Working in UK, Living in Norway (TAX)

mattwilde66

Hi,

I was after some friendly advice on tax when it comes to working in the UK but living in Norway. I currently work offshore in the North Sea on a 2 weeks on, 3 weeks off rota. I'm looking at moving from the UK to Norway but I will still be working in the UK sector and paying UK tax PAYE. Will my tax still stay the same or will I have to pay tax in Norway?

Kind Regards
Matt Wilde

Regshoe

I don't know anything regarding Norwegian tax specifically (and I doubt many reading this forum do either), but I would expect that you would be liable to Norwegian tax, though as there is a Double Taxation Agreement in place you would be able to offset your UK tax already paid.

Scandinavian countries tend to have pretty high taxes, so you'll probably have some extra to pay, but only to the extent that Norwegian tax exceed the UK.

You're best off trying to research via some Norwegian resources really, as the above is just conjecture, albeit based on similar setups with other countries.

chrismac1

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/international/special-jobs.htm

There are special tax rules for your sector, not sure from your post whether they would necessarily apply. The good news is that in April 13 the UK finally came into line with 90% of countries in adopting a Statutory Residence Test which you will find also referenced in the HMRC note above.

Note that it is possible to be a tax resident of more than one country at the same time. This is especially possible with the UK as our silly tax year runs from 6 April to 5 April. I am pretty sure that, like most sensible tax systems, Norway's runs from 1 Jan to 31 Dec.

So I recommend care on when and how you sever links with the UK to avoid this nasty bear pit.

agrinnall

There must be hundreds, if not thousands, of people who already do this and will probably have the answers. Is there nobody else in your company or on your platform who does it? Failing that I would have thought having a scout round for ex-pat forums might find something. You could also try a search on this forum as I'm pretty sure a similar question has been asked previously.

jennifernil

Under the DT rules, if you are resident in Norway, you would be liable to tax there.

You could, as said, be taxable in both countries, but would not pay tax twice. You would however most likely be liable to tax at whatever was the higher amount, and this would most likely be the Norwegian amount.

As wages are generally lower on the UK side, paying tax at the Norwegian rate would likely leave you worse off, so is a bad idea.

If you want to live in Norway, could you not find work in the Norwegian sector?

jennifernil

agrinnall wrote: »

There must be hundreds, if not thousands, of people who already do this and will probably have the answers. Is there nobody else in your company or on your platform who does it? Failing that I would have thought having a scout round for ex-pat forums might find something. You could also try a search on this forum as I'm pretty sure a similar question has been asked previously.

There seems to be quite a lot of people who work on Norwegian rigs, but live in UK, and they still seem to pay tax in Norway, despite the DT agreements, which seems wrong. There are not so many who do as the OP is proposing.

Not sure whether there are special rules for offshore workers in these circumstances. I think this situation would be complicated and the OP would need to speak to HMRC initially.

My OH is Norwegian but resident in UK. He did some work a few years back for a Norwegian company, but was not taxed in Norway as under the DT agreement you are supposed to be taxed according to where you are resident.

Substituting Norway for UK, this would make the OP taxable in Norway, but I think it would take a while to sort out. It took OH over a year to get his tax sorted out, and he has been resident in UK since 1970.