nun

Under the US/UK reciprocal SS agreement you can use credits in one country to top up your credits in another so that you qualify for a pension....those credits are not used in calculating the pension though...so the OP might get a minimal pension, but be able to use that to qualify for other benefits that require a UK state pension.

formula

It is true. Never heard of the NHS postcode lottery?

It was relevant to your statment that I quoted about the UK welfare state changes.

bakedbean

It won't be everyone's cuppa tea but Malaysia has a good retirement visa option. Living costs are a fraction of the UK. Hot weather all year round if you don't mind the humidity. English speaking more or less. Even got Tescos . There's a retirement sub forum under Malaysia if you wish to check out.

spouse of scouse

Would you retire in the UK?

Yes I would, and we are

My husband is a UK/Australian dual citizen, I'm Australian.

Reasons my husband is happy to retire in Liverpool:

Family - out of 13 children, there is just his brother and him left. He did the much dreaded expat thing of flying over at a moment's notice last year, twice, for another brother who passed away while he was there.

Climate - he hates the long, hot Perth summers and the cold doesn't bother him.

Cost of living - on our many, extended trips to Liverpool he's found the price of most everyday things cheaper than Perth. A notable exception is the cost of petrol, but we're going to 'try' to get along without a car.

Just being 'home' - he's enjoyed his 25 years in Australia, but it's never been home to him.

Reasons I'm happy to retire in Liverpool:

Fast and inexpensive (relative to Oz) access to the rest of the UK and Europe, I love travelling and short holidays from Perth are pretty much restricted to domestic destinations or Asian countries (been there, done that, got a million cheap t-shirts)

Climate! Although a Perthie all my life, I am also well over the stinking hot summers.

Liverpool itself - so much to see and do there. Museums, theatres, art galleries, a lively city centre, the Liverpool Philharmonic (yay!). I also love the friendliness and humour of Scousers.

Choice - might sound like a funny one - but. I knew from the outset that Scouse had always dreamed of going home, yet he never put an ounce of pressure on me to agree to that. If I'd wanted to stay in Perth, he would have not only agreed, but more importantly, he would never have made me feel guilty about it. So I'm also doing it for him, because I love him and want him to be happy (sorry about the Mills and Boon moment).

spouse of scouse

Hi bakedbean! I love Malaysia and have visited all around the country, especially with one of my best friends who is a Penang girl. Malaysia was on the table when we talked about where to retire, and apart from the pull of home for Scouse, it was only the humidity that put us off. Some people cope will with that though, even love it, so yes I think it's a great retirement option!

bakedbean

Yes the humidity can be wearing, and wouldn't suit everyone for sure.

Sally Redux

The way you are presenting that information is highly misleading.

You are giving the impression that someone would go to a doctor for treatment and be told the budget has run out and they have to pay.

There may be regional variations for availability of experimental treatments.

Calling it a 'lottery', as the tabloids do, is calculated to frighten off someone unfamiliar with our system.

Oh wait, that's exactly what you want to do.

spouse of scouse

If the term 'postcode lottery' is designed to worry people that they may experience sub-standard health care if they don't live in the right place, then it works. It's the biggest issue I have with moving from private health insurance, which while expensive gives me consistently excellent care, to a system where I might not have a choice in the standard of care I receive.

Thanks for posting an alternative viewpoint Sally, it's comforting to a future migrant

formula

You got that from this. Really? I doubt that a GP (I assume that is what you meant) will know the budgets and how they prioritise their budget, for NHS departments. The GP will write to the relevant NHS department and that department then contacts the patient. The GP will not say "the budget has run out" for other departments, although some GP surgeries control their own budget for their patients and use that to buy treatment.

Some treatment does have to be paid for if the department running that budget say you can't have that treatment for free, or if it is not available on the NHS. Not all operations are available for free on the NHS, that's why you see areas run fund raising activities for people in their area who need an operation that the NHS won't provide.

Did you miss all the news a couple of months ago when there was a massive search for a seriously ill boy taken from a UK hospital by his parents? Remember how he turned up in another country for treatment the NHS wouldn't provide?

A few on other forums have said that their ILR has been allowed even thought they were outside of the UK for more than their allowed days, because they returned home for medical treatment that the NHS didn't provide.

As for the NHS "postcode lottery" for treatment, I know you have recently returned to the UK and may be out of touch, but it seems you didn't google and read about the NHS "postcode lottery" as it is called, before you replied. As I recall, MacMillan Cancer Support also wrote about the "postcode lottery" and the last time I looked, they weren't a "tabloid".

There are different types of medication available in each authority and trust. There are different priorities set for budgets by each department. The NHS does not pay for everything and people have to accept that. I don't know why some people still think it does in this age of the www.

Englishmum

My mum needed to have her knees replaced. She lives in central England and does not drive (but she loves her pensioner's bus pass where she gets free bus travel and in addition free train travel within the W. Midlands! ).

Her nearest hospital for knee replacement surgery was the Coventry University Hospital. However, it's a main regional hospital and always very busy. However, she told her doctor that she was willing to have surgery outside her local area if there was a hospital where she could have the operation more quickly.

Her doctor checked the hospital lists and was able to have her surgery at the hospital of St. Cross in Rugby, Warwickshire. My mum said that her treatment was fantastic and the staff were all very kind and efficient. They didn't do ops on both knees at the same time, she went back a few weeks later to have the other knee operated on. When she was discharged, a physiotherapist came round to her house to show her how to do post-op excercises and an occupational therapist also came round to see if she needed any adaptations to her house, or equipment to assist in getting around if she required it. My mum thought it was marvellous.....no worries about cost or medical bills whatsoever.

For both operations my siblings were able to drop her off and collect her (Rugby is about 16 miles from her house) but I'm sure she said that a non-emergency ambulance could have been arranged if necessary.

Btw; although I have a US passport my spouse and I absolutely don't want to retire in the US, even though our son is intending to stay there indefinitely. We did spend a few years living in Singapore and have from time to time mused about the scheme to retire in Malaysia and it does seem to be an attractive prospect. However, we also have a daughter - and granddaughter - living in England and I think we would be just too far away from our kids if we settled in Asia.

Also to the O/P: last week I went to an evening function for expats (at a cherry brandy factory, here in Switzerland). I got chatting with a lady in her 60s who had just come to Switzerland to retire; she holds dual Swiss & Dutch nationalities.

The lady was a freelance journalist and had spent the last 25 years working in South America. We were standing in a little group, another lady was originally from Paraguay (she was with her Romanian spouse whom she'd met whilst working in Germany) so we were all speaking in English. When the journo was asked why she had decided to retire in Europe she said that 'like Africa, all the South and Central American countries are a basket case'. She said that in her experience, the corruption - especially the politics - is endemic and the drug cartels and violence is out of control. She no longer felt safe and decided to get out before being another statistic of being gunned down. Her last country of residence was Uruguay... The lady from Paraguay said she hadn't encountered major crime back home, but she was from an upper-middle class family and lived in a good area. She did concede though that she personally felt safer in Europe.

nun

Healthcare is only one of the considerations in retiring to the UK. The OP has the complication of whether or not to continue Medicare payments and things like exchange rate variation and tax compliance. The list of real and perceived difficulties is long. But those are no reason to stop you from moving if its what you want. Life is an adventure and while planning is good, it can also overly inflate issues into paralysing problems.

I recommend that you take an extended visit to the UK and rent where ever you want to live for at least 3 months. That way you can get an idea of what it's really like to live in the UK. If you like it then go ahead.

FYI in a recent survey of international healthcare systems the NHS came top and my own experience was that my Mum's NHS care was excellent. Of course you can pick from a range of surveys and anecdotes to bolster what ever opinion you already have.

SeattleSheila

Thanks so much for all the useful input! I have a few years to plan so I am just drawing up the "battle plan".
I do have some experience with the NHS as I used it when I lived in Swindon for two years. The medical isn't so "scary"...the dentist was, well, rather primitive compared to what I've become accustomed to. That was most likely more the impression of the facility rather than the skill of the dentist.
Hmmm....I have no family in England right now but do have close friends in the Rep. of Ireland and relatives in Germany (Mum's) and Sweden (Dad's). Have to look at N.I. too then. I was just visiting last summer.
The suggestion to rent for a few months to try out a place is very good. Will probably do that. Fortunately, I have a knack for learning languages and catch on quickly. I can already function in German, Swedish and Spanish. Over the next few years I want to holiday in a number of places just to get a feel. No worries about England's climate though...I live in Seattle...much the same. I don't want to deal with severe cold or steamy hot.
My thought is that it is a relatively simple thing to take a holiday on the continent if the winter gray and gloom gets to be a bit much.

I heard about the taxation issues. I won't have enough assets to really be slammed by that infernal institution...not enough to toss in the citizenship anyway. The tax forms I have seen don't look too terrible.

I am just looking for a change...slower pace...and if I lived in Europe I could easily enjoy visiting more places and feeding my interest in history and culture...and my genealogy hobby (I've got LOADS to do in Scotland and Germany). That's hard to do from the US. Someone mentioned Malta...been there. Loved it!
So, when the day finally arrives I just have to work up the courage to put the flat on the market, pack (lightly, of course) and boldly go!

Thanks again!

nun

Tax can be a problem if you don't do some planning. It's not necessarily the amount of money you have, but the sort of investments....and remember it's not just the IRS you'll need to keep happy, once you move to the UK you have to comply with HMRC rules too. Pensions are usually not much of an issue, but if you have investments in US mutual funds outside of a retirement account you might have problems managing them with a non-US address and there are some special HMRC taxation rules for many non-UK funds. These issues can be avoided with planning, but just be aware of them.

not2old

SeattleSheila @ post # 27 good luck with your plans

last point from me on this for those at the lower end of the scale.

What is pension credit? Pension Credit | Claiming Benefits | Age UK

https://www.gov.uk/over-80-pension/overview

or considering Malta. Similar situation for Portugal (read posts on the Portugal thread)

https://ehealth.gov.mt/HealthPortal/...e_maltauk.aspx

formula

Yes, the NHS dental treatment is limited: even if you can find an NHS dentist. With the 3 NHS dentist band charges and not everything covered, it sometimes works out better to go to a good private dentist and have a better choice of what they use.

I was going to suggest London until I saw that you want a slower place. If you want to travel to mainland Europe from the UK, then you might need to have easy access to an airport or be near a Eurostar train station. The earlier you book on Eurostar, the cheaper the fares are. There are forums where we share cheap air fares that we find.

Lots of forums in the UK where we help each other with this addictive hobby. Some kind people even offer to do look-ups in their local parish records if you are stuck.