The e-borders programme and UK residence

The new e borders programme to be introduced over the next couple of years looks to ensure that information on anyone travelling to or from the UK is retained by the UK border authorities. This will be shared with the Police and HMRC. The key purpose of this for immigration purposes to ensure that the UK government knows who is actually in the UK, however it will have an ancillary benefit in that it will allow HMRC to keep a track on anyone visiting or leaving the UK for residence purposes. Under the current rules if you've left the UK you need to ensure that your return visits are less than 90 days per tax year (on average) and that you don't spend more than 183 days in any one tax year. If you exceed these limits you could be classed as remaining UK resident. As well as the length of UK visits though HMRC will also want to take into account the frequency of visits to the UK and any UK ties whilst you are absent. Generally the UK ties issue is related to the frequency of visits. For instance if you are trying to establish non UK residence by living abroad but have your wife and children in the UK it would be likely that you'd make pretty frequent visits back to the UK in any case. You will need to disclose both the number of days spent in the UK as well as the frequency of visits (ie the number of separate occasions you visited the UK) on your UK tax return. The e borders programme will allow electronic information to be retained (for up to 10 years) which could be accessed by HMRC. As one of the stated aims of the e borders programme is to: '…help identify those who avoid paying tax by claiming to be resident outside the United Kingdom…' Its fair to say that they will use the information to keep a track on visits to the UK. You can see more on the e-borders programme and UK residence at: The e borders programme and UK residence