The UAE is one of the largest expat hubs for British professionals, and UK pensions left behind after relocating there come with a few considerations specific to the country – mainly its tax-free status and what that does and doesn’t mean for your pension planning. The UAE’s No-Income-Tax Position The UAE doesn’t levy personal income tax, which is a major part of its appeal for expats – but it’s worth being clear about what this does and doesn’t affect. It has no bearing on how the UK taxes your UK-sourced pension income; that’s governed by UK tax rules and your UK tax residency status, not by the tax regime of wherever you’re currently living. The UAE’s tax-free status simply means there’s no local UAE tax layered on top – it doesn’t exempt UK pension income from UK tax rules by itself. UK Tax on Your Pension While in the UAE Once you’re non-UK tax resident, UK pension income is still generally paid with UK tax deducted at source by default, unless you specifically arrange otherwise. The UK-UAE double taxation position is less straightforward than with many other countries, since the UAE’s lack of income tax affects how double taxation reliefRead more →
Once you’re actually ready to start drawing an income from your pension, there’s a choice most expats haven’t had to think about until this point: buy a guaranteed income for life, or keep the pension invested and draw from it flexibly. Here’s how the two compare for someone living overseas. What an Annuity Actually Is An annuity is a product you buy, generally with some or all of your pension pot, in exchange for a guaranteed income for the rest of your life – or a set period – regardless of how long you live or what happens to investment markets afterwards. Once purchased, the decision is generally irreversible, and the income rate offered depends on factors including your age, health, and prevailing interest rates at the time of purchase. What Drawdown Actually Is Drawdown keeps your pension invested and lets you draw income flexibly – as much or as little as you choose, adjusted over time – with the remaining fund continuing to be exposed to investment markets. This offers considerably more flexibility than an annuity but comes with genuine investment risk: a period of poor market performance combined with ongoing withdrawals can meaningfully erode the fund, particularly earlyRead more →
If you’re self-employed or running your own business as an expat, pension planning looks quite different from someone consolidating old workplace pots – there’s no employer contribution, no default scheme, and often no pension at all unless you’ve deliberately set one up. Here’s what’s worth knowing. No Employer, No Default Pension The auto-enrolment system that gives most UK employees a workplace pension by default doesn’t apply to the self-employed – there’s no employer to enrol you, and no default contribution happening in the background. This means self-employed expats frequently have smaller UK pension provision than employed counterparts of the same age, simply because nobody was contributing on their behalf, and it’s worth being realistic about this gap rather than assuming pension savings are automatically building up somewhere. Can You Still Contribute to a UK Pension From Abroad? Yes, in many cases – UK non-residents can generally continue contributing to a UK pension and still receive UK tax relief, though this is capped: non-UK relevant earnings mean tax relief is generally limited to a maximum of £3,600 gross per year (£2,880 net) unless you have UK relevant earnings, such as self-employment income actually generated and taxed in the UK. This capRead more →
Most expat pension guidance, including most of what’s on this site, focuses on moving abroad. But plans change, and a meaningful number of expats do eventually move back to the UK – which raises a different set of questions about pensions arranged while overseas. If You Have a UK SIPP: Generally Straightforward A SIPP is a UK-registered pension regardless of where you live, so moving back to the UK doesn’t require any change to the pension itself – it simply continues as normal, now under standard UK resident tax treatment rather than non-resident treatment. Any arrangement you had for receiving income gross under a double taxation agreement would end, since that specifically applied to your non-resident status, and UK tax would apply in the ordinary way going forward. If You Have a QROPS: More to Think About A QROPS is more complicated. Moving back to the UK while still within the five-year “relevant period” from when the transfer was made can trigger the 25% Overseas Transfer Charge retrospectively, even if the original transfer was exempt at the time – this is one of the more significant, and sometimes overlooked, risks of a QROPS for anyone whose long-term country of residenceRead more →
Expats are a frequent, deliberate target for pension scams – living overseas, often without easy access to familiar UK advisers, makes it harder to check credentials and easier for unregulated operators to sound convincing. Here’s what to actually watch for. Why Expats Specifically Get Targeted Scammers targeting pensions know that expats are frequently sitting on old, forgotten workplace pensions, are geographically distant from easy in-person verification, and sometimes feel less connected to UK regulatory protections once they’ve moved abroad. None of that actually reduces your rights or the rules that apply – but it does make expats a more attractive target, and cold approaches specifically about “your UK pension” have become common enough that it’s worth knowing the warning signs before you’re ever contacted. Warning Sign: Unsolicited Contact A call, text, email or social media message out of nowhere about your pension – particularly one that already seems to know details about you – is a significant warning sign. Legitimate advisers don’t typically cold-contact people about specific pensions; leads usually come through referrals or someone actively seeking advice, not the other way around. Warning Sign: Pressure to Act Quickly Genuine pension advice, particularly anything involving a transfer, takes time –Read more →
If a move abroad is already on the calendar, your pensions are one of the things worth sorting out before you go rather than after – some of it is genuinely easier to handle while you’re still UK-based. Here’s a practical checklist for the run-up to departure. Locate Every Pension You Hold Start with a complete list: every workplace pension from every employer, any personal pensions, and your State Pension forecast. If you’ve lost track of anything, the government’s free pension tracing service can locate old workplace pensions using just an employer’s name – far easier to chase down paperwork while you still have a UK address and phone number providers can easily verify. Identify Any Defined Benefit Pensions Check whether any of your pensions are defined benefit (final salary) schemes rather than defined contribution – this fundamentally changes what your options are, since a defined benefit transfer above £30,000 legally requires specialist regulated advice from a UK Pension Transfer Specialist. It’s worth identifying this now rather than discovering it later, since it affects your whole timeline. Get Your State Pension Forecast and Check Your Destination’s Status Request your State Pension forecast, and check specifically whether your destination country isRead more →
What happens to your UK pension when you die is a question worth answering while you’re planning, not left to be worked out afterwards – particularly for expats, where family, assets and succession law can span more than one country. Here’s how it actually works. The Age 75 Distinction UK pension death benefits are treated differently depending on whether you die before or after age 75. If death occurs before 75, most defined contribution pensions – including SIPPs – can generally be passed to beneficiaries entirely free of UK income tax, as either a lump sum or continued drawdown. After 75, beneficiaries typically pay income tax at their own marginal rate when they draw the funds, though the money still generally passes outside your estate for UK inheritance tax purposes. This age-75 line is one of the more significant, and sometimes overlooked, factors in how much a pension is actually worth to the people who inherit it. Why Pensions Usually Sit Outside Your Estate Most UK pensions – including SIPPs – are held in a trust structure that generally keeps them outside your estate for UK inheritance tax purposes, distinct from savings, property or other assets you own directly. ThisRead more →
If you’re a US citizen or green card holder with a UK pension, your situation carries an extra layer most other expats don’t have to deal with – because the US taxes its citizens and green card holders on worldwide income no matter where they live. Here’s what that actually means in practice. Why US Citizenship Changes the Calculation Most countries tax based on residency – where you actually live. The US is one of a small number of countries that also taxes based on citizenship, meaning a US citizen living in, say, the UAE or Singapore, still has US tax filing obligations on worldwide income, including UK pension income, regardless of where they’re resident. This single fact changes how almost every UK pension decision needs to be evaluated for US persons. The QROPS Problem Specifically A QROPS is very likely to be classified under US tax law as a Passive Foreign Investment Company (PFIC), or as a foreign trust requiring separate, often burdensome annual US reporting. PFIC taxation is notoriously punitive – designed to discourage US persons from holding foreign pooled investments – and can significantly erode any benefit a QROPS might otherwise offer. Many QROPS providers are awareRead more →
Tax is usually the question underneath every other expat pension question – how much you’ll actually keep once income starts flowing. Here’s how UK pension tax works once you’re no longer UK tax resident. Establishing Your Tax Residency First Before any of this applies, you need to know whether you’re actually UK tax resident or not – determined by the UK’s Statutory Residence Test, which weighs days spent in the UK, ties such as family and property, and your residence history, not simply where your address happens to be. Getting this wrong at the outset undermines every calculation that follows, so it’s worth establishing definitively before assuming non-resident tax treatment applies to you. The Default: UK Tax Deducted at Source UK pension income is normally paid under PAYE, with UK tax deducted at source by the scheme administrator before it reaches you – this happens by default, regardless of whether you’re UK resident or not, unless you’ve specifically arranged otherwise. For many non-residents, this means UK tax is being withheld on income that may actually be taxable in their country of residence instead, under a double taxation agreement – which is where things can go wrong if left unaddressed. ClaimingRead more →
SSAS comes up less often than SIPP or QROPS in expat pension conversations, and for good reason – it’s a genuinely different type of scheme, built for a specific situation that most expats aren’t in. Here’s what it actually is, and when it might still be worth knowing about. What a SSAS Actually Is A Small Self-Administered Scheme (SSAS) is a type of UK occupational pension scheme, typically set up by the directors of a small or medium-sized company for themselves and sometimes key employees. Unlike a SIPP, which is an individual arrangement, a SSAS is a trust-based scheme where the members are usually also the trustees, giving them direct collective control over how the scheme’s assets are invested and managed. What Makes It Different From a SIPP The headline feature of a SSAS is that it can lend money back to the sponsoring employer – the company the directors run – subject to strict limits and conditions, something a SIPP generally can’t do. A SSAS can also jointly purchase commercial property, often the premises the sponsoring company itself trades from, with the scheme then receiving rent from the business. These features make a SSAS a genuinely useful tool forRead more →
