Originally Posted by lotte14

Thanks Robin,
Wow - I'd have never have though of reporting an oyster card - its not issued by a financial organisation!
I guess some of the problem is that there appears to be a profitable online scare industry geared towards terrifying everyone about fbar and muddying the water. The IRS generally produces some pretty good literature explaining tax etc - but there seems to be an absence of really good material for 8938/fbar - even if it just debunked some of the grey areas.

Originally Posted by robin1234

you just check the box "I have over fifty accounts."

Originally Posted by fsm

Figure I should ask if anybody has experience in this, my father passed away at the age of 83 unexpectedly last year, my brother and sister are planning on selling his house later this year. Once the house is sold and the estate settled I will have more than $10,000 in a UK bank account, so at that point does that mean I have to file FBAR once I have the money? (Basically as soon as it gets paid into the account planning on transferring)

Also as I will want to transfer the money over here is it better to transfer it all at once or to transfer less than $10,000 at a time.

Originally Posted by Jerseygirl

Yes.

That's up to you but I would transfer it at a time when the exchange rate is beneficial...which it is not at present.

Edit...I would transfer it all in one transaction. Why would you want to send it $10K at a time?

Originally Posted by kodokan

Which I'm sure is basically checking the box "please audit me."

Originally Posted by lotte14

I have another tedious fbar/8938 question.
I have an Australian account where my interest is taxed in Australia at 10% before that interest gets added to my balance. So when finding the max amount do I look at the biggest number on my statement and then add the tax back that was taken off the interest? I was just finished with everything when I thought of this!!!!!

Originally Posted by kodokan

I take the instructions to mean literally the biggest number printed on a statement at any point during the year. Otherwise we'd all have to factor in imaginary virtual things, like the balance of pensions or mutual funds before the fees were deducted, or some such. As long as you're declaring the interest for US tax, I'd use the 'clean' number on the FBAR, etc.

Originally Posted by lotte14

I think I've slightly lost my mind filling in these forms and trying to think of every eventuality. Perhaps a G&T is called for!

Originally Posted by robin1234

It is your responsibility to declare the gross interest you received in bank interest. So, if you got £80 interest from a British building society savings account, you need to gross it up (£100 probably?), and enter that amount in dollars in your 1040 schedule B, just the same as if it was interest from a domestic US bank account. If your UK bank is on the ball, they know you are a U.S. Taxpayer and will be passing your account details on th the U.S. Treasury. If, for whatever reason, your British bank doesn't know you are a U.S. Taxpayer, you should tell them.

I recently opened a current account with a British bank, and as part of the process, had to declare that I was a U.S. Taxpayer, and I filled out a U.S. Form W9, I think it was...

Edited; OK, sorry, I think I totally misread your post! I believe the answer is, you need to fill in the foreign tax credit form, if you want the IRS to give you credit for foreign tax paid.

Originally Posted by MsElui

remember you may also have to declare any other accounts that you control - so not just checks or savings but PENSION funds, shareholdings and the like. We have multiple accounts that hold more than 6k in pension funds as both husband and i moved jobs several times in the uk before we came here.