Moving from overseas to Australia

Over the last 20 years we have advised expats who have repatriated from the UAE, Qatar, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Cambodia, Switzerland and the UK.

Whilst there are common tax themes associated with providing tax advice to returning expats, the domestic tax laws of each country vary quite considerably.

As an example, Switzerland levies income tax at different rates in each of their 26 cantons. The tax rates on pension withdrawals also vary from one canton to another. Therefore, tax optimisation requires a knowledge of Swiss income tax law and the variations from one canton to another.

Examples of our assistance

Another example of a major tax issue that affects expats is that the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) treats ‘early release’ of funds from an overseas pension scheme as a payment from a trust, not from a ‘foreign superannuation fund’. Most expats would not be aware of section 99B of the Income Tax Assessment Act (1936), but you need to be aware of this critical section if you are going to gain early release from a foreign pension scheme including a US 401K of IRA.

Here is one link that may be of interest in relation to section 99B:

The bottom line is that forearmed is forewarned … better to obtain tax advice before making a major financial decision … and better to obtain that adefore moving to Austr

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