They're softening us up for a second Referendum, so have embarked on Project Fear #2.
From The Sun:
EXPAT Brits who have lived and worked in Europe face losing access to their pensions in a No Deal Brexit scenario, Ministers will admit on Thursday.
Most at risk are Brits who have worked in EU countries and built up pension funds abroad that are then paid into a UK bank account. Under Brussels pensions rules, funds that cross borders can only be paid into a bank account registered in an EU country.
Pensioners who have worked in the EU and now live in countries outside the union are currently made to open bank accounts in an EU state to collect their funds.The UK will become a “third country” on 30 March 2019, sparking the risk of expats and former expats with British bank accounts having their payments cut off.
That rule sounds plausible, it's basically protectionism for banks in EU Member States. But all people need to do it open another bank account in an EU Member State, that's hassle and a few extra Euros in bank charges every month, but not the end of the world.
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Rather less plausibly, from This Is Money:
A technical paper published by the Department for Exiting the EU raised fears that UK citizens in Europe may lose access to insurance contracts and other financial services if British-based companies cannot use passporting rights, as is likely to happen if the UK and EU cannot agree a deal.
At a press conference following the publication of the government’s technical papers regarding a no deal Brexit, Raab said British expats' access to their pensions would be 'a practical issue that we will be able to resolve'.
Again, I can imagine that insurers in the remaining EU Member States will be pushing their governments to deny British insurers from peddling their services in their countries, and why wouldn't they? I've no idea why any sane person would want to take out insurance with a foreign company anyway, they are slippery bastards at the best of times, but getting an insurance company abroad to pay out must be a nightmare.
Existing pensions contracts are under UK law, UK based savers paid in their premiums under UK law (before they went abroad) and are entitled to their pensions payments under UK law. If the remaining EU Member States really were to do the stupidest thing imaginable and block such flows of money into their countries (a kind of invisible export), then all expat pensioners need to do is have their UK pension paid into a UK bank account first, and then take the money from there.
The interesting point is that under tax law in most countries, a UK pension received by a UK expat is taxable income in the country where the expat lives, so the other country should be encouraging people to declare them. If they do what is threatened, they would be actually encouraging tax evasion (having hidden the source, the expat would be daft to then tell the authorities that they receive it).
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While I'm on the topic, I saw a related headline on BBC News 24 today, to the effect that EHIC cards would no longer be valid. The most up-to-date article I can find on the BBC is this, which is as misleading as is possible without actually lying:
If you are getting ready to go on holiday to another EU country or Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway or Switzerland, you are likely to be packing your European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) along with your passport. The EHIC entitles you to state-provided medical treatment* should you need it while visiting one of those countries...
A House of Lords report in March 2018 warned that "in the absence of an agreement on future relations that covers this topic, the rights currently enjoyed by 27 million UK citizens, thanks to the EHIC, will cease after Brexit".
* Not true, the cards just entitle you to medical treatment on the same terms and conditions as people in the other country would get, so if a country has prescription or treatment charges for its own residents, a British tourist has to pay the same charges. And by and large, there is no 'state-provided medical treatment' in most European countries. It is usually privately provided (even if that is by government bodies acting as private businesses) and funded/regulated by the government (or some quango or other, which is controlled and regulated by the government).
But it only takes two minutes to find the actual official UK government website which explains that EHIC cards have fuck all to do with the EU:
An EHIC lets you get state healthcare* in other EEA countries and Switzerland at a reduced cost or sometimes for free.
* Same mistake again, but hey.
Thursday 23 August 2018
Nobody move or the pensioners get hurt!
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8 comments:
ALL the expats residing in the EU thay i know already have local bank accounts. And they can also access their UK bank account via either the UK banks branch in the EU, or online. Remember thst pretty well all major UK banks are actually international banks.
This is a non problem.
From personal experience I know that I had to supply proof of residency in the EU to open a bank account in a EU country (at least in Spain). By the way, try opening a bank account in the UK without proof of residence in the UK.
Regarding insurance: I know EU citizens who own life insurance policies with UK insurers.
Unknown. Yes. The 'proof of EU citizenship' is the key point here. It's expansionism and protectionism by the EU. Therefore it's an EU not a UK problem. It's their fault not ours. And you are correct about UK banking account opening. And that's also mad. It's justified by 'anti money laundering', but loads of scammers still easily open UK bank accounts with all the ID they require - we had recent experience of this with a client of ours. Crooks will be crooks and they are always ahead in the arms race so all all this ID stuff does is inconvenience honest people.
I was more referring to the statement: "But all people need to do it open another bank account in an EU Member State". It is not that easy, especially if you have moved back home.
Above, MarkW is correct in theory, but I think Unknown is correct in practice. My EU wife knows she cannot afford to let her UK bank account slip, as the problems of starting again here are vast. Indeed, in reverse, her EU passport renewals assume greater and greater importance.
Unfortunately, when we returned to the UK a decade ago we closed our old EU bank accounts down. Mainly to stop unknown DD, SO, charges 'accidently' appearing in accounts we no longer supervised. In short, back then I thought a clean break was prudent and simple. Ho Hum,
Also we find that our EU state and professional pensions sit over that side of the North Sea. As it happens I am still very happy to 'bet' on the EU country concerned with these funds (a somewhat risky, lifetime, FX bet). But I really did have some personnal skin in the EU no vote, and knew all along I could have problems on our retirement.But if I were really, really worried, a serious financial problem, loomed, etc, I would hire you or Mr Lola in :)
* I don't know if Lola writes articles for his profession this may or may not be of interest to look into. A couple of years ago I made soundings (I was more interested than serious, as you can see) about moving my EU pension fund to my UK pension fund. They effectively said sure, 'is the UK fund on our 'recognised funds' list?'I said 'How many British funds on you list?' they said, 'one or two!' Mmmm. EU Theory and Practice for the little people.
So I read Mrs MikeW your whole article above Mark. She has calmed down about the whole issue. Many Thanks. Unfortunately she has just found something else to be mad with me about instead :)
Ta for comments, but what this boils down is that banks are bastards. That's not strictly much to do with brexit.
Mike W. Transferring pension funds / entitlements across any border is a nightmare. The UK was better than most as it has a long history of private (i.e. non state pensions). Generally it's complicated - complicated deliberately by the ceding jurisdiction that sees extra-jurisdictional transfers as 'costing it money'.
I could go on but I have to do some work today...
MW. yes, banks are bastards. But this is a (Brexit) EU problem.
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