You need to be careful when employees are going to work, currently working, or have worked previously whilst physically present in the United Kingdom. In these instances, you must ensure that you get a statutory residency test completed on your employee’s personal circumstances before making any payments.
Where you have employees that are permanently overseas (and clearly non-UK residents) you will not have UK PAYE obligations and can likely pay them free of tax and national insurance. It is also likely that UK workplace pension (automatic enrolment) legislation will also NOT apply to the earnings of these non-UK resident individuals.
If all your employees are long-term non-residents, you can be reasonably confident that you do not have UK PAYE obligations on their earnings from your UK company.
Depending on the location of your employee it is highly likely that you will have PAYE withholding obligations in their local jurisdiction. You should also be careful to ensure that the type of work these individuals perform for you do not obligate your organisation to register a local branch or subsidiary in this country or region.
Ensure that you have spoken to our tax experts before making any decisions.
