MikePBrown

I am in Thailand on a retirement visa extension I.e not working and I have registered with Bitkub and Satang pro. Both needed kyc. If you hold a USA passport you are unlikely to get registered.

You are correct I should have used Tax Evasion rather than Tax Avoidance - thanks for the correction. However please can you re-read my post which says "anyone who has been living in Thailand more than 180 days per year and brings their pension into Thailand in the same tax year as received is potentially liable for income tax on the remittance" I think you will agree your final comment does not apply to this situation.

Please will you go back and read my post and you will find we are 100% in agreement.

A further thought on whether a tax credit can be carried forward - the tax credit is detailed in the DTA and not in the Thai Tax regulations, although I have not read every article in the UK/Thai DTA the articles I have read make no mention of the Thai tax credit being limited to the year in which the UK tax is paid. Therefore a tax credit could be carried forward - my extrapolation and no doubt open to a differing view from TRD.

I hadn't heard of tax credits not being carried forward and obviously a major issue if this is the case. However on one of the YouTubes with a tax consultant (sorry can't remember which one) his answer to the issue of tax years not corresponding date wise, was that "they" (the tax consultant) used the actual tax payment up to April 4th and then a calculated the tax liability for the rest of the year and put this in as the credit. As I understood it this is what his firm actually did when filing Thai Tax returns for clients and presumably without any issues! However as has been mentioned many times the devil is in the details which we don't know unless you have access to someone or a tax consultant that has actually been submitting Thai Tax returns for clients.

Just to clarify for any UK Expats with UK sourced pensions that are taxed in the UK and then those pensions are remitted to Thailand and are classed as taxable income in Thailand. I believe the relevant clause in the DTA is "Article 23 Elimination of Double Taxation, item 3" quoted below: "(3) In the case of Thailand, United Kingdom tax payable in accordance with this Convention in respect of income from sources within the United Kingdom shall be allowed as a credit against Thai tax payable in respect of that income. The credit shall not, however, exceed that part of the Thai tax, as computed before the credit is given, which is appropriate to such item of income." My interpretation of this article is that you can quote this to the TRD and claim any UK paid tax as a credit against your Thailand income tax liability - providing it is the same income in both countries. My understanding is that the credit amount is put in Thai Personal Income Tax Form 90 under "Item 11.13 Computation" and I guess if the TRD query this you quote the DTA with proof of UK tax paid. Jojothai - I agree there has been a lot of misunderstandings in previous posts but I believe the above is correct. - hope this can help clarify the tax credit applicable in Thailand.

Thanks for your confirmation. Do your private pension providers still deduct tax at the 20% rate? I ask because like you I am not on PAYE but my private pension still has the 20% deduction resulting in a slight tax over payment that I claim back each year.

Question for Sometimewoodworker and nong38. You seem to be saying that if you complete a P85 form to the HMRC - UK to say you are a Uk Non-Resident then your UK pensions will have no UK income tax liability - have I understood you correctly? My understanding is that even though you are a UK Non-Resident you will have UK income tax liability on any UK sourced income which would include pensions, all be it you will have the personal tax allowance and any other allowances available to you to reduce your UK tax liability. The P85 form lets HMRC know you are now a UK Non-Resident and therefore not liable for UK income tax on anything received from off shore or say investments in Jersey or Isle of Mann. I would be interested to know if you have information that my understanding is wrong. E.g. whether I can claim UK income tax back on my UK pension. Thanks

They give details of the change to the tax regulation application at the start and then proceed to talk mainly about the original tax regulations that have not changed. I.e. anyone who has been living in Thailand more than 180 days per year and brings their pension into Thailand in the same tax year as received is potentially liable for income tax on the remittance - Nothing has changed and anyone doing this without submitting a tax return was practicing tax avoidance either knowingly or unknowingly.

Robin - a further thought is that if you sell your rental property and it is either a second home and or you are a UK non-resident at the time of selling you will have UK capital gains liability which I understand through the DTA you could use as a credit against any Thai Income Tax.

My understanding is that you will only have a Thailand Income Tax liability on money brought into Thailand, any money held outside of Thailand will not be of concern to the TRD. If you intend to bring all of the sale proceeds into Thailand in one transfer the advice given in a previous post was to make sure you are not a Thai Tax resident for the year you sell the property and transfer the proceeds to Thailand. If you are intending to transfer the money as a when needed then you would have a tax liability for the capital gains portion - however you would probably have to prove the original purchase price was from pre 1/1/24 monies.

My plan for minimising Thailand Income tax liability is set out below and may apply to some others in Thailand but it is also dependent on whether the Thai Revenue Depart allow capital loss offsets. My main source of retirement funds is from invested capital that I earned pre 1/1/24. A portion of this is invested in stocks (off shore to Thailand) and generally these stocks were bought with capital pre 1/1/24. When I need funds to pay for my retirement in Thailand I intend selling some of my stocks and then transferring the proceeds to Thailand which would be part capital (exempt from Thai Income Tax as the capital existed pre 1/1/24) and part capital gains (liable for Thai Income Tax). Some of my stocks have significant capital losses and I am planning on selling some of these with some of my stocks with capital gains at the same time and then transferring the combined realised monies to Thailand. In such a situation it is the normal practice in other countries to allow capital losses to be offset against capital gains, and although these monies would be treated as income in Thailand I am assuming an offset would still be permitted. Does anyone have a view or knowledge on this matter? I also understand that the capital gains/losses on stocks purchased pre 1/1/24 will need to be calculated from purchase price rather than the valuation as of 31/12/23. Can anyone confirm whether this is correct? Finally for monies transferred from say a bank account is the normal practice to use first in, first out to identify the source and hence liability for Income Tax on any money transferred to Thailand.

Regarding 90 day report. My experience a few years ago was that I could not do the online report until I had left Thailand and returned on the new passport. That was a few years ago, might be different now.

Hi I have a question which I think is relevant to this thread. If an expat Thai tax resident sends a gift ( money transfer) to someone in Thailand from abroad and if the Thai tax authorities some how know this is the situation, wouldn’t the tax authorities consider this as taxable income of the expat but an income exempt gift for the recipient. @mike lister do you have a view on this? Thks

Thanks Mike - It looks like I need to be dead for this option to work!! I'll get my rose tinted glasses prescription checked tomorrow. BTW is the note from the regulation as I see PWC do not mention it in their summary.

The Lawyer mentioned that a Gift (up to Bt20m/year) to support your Spouse would be tax exempt for her/him. To me this appears to be saying that if you transfer from abroad to your Spouse's bank account up to 20 million baht a year, she/he will not need to pay income tax on this. For anyone who will have income tax liabilities in Thailand and has a wife who they support here, then there appears to be a method to reduce your tax liability in Thailand. 20 million Baht also seems to be a high gift allowance - one can only think as to why this large allowance was included????

To answer the question which to buy? I would buy both assuming all fiat will eventually follow history and go to zero and gold would be my hedge against BTC going to zero. Stocks are fine if you know what you are doing but I am unlikely to have the 30 year time horizon a previous comment suggested (Stocks took many years to recover after the Great Depression crash of the 1930's). Hard assets such as land would be my other suggestion. If you are interested in the BTC/Gold option try googling "Byetree" and look at their "BOLD" fund which is based on BTC and Gold with various conditions defining the ratio at any one time to try and reduce the volatility impact of BTC but still benefit from the upside.

Greg - I assume what you are saying is that the land (with a house on it) is being sold, in which case the 5 years is probably a land office issue (i.e. where the chanote ownership change will be registered) where by the tax paid on the sale to the land office is higher for the first 5 years (after 5 years ownership the tax is less). In theory this is the responsibility of the seller but as the other post say these cost are often negotiated and split.

Re QROP - my understanding is that this was an EU regulation that the UK had to comply with and following Brexit this no long applies, also I understood the transfer of a pension pot to a QORP had to be done before the pension started paying out, i.e. before reaching pension age. If someone knows better please correct my understanding.

Hi - I have no legal knowledge on the issue but having dealt with various issues since my wife passed on, I would be certain that to remove his name from the deed or sell in joint names will require a Thai Court Order empowering the executors of his Will to carry out the wishes stated in the Will. If he died without a Will (either UK or Thailand) or with a UK Will but not a Thai Will this will be more complicated. My guess is that the lawyer advising knows this and wants the issue resolved before selling by first transferring the property to his wife (i.e. the court order will be required for the transfer). Just a side thought but if the husband had owned 100% of the Condo would the lawyer be saying it has to be transfer first before selling??

Hi just for information. My Thai wife passed on about a year ago and left a Thai Will with 2 executors. I used a lawyer in Chiang Mai to obtain the Court Order (Thai equivalent of Probate) for the 2 executors to action the Will which took about 4 months and cost less than Bt30,000 for the whole process. The lawyer I used though did not speak any English but otherwise did a very professional job.

Hi I recently used Sumalee Jennapa (26 Tanin Road) to update my Thai Will, Living Will, UK Will and Enduring Power of Attorney for Bt20,000. In my case everything was very simple and all in English only. I understand that it is best to have your Thai Will in English and in the event of your death it is translated, if signed as a Thai language Will there is a risk of someone challenging your Thai Will on the basis that you did not know what you were signing.

Hi - Several years ago I used to use UOB (Thailand Branch) for my visa extension using the Bt800k retirement method. For a couple of years I had minor problems with how UOB presented the information required and on the second time the Immigration Officer told me as a side line that if I use UOB, because it is a foreign bank in Thailand, they (Immigration) are more strict on the paper work to prove the Bt800k. He suggested I use a Thai bank in future to save any issues arising. I have used SCB for the past 10years and provided much less information than UOB provided and never had a problem.

Hi Below FYI is my experience of being an Executor for a Thai Will - my circumstances are not the same as yours but I hope the information will be useful. My Thai Wife passed on last September and I was the Joint Executor of her Thai Will. I appointed a Lawyer in Chiang Mai to collect the paperwork, submit this to the Courts and obtain the Court Order to confirm I was one of the Executors. This took just under 3 months to complete and required me to attend a Court Hearing and answer the Courts questions under oath. Because of covid the Court asked that this be done via Zoom with me in my Lawyers Office. The Hearing was all in Thai and the Court wanted to satisfy themselves I was a suitable person to carry out the Executors duties. My Lawyer charged me Bt20k for this service, I found him to be honest, efficient and a reasonable fee, but he only speaks Thai - happy to share contact information if of use. Armed with Death Certificate, Court Order, proof of my ID and Wife's ID I closed several Bank Accounts she had opened. All the banks required the 2 Executors to be present in the Branch when closing the accounts, though the process was different in each bank. With the except of an Agricultural Bank they did not require me to go to the branch where the account was based, i.e. I could do the paperwork etc at any of their branches. Most banks required me to open an account in my name for receiving the balance of my wife's account. The process varied from being all done in 1 hour to taking up to 2 weeks. Hope this is of help

Hi your title is Living Will but you seem to be talking about a Thailand Asset Will - these are very different documents that serve different purposes and the executor under each has very different duties. For clear answers it would be best if you clarified which Will it is.