International Accounting

Yes. There is no legal requirement for a director of a UK limited company to be a UK resident or even a British national. You can be based anywhere in the world and still be a director of a UK company. The legal question is simple. The tax question is where it gets more complicated, and where getting proper advice matters most.

Carthy Accountants is a Stafford-based firm of chartered accountants with over 25 years of experience. In that time, we have worked with business owners in Spain, New Zealand, Switzerland, the Canaries, and beyond, all of them running UK companies from a different country, all of them trying to make sense of a situation that most accountants find genuinely difficult.

We are not a big firm that treats international situations as edge cases. We are an experienced team that has built the processes, the relationships, and the cross-border knowledge to handle exactly this configuration correctly: UK company, non-UK resident director, obligations in two countries.

We work with advisers in the countries our clients live in, so the UK side and the local side can be coordinated. We use cloud accounting software that gives you real-time visibility of your UK company's finances from wherever you are. And we stay on top of your UK deadlines so you do not have to.

The 181-day rule is a Spanish tax residency threshold. If you spend more than 180 days in Spain in a calendar year, Spain can claim you as a tax resident, regardless of where your business is based. Similar rules exist in other countries, though the exact number of days and the way they are counted varies.

The rule matters for UK company directors living abroad because it can trigger personal tax obligations in your country of residence that you were not expecting, even if your company remains in the UK. One of our clients was caught by this rule during COVID lockdown while caring for an elderly relative. She did not cross the threshold intentionally. The financial and administrative consequences lasted several years.

If you are living abroad and spending significant time in one place, it is worth understanding the residency rules of that country and making sure your situation is structured to work within them.

The UK Statutory Residence Test (SRT) determines whether you are a UK tax resident for any given tax year. It looks at the number of days you spend in the UK, your ties to the UK (family, property, work), and your working arrangements. If you get this wrong in either direction, the consequences can be significant.

Spending too many days in the UK while living abroad can mean HMRC still treats you as UK-resident for tax purposes. Spending too few days in the UK while running a UK company can affect questions about where the company is managed and controlled, which has its own implications.

You do not need to become an expert in the SRT. That is what we are for. But it is worth knowing that it exists and that your day count in the UK matters.

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. It depends on the country you live in, how your income flows, where you are tax resident, and the nature of your business.

In some countries, having a UK company but living locally without any local business structure is perfectly straightforward. In others, the local tax authority may expect you to have a local entity. In others still, whether you need a local company depends on how much time you spend working there and where your income is generated.

One of our clients in New Zealand ended up with both a UK limited company and a New Zealand entity, with income flowing correctly through both. Another in Spain has no local company. There is no universal answer. The right structure depends on your specific situation, which is why the first conversation matters so much.

The same thing that happens if you miss it while living in the UK, but with the added complication that you may not have received the reminder because it went to a UK address you are no longer monitoring.

Companies House fines for late accounts start at £150 and rise to £1,500 or more for filings that are more than six months late, doubling for consecutive years. HMRC penalties for late corporation tax returns are separate. In the most serious cases of persistent non-filing, Companies House can strike the company

 off the register, which dissolves it.
The solution is straightforward: a UK-based accountant who monitors your deadlines and chases you in advance. That is a core part of what we do. Most of our international clients say they do not think about UK filing deadlines anymore because they trust us to flag them.

Our fees depend on the complexity of your situation and the services you need. For a UK company with a non-resident director, a typical package covers bookkeeping, VAT (if applicable), annual accounts, corporation tax return, and director's personal self-assessment. Additional services such as payroll, management accounts, or cross-border structuring advice are priced separately.

We offer fixed monthly fees rather than hourly billing, so you always know what you are paying. We will give you a clear quote after the first conversation, once we understand your setup.

What we would say on cost is this. The question is not what it costs to have a specialist accountant. The question is what it costs not to have one. For business owners in genuinely complex cross-border situations, the cost of getting it wrong, whether through missed expenses, incorrect structure, late filing penalties, or unexpected tax liabilities, is consistently higher than the cost of getting it right from the start.

It is not too late. This is one of the most common situations we work with. People move abroad, manage the situation as best they can, and then realise at some point that they are not sure whether things have been handled correctly.

The first step is understanding where you actually stand, which we can help you establish. Depending on what we find, there may be some retrospective work to do, but in most cases the path forward is clear and manageable once someone who understands the situation takes a proper look at it.

Do not let uncertainty become paralysis. Get in touch and we will tell you honestly what the situation looks like and what needs to happen.

Yes, and in many cases you will need to. We handle the UK side: your company's accounts, compliance, and tax. Your local accountant handles your personal tax position and any local business obligations in your country of residence. Where it matters, we coordinate with each other.

What we have found is that the gap in the market is not local accountants, who generally do their job well in their own jurisdiction. The gap is UK accountants who understand the cross-border picture well enough to work alongside a local adviser rather than in isolation from one. That is the role we play.