Does this need a self assessment tax submission?

Brie

OK - so I have submitted a self assessment for the last couple of years on the basis that I get about £170 a month pension from Canada.  It's not taxed in Canada so needs to be taxed here.  I have pension income here (and a tiddly amount of interest earned) so am above the personal exemption level.

My OH has just started to receive his pension from Canada for the stately amount of about £30 a month.  In the UK tax year 24-25 he should have received about £120 but he couldn't get this paid until in the 25-26 UK tax year because the pension people in Canada wanted to send him cheques which would have cost more to cash than they were worth.  It took until August 2025 to get this sorted out and get the money paid directly to a UK account instead.  It's all been caught up and he gets the payment monthly to our UK account.

So should he submit a self assessment form for the £120 (approx) he should have received in 24-25 but didn't get until 25-26.  Without it I believe he is just over the personal exemption limit but I can't tell for sure as he hasn't yet had any change in tax code info having started his SP in the last year.  He does have another pension payment.

Sam_666

Tax is due when income is paid, not when it could have been paid.

poseidon1

Brie said:

OK - so I have submitted a self assessment for the last couple of years on the basis that I get about £170 a month pension from Canada.  It's not taxed in Canada so needs to be taxed here.  I have pension income here (and a tiddly amount of interest earned) so am above the personal exemption level.

My OH has just started to receive his pension from Canada for the stately amount of about £30 a month.  In the UK tax year 24-25 he should have received about £120 but he couldn't get this paid until in the 25-26 UK tax year because the pension people in Canada wanted to send him cheques which would have cost more to cash than they were worth.  It took until August 2025 to get this sorted out and get the money paid directly to a UK account instead.  It's all been caught up and he gets the payment monthly to our UK account.

So should he submit a self assessment form for the £120 (approx) he should have received in 24-25 but didn't get until 25-26.  Without it I believe he is just over the personal exemption limit but I can't tell for sure as he hasn't yet had any change in tax code info having started his SP in the last year.  He does have another pension payment.

See below -

https://www.litrg.org.uk/international/uk-tax-uk-residents-foreign-income-and-gains/uk-tax-overseas-pensions#:~:text=You may have to do,overseas pension income was reportable.

Generally pensions are taxable on an accrual basis, per below -

https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/employment-income-manual/eim75020#:~:text=paid in advance-,Overview,what amount is actually paid.

Brie

Thanks all

Looking a @poseidon1 's links I found this....

If your overseas pension is taxable in the UK – because it is taxable under UK domestic law and either there is no double tax agreement or the double tax agreement states the pension is only taxable in the UK – you will need to report the overseas pension to HMRC.

So looking at the OH's income for the year 2024/25 he wouldn't have any tax to pay even including the foreign pension.  So I'm not going to file a SA for him.  Likely he also won't have enough income to pay tax in 2025/26 either so again nothing to file.  It may be only in 2026/27 that he gets a full year's worth of SP that there may be tax payable (very likely) so I'll look at it again at that point.  Unless the rules change of course.

DRS1

Beware: taxable means liable to tax.  Just because your income is covered by the personal allowance doesn't mean it is not taxable.

DRS1

BTW when I read @poseidon1's linked page I thought that if your OH's Canada pension was NOT a Govt pension then the bit that was paid in 25/6 but should have been paid in 24/5 could be returned for 25/6.

Brie

DRS1 said:

BTW when I read @poseidon1's linked page I thought that if your OH's Canada pension was NOT a Govt pension then the bit that was paid in 25/6 but should have been paid in 24/5 could be returned for 25/6.

It is the government pension - equivalent to state pension.