overseas.
-you dont have to pay tax on rental income if you are non resident for tax purposes. There is a form you need to fill in for HMRI, but don't ask me what it is.

I am sure someone else will fill in the specifics which I am not sure of.

Pistolpete2

If you are saying that you don't have to have tax withholding taken from any rents paid to you by your agent or tenant, which are then paid onwards to the Revenue on account, that is correct.

Under the Non resident landlords scheme if you are up to date on your tax affairs you need only fill out a form and gain approval to file your property income numbers annually by self assessment, with nothing to pay ahead of time.

However, this income is still taxable but you will typically have your annual personal allowance to reduce or even wipe it out so there is nothing to pay.

mikelincs

NO ordinarily resident means that the UK is your normal home and that you do NOT own property elsewhere, and you are resident there for most of each year, in fact you would have to sign a form stating that to start getting NHS treatment, in your situation, doing that would be equivalent to getting NHS treatment fraudulently.

robin1234

Hang on let's not go too far. Surely you can be ordinarily resident in the UK and own a holiday home abroad..

Pistolpete2

BOY, this thread has become a complete and utter waste of time because so many posters are coming in with inaccurate or partly accurate information.

It did not get off to a good start when the OP was trying to satisfy three entirely different types of residence; one for NHS purposes, one for pension purposes and one for tax purposes, all of which are subject to different interpretation. What is more, he was trying to create the illusion of residence without physically being there through the use of PO Boxes and a property to his name which is deception* and worse than DM name-calling but seems to be rarely pursued by the authorities who have bigger fish to fry.

FYI, ordinary residence means that you are resident in the Uk on a regular basis and you could be ordinarily resident simply by spending more than 91 days there on a regular basis. Thus you could be ordinarily resident in two countries - the UK and somewhere else - at the same time. Owning property elsewhere has nothing to do with it and you could be domiciled elsewhere while still ordinarily resident in the UK FOR TAX PURPOSES.

You could also be ordinarily resident if you leave the Uk but maintain your property there and visit close family and friends there on a regular basis and spend even less than 92 days there, if HMRC feel it worth their while going after you for real money (Gaines-Cooper).

There has been so much confusion relating to residency in the UK for tax purposes that the government are supposedly shortly to produce a STATUTORY RESIDENCE TEST.

*similar to the deception of stating your residence is such and such to be in a desirable school catchment area, for which there can be harsh penalties.

holly_1948

A person can be ordinarily resident in two (or, exceptionally, even more) countries at the same time.
"Nobody" is overreaching, a person might want to enjoy the benefits (such as they are) of ordinary residence in the UK especially if they have little income arising outside Britain. This has applied, for example, to people who spend a large majority of their time working as missionaries in the Third World and living a life of intentional poverty. Absent from Britain for 40+ weeks out of 52 but regularly reporting to their church renders them still ordinarily resident there. It key key that the brief presences in Britain are regular and with a purpose of residence.

Perhaps those who wrongly thought one could have only a single ordinary residence at a time were confusing it with domicile or habitual residence.

See Shah v Barnet Borough Council [1983] 1 All ER 226.