Having recently celebrated 10 years working in tax, I realised that I never had the pleasure of dealing with tax matters prior to the launch of Statutory Residence Test (SRT) regime, the introduction of the SRT pre-dating the start of my career by about 6 months. Never have I had to deal with the concepts of determining whether someone was "Ordinarily Resident”, or the rather confusing “Resident but not Ordinarily Resident”.

Luckily for me, my clients and fellow advisors the SRT brought to an end much of the uncertainty around an individual’s residence. Prior to April 2013, whether one was resident or not was mostly determined by alignment of the facts of a person’s situation to countless tribunal and court cases decided over decades.

Determining UK residence

And so, effective 6 April 2013, the SRT was born, and with it came certainty. Thresholds for day counts written into statute allowed for taxpayers (and advisors!) to accurately determine, from year to year, whether an individual was likely to be resident for tax purposes in the UK or not. With the complexities and consequences of other legislation which relies on an individual’s residence, such as temporary non-residence and the deemed domicile rules, having certainty matters.

From April 2025, an individual's residence will also determine their domicile and, as a knock-on effect, their exposure to UK Inheritance Tax. The requirement for certainty will then be all the more important.

The SRT is built on the broad notions that it should be harder to break one’s UK residence than to commence a UK residence, and that the more ties one has to the UK (through family, accommodation, or work), the fewer number of days one can spend in the UK before becoming resident.

Step-by-step

Working through the SRT flowchart allows a taxpayer to determine firstly whether they are automatically non-UK resident, either by virtue of day counts or working full time overseas. If none of these tests are met, then a determination of whether they are automatically UK resident, again, by virtue of a day count, working in the UK or having a home in the UK. 

‍What if the tests are not met? 

If none of the above tests are met, they must consider the matrix of the number of ties they have with the UK, and the number of days spent in the UK under the Sufficient Ties Test, which considers the taxpayer’s family, accommodation, work and presence in the UK. At the end of the test, the taxpayer should have affirmation over their residence status for that tax year.

Although the SRT isn’t perfect (a statutory definition of “Home”, amongst other things, may make life a little easier!), it is certainly more perfect than what we had previously and the single case that we have seen since 2013 has been focussed on a single concept of the SRT (A Taxpayer v HMRC, concerning what is an exceptional circumstance).

Thank you SRT for over a decade of day counts and ties

Happy 10 and a bit birthday SRT, thank you for over a decade of day counts and ties, of meticulously recording working hours and keeping hotel receipts. May you live a long and helpful life!

If you want to discuss anything covered in this article, please contact Richard Thomson-Curtis, or indeed anyone in the Sanctoras team via hello@sanctoras.com.

We will publish the Sanctoras SRT Guide in April, should you need an advance copy please let us know.

This blog is a general summary of the law. It should not replace legal advice tailored to your specific circumstances.