MacGrizz

Hi,

I'm due to leave for the US on Monday but I still have some loose ends to tie up. Does anyone have knowledge/experience of what I should do with the following:

• child benefit
• electoral roll
• UK doctor registration
• UK dentist registration

I'm heading across for a minimum period of 3 yrs (unless the unforeseen happens) - but maybe for good.

Thanks
MacGrizz

Duncan Roberts

child benefit - No idea
electoral roll - Tell them you are moving, ask for an absentee ballot form. Do all the stuff you need to do and then send it to them.
UK doctor registration - If it's a popular place you go to and getting in is hard, ask them if they can put you on "hold" so that they keep you as a registered patient and wont drop you as a patient.
UK dentist registration - Same as the doctors, especially if it's an NHS dentist.

MacGrizz

Thanks for that. I'll give my doc and dentist a buzz tomorrow. Do you have any idea what happens to National Insurance if I ever return? Having paid so much into this over the years, I'd hate to think I would get hammered at a later date.

Jerseygirl

Child Benefit....write to them. Despite doing this they kept depositing money in my UK bank account for years. In the end they asked for their money back.

Arizona Wurzel

If I were you I would keep paying in seeing you have paid for many years and if you decide to stay in the USA for good then you will be able to recieve payments from UK when you retire.If you dont keep payments up,then you will recieve a % when you retire.Notify Social Security at Long Benton,Newcastle on Tyne six months before you retire and have it direct deposit to your bank account.This is what me and the wife do.I think you only have to have 30 years in now to collect full benefits,I dont know what the age for retirement is now in UK,been gone thirty five years.Hope this helps.

BritishGuy36

Good point....I've been working for 21 years now....worth thinking about.

Bob

Another thing to consider, especially if you are staying for a few years, depending on the visa, you could have the SS tax deferred if you continue to pay NIC, or if you paid SS, with the tax treaty, that payment would be taken into account as payment to NIC...

lochdaz-of-blantyre

Folks...bit of advice for you all from my Dentist (NHS) wife...

a) if you get anything on repeat prescription...e.g. contraception, get a batch before you go, and if you can remain registered with a doctor here, get it repeated when you visit.
b) its not the dentist that will remove you from the NHS list it is the health board that processes payments for the forms, thus if no forms are processed for 3 years (In scotland, England times may be more or less) you'd be automatically de-registered.
c) get a minimum of a checkup during visits to get a form processed by the healthboard
d) get maximum treatment before you go (not so helpful since you leave on monday), Scotland limits this to a patient contribution to £384 so even if you needed every crown/filling in your head replaced this is the most you'd pay which I'm sure you'll agree is lots less than a US dentist would charge and in most cases is even less than the Excess/Deductable the insurance company would charge you.
e) its in the dentists/doctors interest to keep you on their lists as they get whats called capitation payments for every member on their list. Its very small but still...every patient counts.

Hope this helps some of you,
Daz

MsElui

you can ring child benefit and they can help on the phone (ie cancel it)

Anthony919

If you miss any NI contributions, the NI Contributions office keeps records of any shortfall for any and all tax years since you started working and can produce a report for you telling you what you owe, per tax year & cumulatively. You can then pay any amounts, if you want to.

For some tax years, the rate at which you must pay will go up after a certain cut-off date and for any tax years that are several years behind, you lose the ability to pay those years after a certain cut-off date.
The report will show you these dates, if they apply to you.

By the way, you will have a few years to pay any NI Contributions shortfall, so you don't need to worry for a while, unless you think there may already be some gaps in your payment history

You can call/write to them anytime to get figures for any tax years.

NI Contributions
Benton Park View
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE98 1NG

0191 225 5996 M-F 08:00-20:00 Sat: 08:00-16:00

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/individuals/t...nsurance.shtml

I'd like to wish you good luck with your move and wish you well for an exciting time ahead of you

IceBrit

Regarding child benefits, I rang them 4 times and each time I got a different answer. In the end I was told that they would continue to pay into my account for 4 weeks after leaving the country and then it would be cancelled.

I strongly advise that you make sure to cancel it as I know a few people who've had to re-pay them a big chunk of money in the end.

kins

I phoned the Child Benefit people and they stopped paying it pretty quickly.

It took the Tax Credit people slightly longer, so I'm expecting something asking for some money back at some point.

Re the NI pension payments, I got a leaflet about it recently and read it through. I think if you are self-employed you can carry on paying something like £2.20 a week, whereas if you're employed/unemployed then you have to pay more like £7 a week, to keep up your payments. Also if you live abroad then the pension that they will give you at retirement is frozen at the level it was at the day you left the country.

That was the impression I got, it was very confusing and others may well know more.

I plan to continue my NI pension payments so I filled in a form that I need to send off. I am self-employed but not sure what they'll want to see from me to prove that.

Jerseygirl

That happened to me...fortunately 6 yrs of child benefit payments were still in my UK bank account.

Arizona Wurzel

Also if you live abroad then the pension that they will give you at retirement is frozen at the level it was at the day you left the country.

This does not apply to the USA

kins

Oh good! Makes it possibly more worthwhile me making those payments.

I just read http://www.dwp.gov.uk/lifeevent/bene...sa33-oct05.pdf and it says

If you are ordinarily resident in the USA, UK State Pension is payable at the same rate as if you were living in the UK.