So you want to move back home to UK

[Marisawright]

LR - yes and yes. So agree.

Janlo too - yes we are truly stuck. I just worry hugely that our youngest wants to leave Oz and doesn't want to stay here. She was 18mths when we came over but knows Brighton (UK) like the back of her hand and has a deep connection to friends and family there. Our middle girl is 23 and finishing a teaching degree, she could travel anywhere and also wants to live at least three years in UK. i suspect then she'd stay. She has a real problem with the attitudes of just about every 20+ Aussie boy shes met. Our eldest is in a stable relationship with an Australian boy of Maltese/Kenyan parents. He hankers after Europe and has travelled there. Has family in Malta. She is the one we worry about as she'd not cope with us not being around. If we went back it'd destroy her to stay here.

 

On top of that we moved our teachers pension over here two yrs ago (and we had to pay ATO $15000 each as it was classified as income !!) Its performing well but we reckon we'd have to pay massive tax on it to take it out of Oz again. All extra research we'd need to do.

 

 

I'm not a tax expert but I've been told, if you cash out your super and move it to the UK in a lump sum, it's not classed as income so you wouldn't pay any tax on it. I don't see how the history of the account (i.e. where the money came from) would make any difference. I do hope that's right!

 

If you keep your super in Australia and draw down on it gradually, or as a pension, then it is treated as a income and taxed in the UK.

[Bound4Tassie]

I think it is really valuable for potential migrants to read the experiences of people who have decided to move back. It's not being negative- it may help to consider things that you hadn't already thought of. I think too many emigrate having never even visited and only on the basis of a perceived image of Aus. If all you have looked at is promotional literature and Wanted Down Under, it's not exactly the whole picture. Some people may well have done all the research/ reccies then still decide after a while in Aus it's not right for them. Fair enough I say but at least if you've considered some of the downsides it might not be such a shock/ feeling of failure if it doesn't work out for you.

[Quoll]

I think it is really valuable for potential migrants to read the experiences of people who have decided to move back. It's not being negative- it may help to consider things that you hadn't already thought of. I think too many emigrate having never even visited and only on the basis of a perceived image of Aus. If all you have looked at is promotional literature and Wanted Down Under, it's not exactly the whole picture. Some people may well have done all the research/ reccies then still decide after a while in Aus it's not right for them. Fair enough I say but at least if you've considered some of the downsides it might not be such a shock/ feeling of failure if it doesn't work out for you.

 

Hopefully it might give some of them the courage to say nah, I don't get it, this isn't for me! I think a lot of us went for years having those feelings but fearing we were the only ones in the world to have them, ergo we must be bonkers or something! I can't tell you how liberating was that lightbulb moment when I saw that I wasn't Robinson Crusoe, I didn't have to keep my lip zipped for fear of offending anyone, I could be true to myself and not have to live every day in a kind of half life limbo. So if new migrants learn that it's OK not to like it if they really don't and that they don't have to keep bashing their head against the wall in the hope that maybe one day they will like it, then they will have learned a valuable lesson! Other than that, a warning or two so that they may develop a Plan B in case Plan A goes tits up is usually a useful exercise as well. I often think there are too many Unicorns and Magic Koalas in a lot of Plan As!

[Petals]

My concerns for anyone really these days is the changes in pensions and the fact that Australia has made it quite difficult now. If people do want to return then they really need to do it in time to give themselves time back in the UK to build again. To obtain a pension or part pension on retirement in Aus now you have to be resident in the country when you claim it. You cannot leave at fifty say and then try to gain a pension for all the years you lived in Aus, it just does not happen now. With the extended retirement age this will make things a lot worse for anyone intending on heading back to UK when they are older.

 

A lot to think about in migration these days and it really can be burning bridges to afford to live when you people are older.

 

When we are young we think its a long way off, but the planning needs to start when we are young now, attitudes to old age pensions being available to all are rapidly changing in the western world.

 

Aus expects us to get a pension from any country that we have worked in for even a short time. I worked in NZ when I was young and I had to get a pension from NZ so they could reduce my pension. My friend gets her British one, Civil service UK one and her oh gets a Canadian one and British one etc so its very complicated and these overseas pensions that are provided to us are fixed they never increase.

 

Also in Aus pensions are asset based and not a right so you need to know all about it. After my oh died I no longer get a pension due to assets. So there is a lot to think about not just moving and bringing the kids, its about planning life these days.

 

Thank goodness I was young when I was life was a lot simpler and we have definitely been the lucky ones us Baby Boomers, not sure that luck will be around for our young in the future.

[Katie22]

I think of course you need to be sensible and think of the financial aspects when moving back but also have to be careful too that by doing so you don't end up on missed opportunities. Life can be unpredictable, happy one day then who knows what tomorrow brings. A good friend of mine was very financially astute and stopped herself visiting her family overseas as she'd do it when she "retired" or "had more time", she also stayed in a job she hated because of the long service leave and sick leave she'd accumulated. She became ill unexpectedly and died last Christmas years before her retirement or achieving those things she so dearly wanted to.

 

I know I'm rambling but what I'm trying to say is we only have one life to live and don't get the chance to come back and have another go at it, be sensible but not so much that you end up being unfulfilled and unhappy.

[ramot]

My concerns for anyone really these days is the changes in pensions and the fact that Australia has made it quite difficult now. If people do want to return then they really need to do it in time to give themselves time back in the UK to build again. To obtain a pension or part pension on retirement in Aus now you have to be resident in the country when you claim it. You cannot leave at fifty say and then try to gain a pension for all the years you lived in Aus, it just does not happen now. With the extended retirement age this will make things a lot worse for anyone intending on heading back to UK when they are older.

 

A lot to think about in migration these days and it really can be burning bridges to afford to live when you people are older.

 

When we are young we think its a long way off, but the planning needs to start when we are young now, attitudes to old age pensions being available to all are rapidly changing in the western world.

 

Aus expects us to get a pension from any country that we have worked in for even a short time. I worked in NZ when I was young and I had to get a pension from NZ so they could reduce my pension. My friend gets her British one, Civil service UK one and her oh gets a Canadian one and British one etc so its very complicated and these overseas pensions that are provided to us are fixed they never increase.

 

Also in Aus pensions are asset based and not a right so you need to know all about it. After my oh died I no longer get a pension due to assets. So there is a lot to think about not just moving and bringing the kids, its about planning life these days.

 

Thank goodness I was young when I was life was a lot simpler and we have definitely been the lucky ones us Baby Boomers, not sure that luck will be around for our young in the future.

 

just want to mention that although the UK state pension is frozen, all our other UK pensions are index linked, so go up annually.

we make sure when we go back every year to get the state pension increased for the duration of the visit, just to make the point.

[Petals]

just want to mention that although the UK state pension is frozen, all our other UK pensions are index linked, so go up annually.

we make sure when we go back every year to get the state pension increased for the duration of the visit, just to make the point.

 

Guess you can do that if you have an address in UK but a lot of us do not and it only reduces people's Centrelink. If you receive Centrelink and do not tell them then believe me they have ways of finding out even though there is no agreement signed between countries presently. Also have to tell Centrelink when you go away and how long you are away for at a time and as I said before they remove those payments whilst people are overseas.

 

Originally I never told them about my overseas pensions as did not think about it, however one day a letter arrives telling me that I had to get this pension from UK and another from NZ. Amazing really, computers are wonderful things when linked.

[ramot]

Guess you can do that if you have an address in UK but a lot of us do not and it only reduces people's Centrelink. If you receive Centrelink and do not tell them then believe me they have ways of finding out even though there is no agreement signed between countries presently. Also have to tell Centrelink when you go away and how long you are away for at a time and as I said before they remove those payments whilst people are overseas.

 

Originally I never told them about my overseas pensions as did not think about it, however one day a letter arrives telling me that I had to get this pension from UK and another from NZ. Amazing really, computers are wonderful things when linked.

 

Sorry we are in a different position as on long term temporary retirement visa here. Didn't mean to confuse, was only mentioning that our UK pensions apart from the state one are index linked not frozen.

again sorry didn't mean to confuse any one