Self-assessment - donation to overseas charity

pinkteapot

I'm employed PAYE and self-employed in my spare time so complete tax returns.

Hubby and I make an annual donation to an Indonesian charity (it's a registered charity, but over there, not in the UK). I seem to remember that self-assessment asks about charitable donations (?), but I've never connected this before!

1. Do donations to non-UK charities count?

2. If so... Donation is paid out of our joint account - can I/should I put down half of the amount on my self-assessment?

I found this page on the HMRC site:
https://www.gov.uk/donating-to-charity/overview

But this only talks about specific methods of giving (gift aid, payroll giving, land/property/shares and in a will). Does this mean that simple cash donations to charity don't count?

Not a big deal really - will just take any tax relief I can get.

sheramber

UK charities can claim the tax paid by you on the money donated under the gift aid scheme.

You would only have a claim if you are a higher rate taxpayer when you can claim the dofference between standard rate and higher rate rate.

Hpwever, as you donate to a charity which is not registered in the UK it cannot claim the tax back and you cannot claim anything.

chrismac1

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/bimmanual/bim45072.htm

In my view this is a "qualifying charitable donation" and therefore claimable. Unless I have missed something, overseas charities are not excluded from being "qualifying".

fubar4164

Afraid you don't get any relief unless it is a qualifying charity. That is defined as basically a UK or EU registered charity. The definition is halfway down the BIM website page.

chrismac1

"Relevant territories are those in EU Member States, Iceland and Norway."

Sorry I maybe was hasty, that is precisely 30 overseas countries which qualify. Admittedly that leaves 174 or so which don't.