Korean Job Discussion Forums

[newintown]

i naively thought not only would i be precluded from paying tax on my year abroad, but i might receive some back given i will not work the full tax year (april-april) at home. not a chance.
my boyf met with an IR inspector before our departure who advised that we would be required to declare our earnings on our return, and then pay tax owed for that year. JOKE. so, we're just going to say we have been travelling for a year, theres no way i'm paying tax twice to fund the underclass scumbags of my home country, when every man & his dog work their asses off in korea. the work ethic here is commendable.
ANYWAY....
what i want to check is, if i send money home to UK bank, is it possible for my earnings to be traced, and therefore the tax man catch up with me eventually?
(sorry if this is stupes question, i am rubbish with these matters)

[the saint]

to solve having to pay tax inthe UK you must be resident abroad for a certain number of days in any one given tax year. I forget what it is but it's somewhere over 200 I'm pretty sure. Sounds like you'd qualify. What you need to do is file a tax return yourself and get the supplement for non-residency.

However, there are countries which do not have a reciprocal agreement with the UK for tax and then you may well be taxed double. This does not apply to Korea though. The agreement is reciprocal as far as I know.

In the future, you might want to consider filling in a non-resident status tax exemption form before you leave the UK to make the situation watertight. For the first three years I was abroad I hadn't done this. As a result, while one tax office was saying I was high and dry, another was sending me tax forms and telling me to declare income. i knew this was wrong and insisted so. I turned out to be right and they realised they didn't know their a** from their elbow.

The tax monster is a big beast... but I'd bet that you don't actually need to pay tax but they don't know that. You may well have to pay to avoid a penalty and then claim it back... all the best

[the saint]

Sorry... I realised I didn't really address your basic question. If you do send money back to the UK, I don't see how you can avoid being traced. The bank would be required by law to submit details of its transfers surely. Might be a case of simply and humbly rending unto Caesar...

[newintown]

thanks thats helpful. i was pretty sure the tax inspector was talking out of his ass. do banks really declare all deposits made then? i'm not talking about sending home hundreds of thousands, just enough to clear my overdraft & CC's. would their attention really be drawn to that?

[mrsquirrel]

Since the 9-11 business the amount that banks have to flag is a lot lower.

I think it used to be 5000 pounds and now it's 2000 - I could be wrong.

Large transfers coming in they need to check their source.

Even if you have an offshore account with the likes of HSBC in Jersey you will still be flagged.

I don't know if they have to report it to the tax-man though. I think if it happens repeatedly they do.

Not sure 100%. I know my ISA savings account was flagged a few years ago when I was putting money in and out of it in cash. My mate who worked at the bank said there had been a note put onto the account about my cash deposits. Anymore and they would start following them up.

I was buying and selling cars btw.

[newintown]

thanks for the advice. i will look into it properly.
it doesn't help when employees of the inland revenue don't actually know what they're talking about. similair to the student loans company in that respect.
i wish i wasn't such an idiot. financial matters really break my balls.