Off-shore pension

[ace00]

The info can be found under QROPS (Qualifying recognised overseas pension schemes).

hope this helps a bit.

Hi,

Yes, thanks, I am looking at QROPS now.

[glashIFA@Paramount]

Cheers - it's all very confusing isn't it?

It would be great if there was an IFA out there worth the name. Usually you end up telling them about finance, you know:
IFA Well you need to pay off your credit card debt and.....
Me: What if my card is 0%
IFA: Well debt is bad
Me: But due to time value of money I'm actually profiting from this
IFA: .......?.........Lets talk about pensions....
etc...

Not surprised IFAs azre reluctant to post on here given the slating they normally receive "commisssion hungry salesman, only recommend whats good for them", don't need IFAs to help with investments - a good tracker fund will do it (not at the moment!)"
Still, so that you don't tar all IFAs with the same brush, lets see if i can clarify some issues for you.
Starting point - tax relief is available on contributions providing that they are from "relevant UK earnings", such as:-
Profits from self-employment derived from a trade, profession or vocation.
Employment income that is chargeable to tax.
Any part of a redundancy payment above £30k
PHI payments paid by the employer whiulst the individual is still in employment
Profit related pay
Patent rights treated as earned income..........and a few more besides.

It is important to note that where any relevant UK earnings are not taxable in the UK due to a double taxation agreement, those earnings are treated as not being chargeable to income tax and so will not count towards the annual limit for relief on pension contributions. As a result, no tax relief will be given on any pension contributions paid in this instance.
From 6th April 2006 the rules for transferring a UK pension benefit overseas are generally speaking a lot simpler than they used to be. The info can be found under QROPS (Qualifying recognised overseas pension schemes).

hope this helps a bit.

[ace00]

Cheers - it's all very confusing isn't it?

It would be great if there was an IFA out there worth the name. Usually you end up telling them about finance, you know:
IFA Well you need to pay off your credit card debt and.....
Me: What if my card is 0%
IFA: Well debt is bad
Me: But due to time value of money I'm actually profiting from this
IFA: .......?.........Lets talk about pensions....
etc...

[expat]

If you are interested in the tax-privileged nature of saving in a pension, do remember that it is pointless to have the country where the pension is held agree not to tax income on it, if your country of tax residence then fails to agree that.

E.g. if you had a pension in Switzerland and kept it there while later living in the UK, you would be obliged to declare the income (including interest income rolled up in it), and the UK might not agree to refrain from taxing that income.

[meridian]

I'm a British citizen, currently tax resident in a high tax country on a temporary contract (but longer than 6 months).
I'm not expatriated, hasn't been worth my while so far, but I have been mostly out of the UK for some years. I have no problem to officially expatriate.
I am paid from a low tax country. I wish to retire to a low tax country. I wish to avoid UK system as it is simply not required. So I would like the company that pays me to pay me a significant monthly pension offshore .
Hope that makes sense!

Hmmm, you raise an interesting question. May I ask which high-tax country you're resident in?

If it's the UK, you can probably still get full tax relief on any pension contributions anyway. Other countries will have different rules on pension contributions and limits for deductibility.

IANAA...

[ace00]

[QUOTE=meridian;559909][QUOTE=IR35 Avoider;559744]A pension is really a tax-privileged savings scheme, so I suppose whether an off-shore pension makes any sense depends on which countries tax regime you are trying to avoid.

evade

If the OP is British tax resident and domiciled then he/she will need to declare that income. Of course, there's nothing in the original post that explicitly states that the income will not be declared, but the implication is there.

To the OP: a pension is just a fancy tax wrapper with specific rules, like ISAs etc. As IR35 Avoider stated, it depends on what tax you're trying to avoid/evade - the initial hit on income? The DIRT on interest/dividends? The final annuity?
Or maybe we're barking up the wrong tree and you just want a fund that may outperform UK based funds, or you just don't want to bring Euoros/Dollars/whatever back to the UK because of the exchange rate.....

I'm a British citizen, currently tax resident in a high tax country on a temporary contract (but longer than 6 months).
I'm not expatriated, hasn't been worth my while so far, but I have been mostly out of the UK for some years. I have no problem to officially expatriate.
I am paid from a low tax country. I wish to retire to a low tax country. I wish to avoid UK system as it is simply not required. So I would like the company that pays me to pay me a significant monthly pension offshore .
Hope that makes sense!

[meridian]

[QUOTE=IR35 Avoider;559744]A pension is really a tax-privileged savings scheme, so I suppose whether an off-shore pension makes any sense depends on which countries tax regime you are trying to avoid.[QUOTE]
evade

If the OP is British tax resident and domiciled then he/she will need to declare that income. Of course, there's nothing in the original post that explicitly states that the income will not be declared, but the implication is there.

To the OP: a pension is just a fancy tax wrapper with specific rules, like ISAs etc. As IR35 Avoider stated, it depends on what tax you're trying to avoid/evade - the initial hit on income? The DIRT on interest/dividends? The final annuity?
Or maybe we're barking up the wrong tree and you just want a fund that may outperform UK based funds, or you just don't want to bring Euoros/Dollars/whatever back to the UK because of the exchange rate.....

[IR35 Avoider]

I think major British companies like Standard Life and Prudential do offer off-shore products in the channel islands, and of course other companies offer products there as well. The information I've come across seems to indicate that charges are much higher than in the bigger and more competitive UK market, and depending where you live when you take your pension you may not even pay any less tax. (Having said that, I think there can be an option to take all your money as a lump sum, which depending where you are tax-resident at the time could be advantageous, so it might be worth looking into.)

A pension is really a tax-privileged savings scheme, so I suppose whether an off-shore pension makes any sense depends on which countries tax regime you are trying to avoid.

If the money doesn't otherwise have to be taxed as salary (in any country) then there may not be much to be gained from putting it in a pension.

[ace00]

Hi,

I've taken a look through the posts but have not found a direct answer to a specific point - can anyone recommend an off-shore pension fund provider?
What I would like to do is have money earned outside of the UK be paid by my employer based outside of the UK to my account based off-shore. I would like this to be a pension / investment fund. Does a specific off-shore pension product exist or would I just be investing in an off-shore deposit account / unit trust?
Any recomendations appreciated.