Before you move abroad

This is the order I’d work through things in the six months before moving or retiring to South East Asia: the big decisions first, then documents and accounts, then the offices to tell. The steps apply whichever passport you hold, and the last three sections list the offices for Australians, Britons and Americans. If you’re leaving Canada or New Zealand, take the same questions to your own tax, pension and health offices.

Some of these jobs can only be done, or are far easier, while you still live at home. My own time in Saigon was meant to be three months and turned into eight, then longer, so I’d do the paperwork as if you’re staying, even if you’re “just trying it”.

Six months out: the decisions

Choose your visa

Your visa sets the timetable for everything else, because it decides which documents you need and how fresh they have to be. Thailand’s O-A retirement visa, applied for from home, wants a police check and a medical certificate no more than three months old. The Philippines’ SRRV wants a police clearance and a medical certificate issued in the six months before you apply.

If you haven’t settled on a country yet, start with retiring in South East Asia, which compares the visas side by side.

Check your passport

Thailand wants at least six months left on your passport when you arrive. A long-stay visa can need more: the Royal Thai Embassy in Washington asks for 18 months for the O-A.

Renewing from abroad is harder. An Australian renewing overseas has to lodge at an embassy or consulate and can’t pay for priority processing, and the current passport is generally cancelled when they apply, which is awkward when your visa is stamped in it. If yours has less than about two years left, renew it before you go. In Australia, allow at least six weeks.

Get tax advice before you sell, rent out or move anything

Leaving can change your tax residency, and some decisions are hard to undo once you’ve gone.

• Australians: if you’re a foreign resident when you sell your home, you generally can’t claim the main residence exemption, so the timing of a sale matters. The expat tax guide explains the residency tests.
• Britons: GOV.UK says you may be non-resident the day after you leave, but UK income such as rent can still be taxed.
• Americans: you’re taxed on worldwide income wherever you live, so you keep filing a US return.

The country you move to may tax you too, and the expat tax guide covers how Thailand taxes money its residents bring in. See a tax adviser who handles departures before you sign anything.

Work out what happens to your pension

• Australians: claim the Age Pension before you go. On the day you claim, you must be an Australian resident and in Australia, and none of the four countries has the social security agreement that would let you claim from there. The Age Pension overseas covers what’s cut after 6, 12 and 26 weeks.
• Britons: your State Pension can be paid in all four countries, but it only rises each year in the Philippines. It’s frozen in Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia. See your UK State Pension abroad.
• Americans: if you’re a US citizen, Social Security can keep paying you in all four countries while you’re eligible. The places it can’t send payments are elsewhere, such as Cuba and North Korea.

Price health insurance while you’re healthy

Your home cover stops working where you’ll live. Medicare doesn’t pay for treatment overseas, though Smartraveller says you can still use it on visits home for up to five years after you move. The NHS is residence-based, so you lose automatic entitlement when you move abroad permanently. US Medicare doesn’t cover care abroad either.

Travel insurance isn’t the answer: GOV.UK points out it isn’t designed for people who live abroad. You need an international health policy, and insurers can refuse cover for pre-existing conditions, so get quotes now, before anything changes. The healthcare and insurance guide covers what to compare and what it costs by age.

Three months out: documents, money and logins

Order police checks and medical certificates

Time these to your visa, not your departure. Order too early and they expire before you apply.

• Australia: the AFP National Police Certificate costs A$57 online, and most are completed and posted within 48 hours. Some checks take 15 to 30 business days, and a check with fingerprints can’t be done online.
• UK: an ACRO police certificate.
• US: an FBI background check.

Get documents certified the way they’ll be accepted

Before you pay for anything, ask the office that wants a document exactly what it needs: the original, a certified copy, an apostille, or legalisation by its embassy. An apostille is a certificate from your own government confirming that the signature, stamp or seal on a document is real, and it’s accepted in countries that belong to the Hague Apostille Convention.

Where apostilles aren’t accepted yet, ask that country’s embassy how it wants your documents legalised. Who issues the apostille depends on where the document came from:

• Australia: DFAT, for Australian public documents.
• UK: the FCDO Legalisation Office, £45 per document for a paper apostille, usually taking up to 25 working days plus postage. Its £35 e-Apostille takes up to two working days, but not for birth, marriage or death certificates or ACRO certificates for England and Wales.
• US: the State Department for federal documents such as FBI checks. Documents issued by a state, such as birth and marriage certificates, go to that state.

Pack the originals of your birth, marriage and divorce certificates too. Replacing them from overseas is harder.

Banks and cards

Keep at least one account at home. Your pension, tax refunds and bills need it: the ATO needs an Australian bank account to pay a refund, and HMRC suggests keeping your UK account open until any refund has arrived.

Then tell your banks you’re moving. The ATO says to tell your Australian bank you’re a foreign resident and give it your overseas address, so it withholds the right tax (10 percent on interest). If it doesn’t know, it may withhold at 47 percent.

Set up a card with no foreign transaction fees and a transfer service while you still have a home address, because identity checks are easier from home. Banking when you move to Asia has the setup I’d use, and sending money from Australia compares the services.

Keep a phone number that gets your codes

Banks and government services send security codes by text, and losing your home number can lock you out. Check every login before you cancel anything.

• myGov: text codes work overseas only with international roaming on the Australian number registered to your account. The myGov app, passkeys and Digital ID don’t need codes, so switch to one of those before you leave.
• GOV.UK One Login: it can’t text a number registered outside the UK. Set up an authenticator app instead.
• Login.gov (US): which international numbers can get codes changes from time to time. Set up more than one sign-in method.

The simplest fix is to keep your home number on the cheapest plan with roaming, and move every login you can to an app.

Driving licence and permit

If your licence will expire while you’re away, renew it before you go. GOV.UK’s online renewal is only for residents of Great Britain, and Australian states have their own rules for renewing from overseas.

Get an international driving permit (IDP) at home before you leave:

• Australia: from the AAA and its member clubs, the only authorised issuers for Australian licence holders.
• UK: from PayPoint shops, £5.50. GOV.UK lists the 1968 type for Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines, and the 1949 type for Cambodia.
• US: from AAA or the American Automobile Touring Alliance (AATA).

In Thailand, Smartraveller says you need the IDP plus your licence for that type of vehicle, and Australian digital licences may not be accepted, so take the card. Riding a motorbike needs a motorcycle licence, whatever the rental shop says.

Someone at home who can act for you

A power of attorney lets someone you trust deal with your bank, tax office or property at home. Moneysmart explains the difference: a general power of attorney covers a set time, such as while you’re overseas, but ends if you lose the capacity to make decisions. An enduring one keeps working. Each Australian state and territory has its own rules.

A home power of attorney may not work in your new country. GOV.UK says a UK lasting power of attorney may not be recognised in Thailand, and the US State Department says wills, trusts and powers of attorney may not be enforceable abroad. Review your will at the same time, especially if you might buy anything overseas, and get local legal advice there.

The last month: tell people and pack the right things

• Medicines. Ask your doctor for a letter listing your medicines, doses and that they’re for your own use. Check each one is legal where you’re going: Smartraveller says some medicines are illegal or restricted in Thailand and may need a permit. PBS medicines can only be taken overseas for your own use or for someone travelling with you.
• Your address. Give your tax office and banks your real overseas address once you have one, and arrange for post at home to go to family or a mail service.
• Travel advice. Subscribe to Smartraveller’s updates for your new country, sign up for email alerts on the FCDO travel advice page, or enrol in the US State Department’s Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP).

Once you land, each country has its own first-month list: a local SIM in your own name, registering your address and opening a local bank account. See moving to Thailand, moving to Vietnam, moving to Cambodia or moving to the Philippines.

Australia: who to tell

The ATO. You can lodge your return early, before 30 June, only if you’re leaving permanently and won’t earn Australian income other than interest, dividends or royalties. Early returns are on paper. Otherwise you lodge in the normal period, from overseas through myGov if your sign-in works there.

Services Australia. If you get the Age Pension, tell them if you’re going to live in another country or will be away for more than six weeks. You can do it in your Centrelink online account through myGov. Immigration tells them when you leave and when you return.

Private health insurance. Your fund won’t cover you overseas. If you cancel hospital cover after your Lifetime Health Cover base day to go overseas for at least a year, the days you spend outside Australia don’t count towards the 1,094 days you’re allowed without cover. Visits home of under 90 days in a row still count as time overseas. So you can stop paying without building up a loading for the time away, if you ever come back and rejoin.

Voting. You can register as an overseas elector up to three months before you leave or within three years after, if you plan to return within six years. Voting isn’t compulsory while you’re overseas, but if you neither vote nor apply for a postal vote, your registration and enrolment may be cancelled. The registration lasts six years from when you left, and you can extend it a year at a time.

The UK: who to tell

HMRC. Use P85 if you don’t file Self Assessment. If you haven’t left yet, you have to print and post it; after you’ve gone, you can claim online. If you file Self Assessment, send the SA109 residence pages with a paper return, due by 31 October, because HMRC’s online services can’t be used to say you’ve left.

Benefits. You generally can’t get income-related benefits such as Pension Credit if you’re abroad for more than four weeks. Not telling the office that pays you that you’re going abroad counts as benefit fraud.

Voting. Since 16 January 2024 there’s no 15-year limit, so you can register however long you’ve been away. You can vote in UK Parliament elections by post or proxy, or only by proxy if you’re registered in Northern Ireland.

Your State Pension. It’s frozen in Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia. Your UK State Pension abroad covers what that costs and the rules for topping up National Insurance from abroad.

The US: who to tell

The IRS. The automatic extension is for filing only: interest on any tax you owe still runs from 15 April.

Social Security. If you don’t send the questionnaire back, your payments stop. From all four countries, the contact is the Federal Benefits Unit at the US Embassy in Manila.

Medicare. It generally doesn’t pay for care outside the US, but Part B is a decision to make before you go. If you drop it and sign up again later, you’ll usually pay 10 percent more for each full 12-month period you went without, generally for as long as you have Part B. You can usually only sign up again in the General Enrollment Period, 1 January to 31 March, and cover may start later.

State taxes. Ask your state’s tax agency whether it still counts you as a resident after you leave. The rules differ from state to state.