Can I still get relief if my appeal deadline has passed?
Possibly. The mutual agreement procedure is a treaty process rather than a domestic appeal, and it is generally available even where domestic objection rights have run out. It carries its own time limit, usually measured from notification of the action that caused the double taxation rather than from a filing date, so the question is whether that period is still open rather than whether the domestic one is. It is worth checking before concluding nothing can be done, because the two clocks are different and a closed domestic route does not always mean a closed treaty route.
What is the mutual agreement procedure?
It is the route a treaty provides where the two countries' treatment of the same income leaves a person taxed twice, or taxed contrary to the agreement. The person presents a case, and the two designated authorities then deal with each other to try to resolve it. The important features are that it operates between administrations rather than in a tribunal, that it can address a result neither country's domestic law regards as wrong, and that relief is given by each country within its own system once they agree. Presentation is the taxpayer's part; the negotiation is not.
How long does a mutual agreement procedure take?
Longer than a domestic appeal, and the pace is set by two administrations rather than by you. The case has to be examined on both sides, the two authorities have to correspond, and neither is under an obligation to agree. Some modified treaties add a binding step where agreement is not reached and some do not, which changes both the likely duration and the leverage in the discussion. Plan on the basis that the matter will be open for a substantial period: keep the underlying records available, keep the domestic position protected where a deadline requires it, and expect further questions from either side.
Should I file an objection as well as a treaty request?
Usually yes, and the two have to be kept consistent. A domestic objection preserves rights a treaty request does not preserve, and a treaty request reaches an outcome a domestic objection cannot, because it commits both countries rather than one. The risk in running both is telling two different stories, and the risk in running neither is a deadline passing while the other process is pending. In practice the domestic filing protects the position and the treaty case does the work, with one set of facts and one analysis underlying both submissions.
Does interest keep running while the two countries negotiate?
Presenting a case does not by itself stop the machinery in either country. Whether collection can be suspended while the matter is open, and how interest is treated in the meantime, are questions of each administration's own rules and practice rather than of the treaty, so they have to be checked separately for each of the two countries. Do that at the start. A case that resolves well but leaves a long period of accrued interest and enforcement activity behind it is a worse outcome than it appears, and both of those are usually addressable early.
What happens if the two countries cannot agree?
Nothing forces them to. In a treaty with no further step, an unresolved case leaves the double taxation in place and sends you back to whatever domestic rights remain, which is why protecting those from the outset matters. Some agreements as modified provide a binding step where the authorities fail to agree within a set period, but that is not universal, because it depended on both countries opting into it. Establish which position your treaty is in before deciding how much of the case to invest in, because it changes what a failure to agree actually costs.
What is cross-border tax?
Cross-border tax is what applies when income, assets or people touch more than one tax system at once — someone living in one country and earning in another, a company selling or hiring abroad, a family holding property in a second country. The work is rarely one country's rules applied harder; it is reconciling two sets of rules and claiming the relief that stops the same income being taxed twice at full rates. See what we do.
Is double taxation illegal?
It is legal. Two countries can each have a valid claim on the same income — one because the income arose there, the other because you live there — and nothing prohibits both from exercising it. What exists instead is relief: tax treaties allocate the claim, and domestic law gives a credit for foreign tax paid. The relief is not automatic, though. It is claimed on a return, and unclaimed relief is simply lost. See how double taxation is relieved.
