FATCA (metro)

meer53

EdSwippet wrote: »

All well and good for US residents hiding funds outside the US, but what about US citizens who live and work full time outside the US?

All their accounts are given the full-on 'evil offshore account' treatment as if being used for money laundering. Yet in reality they are simply accounts at the bank down the road for these people, who use them for such nefarious purposes as paying the rent or mortgage, settling utility bills, buying groceries and the like. Of course these folk will be "keeping funds abroad".

Forcing UK banks to report (at their expense) to the US IRS on people who live and work full time in the UK, and who may well be UK citizens with only place of birth or parentage as a connection to the US, is gunboat diplomacy. No other country on earth demands anything so outrageous.

I think you'll find there are lots more countries joining in.

http://www.hsbcnet.com/gbm/about-us/financial-regulation/ukcd-ot

EdSwippet

meer53 wrote: »

I think you'll find there are lots more countries joining in.

http://www.hsbcnet.com/gbm/about-us/financial-regulation/ukcd-ot

This operates on tax residency, not citizenship. Two very different things. From the link you provided:

"The key difference is that for UKCD and OT we capture ‘tax residency’ as opposed to ‘US Persons’ for FATCA."

A 'tax resident' is someone who lives somewhere. A 'US person', on the other hand includes not just US residents but also non-US residents born in the US or perhaps born outside but to a US citizen parent, non-US residents holding a US green card, and anyone who may have spent more than a certain number of days in the US over the past three years.

gfplux

Everyone who has a rental property in Orlando might find they are in the firing line in a few years down the road.

meer53

EdSwippet wrote: »

This operates on tax residency, not citizenship. Two very different things. From the link you provided:

"The key difference is that for UKCD and OT we capture ‘tax residency’ as opposed to ‘US Persons’ for FATCA."

A 'tax resident' is someone who lives somewhere. A 'US person', on the other hand includes not just US residents but also non-US residents born in the US or perhaps born outside but to a US citizen parent, non-US residents holding a US green card, and anyone who may have spent more than a certain number of days in the US over the past three years.

Fatca covers both Citizenship and Tax Residency. I work for a bank and check Fatca notifications. Country of birth, citizenship and tax residency are all included when customer details are logged.

http://www.hsbcnet.com/crs

EdSwippet

meer53 wrote: »

Fatca covers both Citizenship and Tax Residency. I work for a bank and check Fatca notifications. Country of birth, citizenship and tax residency are all included when customer details are logged.

Right, for FATCA. But the OECD CRS does not revolve around citizenship:

https://www.kpmg.com/Global/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/frontiers-in-tax/Documents/the-common-reporting-standard.pdf
"In gathering data, residency or tax residency within a particular country is the decisive factor – not citizenship."

No country other than the US demands information on non-residents (that is, US citizens and other 'US persons' not resident in the US). Under CRS countries do collect information about account held offshore by their residents, but not by non-residents. That's a substantial difference.

colsten

Bizarre FATCA story: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/bank-accounts/11571643/Church-bell-ringers-in-Kent-told-to-fill-out-US-tax-form-to-open-bank-account.

Strange that none of our politicians is campaigning for exiting FATCA.

rtX_2

I have a number of company accounts with Metro Bank in which I am the sole shareholder and director. I am also linked with many accounts at other banks. Metro Bank have only (repeatedly) written to me about one of these accounts/relationships. I am British, have no US interests have never had US interests, have never had a green card. And neither have any of the companies. In short, by Metro Bank's own criteria, I am not someone from whom they should be seeking this compliance documentation. The really annoying part is that I gave them all this information when I opened the accounts, so they already have all they need to comply. They can see I am UK tax resident and so is the company.

I've written to them (over a month ago) asking for an explanation but they have not even had the courtesy to respond.

If everyone refuses to return these daft forms then their system will creak under the weight of their own ill-thought through bureaucracy. It's a system constructed by people who've never had to run a small company, and don't understand the irritation and workload created, by this sort of stupidity.

One of my companies has to register under the Data Protection Act as a data controller. The USA is not considered a safe place to send personal data (per the Information Commisioner's web site, it's ico stop gov stop uk), because their data protection legislation is considered inadequate. My company could be fined such large sums that it would put it out of business if it does not comply with this requirement. Yet 'my' government is quite happy to sign up to an accord which results in banks sending personal and company data to the US on the strength of nothing at all. It's totally ridiculous.

Metro waffle on about my security being their paramount concern but encourage me to send them via e-mail enough information (on their forms) to hijack my company and get into their telephone banking system as an impersonator of me. E-mail is notoriously insecure and most of the information almost certainly goes through US servers and it is therefore also potentially in breach of UK Data Protection legislation.

If Metro don't stop, I am closing the account, and I've just e-mailed them to tell them that. Speak with your feet and people listen. I intend to draw a line in the sand.

gfplux

Hello rtX, good post.
The Banks are so afraid of the U.S. Government that they will probably welcome you closing the account.

nyermen

I work for a software company whose customers include banks. FATCA is mentioned in every "Request for Proposal" now (An RFP - basically, they send a questionnaire document detailing their requirements and asking how our software matches their needs).
The problem is that a bank with any connection to the US at all (even if they don't deal in the US but happen to send payments there for customers), can be caught up, as the US can even fine banks there who deal with your bank if they don't do what they ask.
Result is, I suspect banks just send their entire customer profile over to be safe - I suspect the US government knows more about UK citizens now than our own government...