Self Assessment filing

[Jayne1234]

I filed my self assessment for 2024-25 yesterday.

When I got to the section about do you have any foreign income, I clicked on the "no" button and a message popped up, which has never happened before, saying "are you sure, we know you have an overseas bank account".

This is true - it is to pay utility and other bills for my holiday apartment. It is a Euro current account, does not earn any interest, and I do not rent the apartment out. The account is funded by transfers from my UK bank account. I can only assume that EU banks must have started sending details to HMRC of their UK customers.

My question is: do I need to tell HMRC that I own an overseas property, and do I need to provide bank statements to prove I have no foreign income? TIA

I can only assume that EU banks must have started sending details to HMRC of their UK customers.

Can't help you the specifics but for info in at least one EU country it's been mandatory for a few years now to declare full details of any accounts held overseas when filing your annual tax return and the authorities do run checks..

I would indeed assume HMRC might well be doing similar.

Funnily enough, I am about to submit my first HMRC self assessment because I've started receiving an income overseas.

The regulatory framework giving rise to this is called the Common Reporting Standard. The EU joined in 2016, the UK in 2017, and there has been a big move recently by banks everywhere to gather information necessary to send to other CRS members. I have jointly held a bank account in the EU since 1999, but recently changed the address on it to my UK one when I became the sole account holder, and they wanted my UK NI number. I am also required to confirm or update the information they hold every year.

I presume if you have no income then you can't declare it. If you're asked about foreign assets like a house then answer, but I don't think you are. And, if you ever sell the place, look very closely at how any CGT is applied there and in the UK.