UK Private Pension Withdrawal in OZ

[Hendo]

Hi

I am 61 and a dual national (UK/Aus)  and have a couple of Private Pensions in the UK from previous working, I am currently unemployed and planning to self fund retire or work part time, earlier this year I closed and withdrew the balance of one of my pension funds (not much 20k or so ) as it did not allow me to Draw Down from it and wasn't performing well. The money is sat in my UK bank account currently and as I was an Australian Tax Payer I claimed my Tax back that the Inland Revenue automatically stopped.

I now need to fill in my 2020 Oz tax forms and was wondering::

A)  Do I have to declare these as earnings as I am self funding retiree,not claiming anything at all atm?

B) I also have an Australian Super but did not draw the $10,000 Covid payment that was allowed earlier this year so can I offset some of the UK super for that?

[Guest The Pom Queen]

Hi @Hendo the best person to talk with would be @Andrew from Vista Financial

[Marisawright]

17 hours ago, Hendo said:

Hi

I am 61 and a dual national (UK/Aus)  and have a couple of Private Pensions in the UK from previous working, I am currently unemployed and planning to self fund retire or work part time, earlier this year I closed and withdrew the balance of one of my pension funds (not much 20k or so ) as it did not allow me to Draw Down from it and wasn't performing well. The money is sat in my UK bank account currently and as I was an Australian Tax Payer I claimed my Tax back that the Inland Revenue automatically stopped.

I now need to fill in my 2020 Oz tax forms and was wondering::

A)  Do I have to declare these as earnings as I am self funding retiree,not claiming anything at all atm?

B) I also have an Australian Super but did not draw the $10,000 Covid payment that was allowed earlier this year so can I offset some of the UK super for that?

It's unfortunate that you withdrew the money before getting advice from an expert.  Yres you do have to declare it and it will be taxed.   Your Australian super isn't relevant.  

[Ken]

On 07/10/2020 at 14:42, Hendo said:

Hi

I am 61 and a dual national (UK/Aus)  and have a couple of Private Pensions in the UK from previous working, I am currently unemployed and planning to self fund retire or work part time, earlier this year I closed and withdrew the balance of one of my pension funds (not much 20k or so ) as it did not allow me to Draw Down from it and wasn't performing well. The money is sat in my UK bank account currently and as I was an Australian Tax Payer I claimed my Tax back that the Inland Revenue automatically stopped.

I now need to fill in my 2020 Oz tax forms and was wondering::

A)  Do I have to declare these as earnings as I am self funding retiree,not claiming anything at all atm?

B) I also have an Australian Super but did not draw the $10,000 Covid payment that was allowed earlier this year so can I offset some of the UK super for that?

A) You have to declare some of those earnings. The part that doesn't need to be declared is the part that was earned before you became resident in Australia. Unfortunately that's not always an easy number to get to, but it is at least easier for a defined contribution policy that it is for a defined benefit policy. If you were able to obtain the value of your pension fund on the date you moved back to Australia (that presumably being the date you resumed Australian Tax Residency) it would be relatively straight forward because the taxable amount is the amount your fund grew from then to day it was paid into your UK bank account and the only complication would be the conversion to AUD. You are unlikely to have a statement on that date however, in which case it would need to be estimated by calculating from the values on dates that you do have.

Incidentally there is excellent communication between HMRC and the ATO. As soon as you claimed your tax back because of being an Australian Tax Payer HMRC will have notified the ATO. Don't go thinking that the ATO don't know about it because it's in your UK bank account. 

B) No, you can't offset that. If you didn't use it when (and if) you could it's gone and in any case it was only valid for Australian Super withdrawals.

[Hendo]

Thanks for the help Ken

Is it possible then to get statements of past performance easily?  I have written to the relevant Pension Fund to try and get a statement of performance for the last 15 years (how long I have been here) as unfortunately through moving etc past statements have been lost.  Wondered if there was a short cut as I only have a week left to complete my tax return to finding out past past pension performances through the years.

[Ken]

On 22/10/2020 at 14:03, Hendo said:

Thanks for the help Ken

Is it possible then to get statements of past performance easily?  I have written to the relevant Pension Fund to try and get a statement of performance for the last 15 years (how long I have been here) as unfortunately through moving etc past statements have been lost.  Wondered if there was a short cut as I only have a week left to complete my tax return to finding out past past pension performances through the years.

Some funds are better than others at the provision of information, but no, it's not very easy - especially as most still like to send the information by post and even if they are willing to set you up with online access will need to post you a password to get you started. Technically it's the past fund balances that you want rather than the statement of performance - although obviously the two are closely connected once you stop paying in to a fund. Those fund managers that do give online access often provide very little history.

Appointing a tax agent will extend your lodgement deadline.

Edited October 23, 2020 by Ken