Gary C

I agree the OP's comments about entitlement. S178 ITEPA 2003 states that "The taxable pension income for a tax year is the full amount of the pension, benefit or allowance accruing in that year irrespective of when any amount is actually paid." The state pension is a weekly benefit, normally paid 4-weekly paid in arrears, even though entitlement arises on each week end-date within those 4 weeks. That surely means that if one receives a 4-weekly payment on, say, 10 April 2024, when the pension increase date was on, say, 8 April, then that payment includes entitlement to 3 weeks relating to 2022/23 tax year and 1 week (week ending 10 April) during 2023/24 at the rate applicable to 2023. The first week's entitlement at the 2024 pension rate would be week commencing 11 April, so ending on 17 April. This means that when calculating entitlement for tax return purposes, one must surely use 1 week at the old rate and 51 weeks at the rate for the year in question. This appears to be how Tax Codes are calculated, so why is it that Tax Returns are not pre-populated in the same way? The final sentence of EIM76005 would seem to support this. If you search this forum there is massive confusion on both sides and calling your helplines is equally frustrating. Calling DWP is even less rewarding. Isn't it time that HMRC and DWP worked together to give taxpayers certainty over the taxable amount of their state pension in the form of a statement on the annual increase letter telling people their taxable amount for the preceding tax year was £X, i.e. something broadly similar to a P60?

To answer their question, surely the state pension will be taxable only in Italy and the LA pension will be taxable only in the UK unless Jif100 Milan has Italian citizenship?

Surely, if the person is not UK resident, i.e. resident in Germany, then they will be taxed on their worldwide income by Germany, subject to the DTA changing who gets the tax. UK Domicile is not relevant, or have I missed somehting?

HMRC Admins, I am confused. Robert S has indicated that he is not resident in the UK - he is resident and working in Germany, so tax resident there and taxed, as you would expect, by Germany on his German salary and other worldwide income, subject to the DTA between the UK and Germany. Surely, the only time he needs to even consider a UK tax return is if he has UK-source income that is not exempted by the DTA between the UK and Germany, e.g. UK property rental income. Are you and he talking at cross-purposes?

JanetTootill, I am a little confused. I searched BR1 and that relates to the old state pension for those reaching pension age before 6 April 2016. When I claimed my German pension a couple of years ago, DWP sent me (and others I know who have recently claimed their foreign pensions as UK residents) form CFN901 and routed that information to Germany (or whichever other EU country is relevant). You cannot download the CFN901. I think a call to DWP may be helpful to clarify the position for you. They will either say the BR1 can be used, or will pop a CFN901 in the post to you. It is not long - only about 8 pages of personal info and info about where you have worked and which bank account the pension should be paid into... I am not sure why you mention the non-EU/EEA form as you won't need that unless you are electing to be treated as if you were resident in Germany (a tax fiction) to give access to their personal allowance. You can only make that election if at least 90% of your income is taxable in Germany, or your income that is not taxable in Germany, i.e. everything other than your German pension, does not exceed the German personal allowance of 11,604€ for 2024. If you cannot make such election, you are taxed on every Cent under their limited liability rules. In the event you do need the certificate, you would send it to HMRC as it relates to your UK taxable income, not your pension as such. Hope this helps.

I assume DWP has sent you form CFN901 to complete to tell them about your non-UK pensions, so they can set the ball in motion. In theory it shouldn't take too long as they exchange all information electronically but DWP will need something like 6 to 8 weeks to get the process going and Germany may take about 3 or 4 months to their normal timetable. I applied for mine about 5 months before the start date, so it could be paid on time at the end of the first month (which is the first full month following your birthday as they do no apportion month 1). DRV will inform RiA and you will get a Tax Identification Number at some point from a central office but RiA will also give you a Steuernummer. I informed RiA as soon as I knew I would be getting the German pension, even though there isn't much to do until the end of the tax year in December. There isn't really any reason to delay and you can all of the forms about communicating by email, paying by direct debit and asking RiA to assess you absent tax returns all set-up before the end of the year. The RiA website has a lot of info and forms in English and that side of things ran quite smoothly. The DRV process shouldn't be too bad either, except they may well ask you for your post-17/pre-work education/training history to update that on your German records before doing the EU calculations to work out how much you will get.

Vinay6124/BarbaraS Scmidinger, I feel your pain and all I can suggest is you send a self assessment return voluntarily/unprompted to HMRC for the year in question, which is what we decided to do because of the unacceptable HMRC delays in dealing with a simple request to check, sign and date stamp a form required for a foreign tax authority. Our self assessment showed UK tax £0 as the income was covered by the personal allowance but the German tax office in Neubrandenburg (I assume that would be yours too) was then happy with a printout of the self assessment part (not the whole return) and we adopted this approach going forward, until we could no longer make the election to be subject to unlimited tax treatment... Not ideal but puts the control back in your hands.

HMRC Admin 25 - why are you pointing Vinay6124 at SA guidance? The form they are talking about is a form from and needed by the German tax office once it has been signed and stamped by HMRC. If the person is in SA and has completed a tax return they can send their self assessment to Germany in lieu of the form they are trying to get you to sign and stamp.

Hi Richard Storer, The legislation you asked for is S578 Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003, which states, "If section 577 applies, the taxable pension income for a tax year is the full amount of the pension, benefit or allowance accruing in that year irrespective of when any amount is actually paid." The State Pension is listed in S577, so S578 is applicable. Hope this helps.

Thank you, most helpful.