RELOCATION BLOG
Do You Have to Pay Tax?
When renting a residential property in the UK, the tenant must pay Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) if the rent is over a certain rental amount in England and Northern Ireland, Land and Buildings Transaction Tax (LBTT) in Scotland, or Land Transaction Tax (LTT) in Wales (as of 1st April 2018).
The value thresholds are £125,000 in England and Northern Ireland, £145,000 in Scotland, and £180,000 in Wales (as of 1st April 2018).
Are you relocating employees to the UK? Here we try to make the subject of relocation taxation a little clearer for you to understand.
If your organisation is considering relocating an employee to the UK or is already contributing towards employee relocation costs, the organisation will incur certain tax, National Insurance and reporting obligations, so you need to be aware of which relocation costs incur tax and what needs to be reported to HMRC.
The Government adverts tell us that "tax needn't be taxing". Well it is and UK domestic employee relocation costs are no exception. The subject of tax is almost as confusing as the British electorate but here we will try to make the subject a little clearer to understand.
If your organisation contributes towards employee relocation costs, the organisation has certain tax, National Insurance and reporting obligations, so you need to be aware of which relocation costs incur tax and what needs to be reported to HMRC. In terms of the technicalities of reporting, you can very happily leave that to your accounts department to deal with.
There has been much coverage in the press of late about the challenges many employers across a range of industries face when trying to recruit skilled workers locally. What effects can this have on a business and are there any solutions?
Skill shortages can cause noticeable problems within an organisation, affecting productivity and growth, delaying or cancelling projects, creating continuous gaps in the team and subsequently endless recruitment programmes...
Landlords rather than tenants are to be liable for the costs of letting a property.
In his first Autumn Statement under May's government, Philip Hammond said, "We’ve seen these fees spiral despite attempts to regulate them." He went on to say that, "Landlords appoint letting agents and landlords should meet their fees."
This has caused a bit of stir for various reasons and the debate will continue long after the legislation is implemented, but what are the implications of this for tenants?
In the UK, most tenancies are created when both parties to the agreement, the landlord and the tenant, sign a tenancy agreement before the start of the tenancy.
However, there are some instances where a tenancy agreement does not exist, for various reasons. We recently helped a customer who relocated to the UK and found a property to rent from a private landlord who had chosen not to use the services of a letting agent in order to save a few quid. We wold usually only recommend taking a property through a letting agent but due to a dire lack of availability in the area, the customer had little choice.
Move quickly. Do not dawdle as though you have all the time in the world, even if you have got all the time in the world. You need to keep up with the pedestrian traffic, otherwise you will find people knocking into you or shouting at you to get a move on. Stuff needs to happen and the world needs to be saved and if I miss this train the next one could be a whole two minutes away. Don't be the obstruction to salvation.
Of course, you all know we are a ridiculously, almost eye-wateringly, polite nation of people. If ever there is an opportunity to say, "please", "thank you", or "sorry", then we are there - whether or not we've had an invitation. So it seems all the more discourteous when some people choose not to follow the "rules". Oh yes, the rules, unwritten as they may be, are as valid as the statutes which form our legal system.
Relocating to the UK? No, UK investment is not all about London. While London may arguably be the largest and oldest financial services centre in the modern world, many financial services businesses are choosing to locate their business in other regions of the UK.
These regions within the UK have developed, and continue to expand, their own large-scale capacity to provide such services. But does everyone know about this?
For those of you considering relocating to the UK, this provides information about the UK rental market, types of housing available, and utility and media information.
Please note that there is a lot of legislation involved in the UK lettings market, most of which is very out of date and inadequate, so be sure to speak to a property expert before you sign a tenancy agreement or hand over any money. Our Front Office Consultants and Personal Coordinators have a two-step validation process to make sure all tenancy agreements are legal and suitable for the tenant
Once you have decided your organisation is going to relocate an employee, your first concern should be immigration. Until your company and your employee has immigration clearance, your project cannot proceed at maximum potential. You should be aware of the costs, and, perhaps more importantly, the timelines, which do vary from country to country.
The sooner you start the immigration process, the sooner you can get your employee(s) on the ground in the destination location to fully advance the project.
To help you along, here is a brief overview of the UK immigration process. Watch this space as we will post some more of these shortly.
There are many times when we are in need of a good letting agent, but not all letting agents provide the same level of service, so it will be up to you to decide whether it is worth your time dealing with the difficult ones. You may not have a choice depending on the size of the market you’re going for, but for the most part you should keep a few things in mind no matter what agent you’re working with:
UK immigration law is a complex field of rules and regulations which can be difficult to interpret.
Equally as difficult to interpret are the acronyms and terminology used when dealing with UK immigration departments, representatives or application forms.
This handy glossary will help you to decipher your entry clearance from your leave to remain, and your PBS from your ILR.
1. We love the middle lane of the motorway
Our road sense is so bad in Britain that the Government produced a set of guidelines - The Highway Code, which applies to England, Scotland and Wales.
Many of the rules in the Code are legal requirements, and if you disobey these rules you are committing a criminal offence.
Welcome to our third instalment in our "about Britain" series. For the uninitiated, Britain can appear to be a pretty odd place. We have odd habits, odd food, odd weather, odd taps and an even odder sense of humour. It's nothing that a good bout of cultural training can't sort out, but I'm going to run a series of posts about what makes the Brits so wonderfully weird - or weirdly wonderful - which may help our non-indigenous friends to understand what the heck we are all about.
Although our winters can be (i.e. tend to be) wet and windy or cold and hostile, they can also be very beautiful, and a great opportunity to get out and about and enjoy our countryside. Colourful autumn leaves, crisp, sunny days or wet and wild weather all make wonderful settings for some mood-boosting exercise alone or with friends and family.
The Scottish rate of Income Tax (SRIT), introduced by the Scotland Act 2012, gives the Scottish Parliament the power to set a Scottish rate of income tax and to raise taxes on land transactions. The SRIT will be charged on the non-savings and non-dividend income of those defined as Scottish taxpayers and will start from April 2016.
A survey of people who had failed to secure a mortgage last year suggests that many are failing to do the basic research needed to get proper control of their finances:
Official figures have measured new record highs (I know, it is hard to believe we are hearing this again...) for average house prices in the UK, with growth of 6.1% over the past year. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) measured a jump of £1,000 in the typical cost of a property between August and September. It left the average price at a new peak of £286,000.
This may be "good news" for the property industry, but it's not so great for home buyers, especially first-time buyers who traditionally drive the market.
