Living and working abroad

Find out how to manage your Nationwide products while living or working abroad, and overseas fees and charges.

For tax reasons, you must tell HMRC if you leave the UK to live abroad. See moving or retiring abroad for information about benefits, pensions and voting.

See change of contact details as you need to change your address, and give us an overseas telephone number in case we need to contact you urgently.

If you're using a debit or credit card abroad, there may be fees for making cash withdrawals in foreign currency outside the UK and making debit card payments in a foreign currency. Find the fee for your card and see examples of foreign purchases and cash withdrawals.

FlexAccount
If you currently have travel insurance through your FlexAccount, please note that this cover is only valid for permanent residents of the UK.

If you're in the British Forces you'll need to demonstrate a permanent UK address when you make a claim. Trips must start and end in the UK to be valid.

FlexPlus
If you live outside the UK you will not be able to use the insurance benefits (including travel insurance) that come with FlexPlus accounts and will still have to pay the monthly account fee of £13 for maintaining the account, so FlexPlus may not be the right account for you.

If you want to rent your house out while living abroad, you need to be aware of the additional interest charge (unless you're in the British Armed Forces) and fill in our ‘permission to let’ form. Read about the fees, charges and steps to apply.

If you’re living abroad and have ISA flexibility, you can withdraw ISA funds (during the tax year), without impacting your annual ISA allowance. But you can’t add any new funds above the amount withdrawn to your existing ISA.

You’ll probably want to open a bank account in the country you’re living in to handle your salary. We can provide a list of your payments to help you set up the new account.

If you’re moving abroad to a country in the EUFallback Textor EEAFallback Textand want to move your banking there too, we can help.

You can send your money between your UK bank or building society account and an overseas bank account. See our guide to sending money outside the UK to find out how. Please note that Nationwide only accept Sterling as a currency and we don't accept cheques from foreign banks.