183 day rule

[HannahSmith]

Without wanting to sound thick how do the authorities know if you've been here more than 183 days for tax purposes or not?  Is it down to you to say/state on your tax form whether you have or haven't?

Thank you!

Hannah

[LesLauriers]

Yes it is.

The only time an issue would arrise is if the tax people decided to take a closer look at you. Then they would be looking at your spending pattern via bank statements etc and asking you for your travel receipts.

I guess it is quite easy to establish but unless you are investigated then they simply would not know.

[Val_2]

You can't fool either the french or UK IR services I can tell you. They know where you have travelled to and when and how - we found that out during an investigation back in 1992 and couldn't believe the intelligence they had on us even though we had nothing to hide and had paid all our dues to date, just a routine investigation into all the local building companies they said.

[HannahSmith]

Thanks for your replies.

Hannah

[Simon]

Apologies for the length of this posting, but it is a cracker...

Taken from the Guardian, an actual letter sent by the Inland Revenue:

Dear Mr Addison,

I am writing to you to express our thanks for your more than prompt reply to our latest communication, and also to answer some of the points you raise. I will address them, as ever, in order. Firstly, I must take issue with your description of our last as a "begging letter". It might perhaps more properly be referred to as a "tax demand". This is how we, at the Inland Revenue have always, for reasons of accuracy; traditionally referred to such documents.

Secondly, your frustration at our adding to the "endless stream of crapulent whining and panhandling vomited daily through the letterbox on to the doormat" has been noted. However, whilst I have naturally not seen the other letters to which you refer I would cautiously suggest that their being from "pauper councils, Lombardy pirate banking houses and pissant gas-mongerers" might indicate that your decision to "file them next to the toilet in case of emergencies" is at best a little ill-advised. In common with my own organisation, it is unlikely that the senders of these letters do see you as a "lackwit bumpkin” or, come to that, a "sodding charity". More likely they see you as a citizen of Great Britain, with a responsibility to contribute to the upkeep of the nation as a whole.

Which brings me to my next point. Whilst there may be some spirit of truth in your assertion that the taxes you pay "go to shore up the canker-blighted, toppling folly that is the Public Services", a moment's rudimentary calculation ought to disabuse you of the notion that the government in any way expects you to "stump up for the whole damned party" yourself. The estimates you provide for the Chancellor's disbursement of the funds levied by taxation, whilst colourful, are, in fairness, a little off the mark. Less than you seem to imagine is spent on "junkets for Bunterish lickspittles" and "dancing whores" whilst far more than you have accounted for is allocated to, for example, "that box-ticking façade of a university system."

A couple of technical points arising from direct queries:

1. The reason we don't simply write "Muggins" on the envelope has to do with the vagaries of the postal system;

2. You can rest assured that "sucking the very marrows of those with nothing else to give" has never been considered as a practice because even if the Personal Allowance didn't render it irrelevant, the sheer medicallogistics involved would make it financially unviable.

I trust this has helped. In the meantime, whilst I would not in any way wish to influence your decision one way or the other, I ought to point out that even if you did choose to "give the whole foul jamboree up and go and live in India" you would still owe us the money.

Please forward it by Friday.

Yours Sincerely,

H J Lee

Customer Relations

...brilliant

Regards

Simon