Opting out of 'Double taxation treaty' - has anybody done it?

[Gardian]

[quote user="John Brown"]On the question of is it worth opting out of the DTT

With a local authority pension of 22k and a state pension of 7k you would pay 200 euro a year tax ( 4 euro a week, tax on a UK bottle of wine )
Using the France individual form for your state pension, making it none taxable and not reducing your UK tax allowance you pay less tax on your
local authority pension in the UK balancing the figures.
IMHO You need a LA pension of over 30k to make it worth bothering with

JB 
[/quote]

I really don't know where you get your numbers from.

On the UK side, its quite simple.  I gave an example in an earlier post, but put simply, the 'saving' is 20% of whatever one's annual UK State pension figure is.  For most, its £6 - 7k, thus €1500 - ish. All that is dependent on the individual being of UK State retirement age and imposable in France. Its 'money for old rope'.

On the French side, on the example figures of £22k & £7k, I get a liability of €559 not €200.

But the real point about this, is that 'opting out of the DTT' ..................... is not an option. Individuals are not in a position to say "I'm going to be taxed where it suits me".  It doesn't work like that for goodness sake.

Broadly speaking (and thus for most of us) whatever the OP's circumstances (i.e. whether one or both partners have income, whether one or both is of UK State retirement age), then if they are French resident, then they are imposable. That may or may not generate a liability, depending on the numbers.

Your 30k number is nonsense and has nothing to do with declaration of earnings in France.  Completion of the France Individual form simply reduces one's UK tax liability.

n.b. UK tax liability only reduces by the extent to which the cumulation of one's State & Occupational pensions exceed the personal allowance.  With the p.a. at £10,500 now (for OAP's), then the benefit only kicks in if your Occupational pension is above c £4k p.a. (not £30k!). However, in previous years, the p.a. was much lower and thus the benefit was greater. 

 

[richard51]

What a bizarre thread. Haven't even bothered to ask OH as she would again wax lyrical about Private vs Public sector jobs, including the rights and wrongs.

Eurotrash summed it up very early on.

Richard.

[dr orloff]

Loiuse&Gary,

You have completely misunderstood.  You don't have the choice as to where you pay your tax,  you cannot opt out of the DTT.   Your government service pensions are taxable in the UK and not in France, end of story.  France simply has no right to tax this income.  The form you have is to ensure that you are not taxed in the UK for UK sourced income that is taxable in France - bank interest and other pensions.  You are wasting your time.

[John Brown]

Gardian, you assume I'm single, for 1 person you are right its 559 euro tax, for a couple its 200 euro

I didn't say you can have a choice of opting in or out, I was making the point its academic anyway unless your LG pension is mega bucks

IMO the reason its a none starter is the employer's contributions ( Council, in my case ) far exceeds my contributions to my pension fund therefore its only fair that the government claw back some of their money they indirectly paid in when its comes to be paid out as a pension

I for one are happy with the way it works now

JB

[Gardian]

[quote user="John Brown"]I didn't say you can have a choice of opting in or out, I was making the point its academic anyway unless your LG pension is mega bucks

[/quote]

Nonsense.  "Mega bucks".  Well, as I believe that I illustrated above, if one's LG pension is greater than c.£4k then you benefit.

Oh well, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't give it a lesson in Maths if it doesn't want to hear it. 

[John Brown]

The forum is mainly about people expressing opinions. The lesson you need, is to know when you are are being opinionated

It's a waste of an argument because opting out is not an option anyway

I'm off to spend my Mega bucks[:P]

Enjoy the sunshine

JB