Your Tax Status on Leaving the UK
Short trips overseas on holiday or on business have no effect on your tax status. However, if you leave the UK to live abroad permanently, for 3 years or more or to work abroad full-time you will normally be considered to be not resident and not ordinarily resident from the day after you leave the UK so long as:
- You are absent from the UK for a complete tax year (6 April to 5 April)
- During the period of absence any visits to the UK total less than 183 days per tax year, and average less than 91 days per tax year (the average is taken over the period of absence up to a maximum of four years)
For visits to the UK, days of arrival and departure are not normally counted as days spent in the UK.
On departure from the UK we recommend that you ask the Inland Revenue for form P85, which should help determine your residency status. The completion of this form will also help support a claim for the early repayment of PAYE Income Tax - the personal allowance is offset against salaried income as the tax year progresses and so if you leave the UK part way through a tax year you should be entitled to the balance of your allowances, generating a tax repayment.
Further details may be obtained from your local Tax Office and in the Inland Revenue's leaflet IR138.
