Bridgeman

My spouse contacted Teachers Pension and they sent him details of his personal contributions.  He then filled in a form D11 Deductible amount of undeducted purchase price of a foreign pension or annuity (which you can find on the ATO website).  He sent this off to the ATO and they told him how much he could claim as UPP.

21 hours ago, InnerVoice said:

Sorry to hear that and I agree, it's very inconvenient. My wife had a Barclays current account and I had a Barclaycard, so they've just gone down the swanny. Fortunately I've several other UK bank accounts to fall back on. My wife thinks I have some kind of money laundering operation going on but I just took advantage of all those deals they were doing 10-15 years ago, when they were throwing money at you to open a current account, or switch. Anyway, that doesn't help you much but here's a couple of ideas...

You could try switching your Barclays account to another UK bank via the USwitch website. They don't specify that you need to be a UK resident and I guess it will depend on whether it's permitted by the bank you want to switch to, but at least you have a regular income, which is usually the main hurdle when it comes to opening a new current account. Worth a try.

https://www.uswitch.com/current-accounts/#current-account-deals

An alternative, as Marisa mentioned, is to use Wise. I've been using them for over 5 years and their service has been excellent to date. They provide you with a UK account number and sort code that you can make payments from and to. You can also have your salary or pension paid into the same account, which gets over the problem of needing a UK bank account to receive private pension payments. Once the money is in your Wise account, you can transfer it directly to your Australian bank account (transfer fees apply). Hope this helps.

Thanks for that.  Good to know.

I am with another bank in the UK and hope they won't follow suit as I have various UK pensions paid in as I prefer to have control over when I bring the money over to my Australian account.

.  The UK state pension isn't a problem as you say, it can be paid direct into an Australian account but I have a couple of other private pensions which will not pay into a foreign bank account.  I would be interested in any suggestions.

The vaccination rollout is being controlled by the GPs and the capacity they can cope with. Getting vaccinated is not as easy as the government are making out. It's alright opening up the progamme to over 40s in Victoria, but just look what happened.  You need to get all your ducks in a row before you make announcements.  My friend, just under 70, contacted her local medical centre recently, only to he told, oh we can't take your booking as we are still vaccinating 80 year olds.   They also don't like you going to another medical centre.  Another friend tried this and was given short shrift.  Incidentally we don't have large vaccination centres here in Queensland, walk up or otherwise.  

However, I do think that without a high vaccination rate, we are just sitting ducks here in Australia if there is an outbreak that cannot be contained.  Also, getting vaccinated protects not only yourself but helps prevent you spreading it to other people.  It doesn't really make sense to be complaining about borders not opening unless you are willing to get vaccinated as until there is a high level of vaccination, it's unlikely to happen.

3 hours ago, bobo123 said:

Hi everyone,

I am preparing to apply for 143 for my parents.

Just checking if I could apply for them here in Australia by sending the application to any of the Australian offices? or does it have to be from the country where applicant is currently residing ?

Thanks 

If you read all the information about this visa on the home affairs website you will see that the application can be submitted from inside Australia.  If you look at the actual application form you will see that the application needs to be sent to the Perth office.  It might a good idea to read everything through before you start the application.

There's nothing to prevent you submitting/posting the application while you are in Australia, but you won't get a bridging visa when your visitor visa expires.  You will need to be offshore when the visa is granted.

On 31/07/2020 at 14:18, dady dady said:

hi there dose any one  help me with this question  pls do we have to fill 2 separate form for mom n dad like  47PA Form and form 40 or

47PA ONE FORM FOR BOTH ?

FORM 40 ONE FOR BOTH ?

OR EACH ONE FOR BOTH 

PLS NEED HELP 

THANKYOU AND STAY SAFE 

You need to find the forms and read all the notes before you start.  The information you need is right there in the notes.  It says the form covers a family unit.  You will find help on here, but you do need to do the groundwork yourself.

The notes are at the bottom of the fees table.  You just need to scroll down.

As the 143 is an offshore visa, they would not get a bridging visa to allow them to stay in Australia.  They would have to leave when their visitor visa expired

1 hour ago, Fisher1 said:

Actually it’s happened before - we had a Christmas 2018 card from my neice that turned up in JUNE 2019.  The good news is, I’ve finally had an email from the UK passport office to say that my passport is on it’s way. It hasn’t arrived of course, but at least I know they’ve sent it. I was a bit bemused when they emailed to tell me my application for a new passport had been accepted ... I had hoped there was no doubt about that part!

 

Can I ask when you sent off your application?  I need to renew mine but the website is saying not to apply unless you need to travel urgently.

I need to renew my UK passport but have been reluctant to do so due to the long delays in the post and the possibility it might go astray.  I got the photos done just before lockdown.

A couple of months back I posted a query about renewal of UK passports which had expired.  I got my photos done and then Covid19 happened so I haven't as yet put in the application.  I am assuming that the process may take longer in the current circumstances but am just wondering if anyone has actually applied during the current circumstances and how long it took.  I don't want to have to get photos redone.  The website just says it is taking longer.

Well fortunately my postal vote arrived on Friday just in time.  Although they said it was 'safe' to go, and that there was social distancing, maybe inside but I saw pictures of long queues outside the prepolling stations and guess what, people lined up one after the other, no social distancing there. There was no way I was going to go and queue up with them.   I since heard that they are going to waive fines for over 70s.  It would be interesting to hear whether there is a big jump in cases now.

No, apparently not.  They have been given the powers to cancel if they want but they don't seem inclined to.

43 minutes ago, LindaH27 said:

People on 143 are not eligible for benefits for 10 years. It’s one of the conditions for the visa. I’m not sure  about the government stimulus but I believe that if you did manage to get any other  financial help from Centrelink  they would recover  it from the sponsors AOS  bond, which is normally refundable after 10 years. 

That's not quite true, it's only the pension you have to wait 10 years for.   You can access benefits same as all other visa holders, used to be after 2 years now I think it may have been extended to 4.  They are also looking at waiving this for new visa holders so watch the news.

Just that.  We are being told to observe social distancing, yet they are asking us to go and mix with a load of strangers, just to put a cross on a bit of paper.  This is madness.  I did apply for a postal vote, but so far nothing has arrived yet.  I am an older person, not going out at the moment but yet am expected to turn out to vote.  Meanwhile New Zealand is in total lockdown.  What's wrong with out policiticians?

Thanks for that,  that's reassuring.  Just hope Brexit doesn't cause all the rules to change now.   Hoping the CV will all be sorted before next January.

Does anyone know how long your UK passport can be expired and still renew it?  My UK passport expires this month and I am concerned about sending it back to the UK with supporting documents as I know there aren't many planes flying.    I would rather wait till after the Coronavirus is over and things are a bit more back to normal (hopefully) .

4 hours ago, Alan Collett said:

Once you have permanent residency and are living in Australia UK pension income IS taxable income in Australia.

Indeed, IMHO it is a more secure and regular source of income that that of a salaried employee.

The banks are most bewildering organisations ...

Best regards.

Thanks Alan, exactly, I agree.

10 hours ago, SusieRoo said:

I’m not sure if it’s a credit card or just a debit card (savings) you need, but we discovered Transferwise a few years ago. I would highly recommend their debit card linked to virtual bank accounts. Especially good for converting currency with a super easy to use app on your phone and you can have your income paid in from any country.

Yes I have a debit card. I found that in order to be able to hire a car when travelling they will only accept a credit card, so this is the reason I wanted one.  Also you get extra protection when buying stuff online and booking airline tickets etc.

9 hours ago, ramot said:

I should have added, that we already live in Australia and have an account with the Commonwealth bank, and cards in both names, so it has never crossed my mind that there might be a problem I Hope a long way away, retaining mine should my husband die?

The card was in my husband's name.  Apparently you have to have a taxable Australian income to be eligible to apply.  I have found one card, Virgin which will consider overseas pensions, but have read some bad reviews.

8 hours ago, Pertenhall said:

Has anyone had a problem in applying for a credit card once you are in Australia?  We have been banking with Westpac for over 4 years and have just tried to get a credit card with them.  We were so used to using our credit card for monthly shopping in the UK, paying the balance off each month and would have liked to continue that way now that we are here in Australia.  We were very disappointed that Westpac didn’t even want to know what our income from our UK pensions was (I have a very good state pension and hubby has state pension plus military pension plus work based pension, all very good).  The reply we got was that we needed to have an Australian taxable income.  We confirmed with them that we are registered for tax in Australia and that all our UK pensions were liable to Australian tax.  Their reply “I have double checked this with our credit team today and they have confirmed that we cannot accept only UK Pensions as a sole income to support a credit card application. Our current policy will not allow it. We would need you to be drawing a Australian pension as well for the UK pensions to be able to be used.”  We will try other financial establishments but did just wonder if anyone else has come up against this problem.  We are fully retired so won’t be able to get an Australian work based pension and won’t be eligible for an Australian state pension for another 9 years and even then because of our income from UK pensions and assets this will probably be close to zero.

Yes, I have had the same problem with NAB bank.  I don't understand it as we had a card which my husband applied for 5 years ago with only UK pension income.  My husband recently passed away and I applied for a card in my name, and even though I have roughly the same income, including an Australian super, I was told they could not consider my UK income, even though I was able to provide UK bank statements and proof of transferring monthly to my NAB bank account.

20 hours ago, Paul1Perth said:

If your UK investments were doing so well and you knew them why move to Aussie ones? With the internet you can invest in anything anywhere.

 

Actually, you can't.  You can't open a savings account in the UK for example unless you are resident there.  Also Australia doesn't like anyone to invest their money out of the country.   I tried to open an investment in the Channel Islands, only to be told by them that I couldn't as I was resident in Australia and Australia doesn't allow it.

It would be nice if they would backdate the increase to when we moved over to Australia and give us back the money they have stolen from us.

I actually contacted the DVLA in the UK and this was their response:

'It may help if I explain that you may drive in GB on your UK issued licence, however we would be unable to process a new licence for you as you are not currently resident in the UK.'

So it  seems my UK licence is valid to drive in the UK, so why would the car hire insurance not be valid?