Check you qualify, then elect and claim
The new OWR runs off the same gateway as the FIG regime. You qualify for 2025/26 if you are UK resident under the Statutory Residence Test, the year is one of your first four years of UK residence, and you were non-UK resident for at least 10 consecutive tax years immediately before your first resident year. A split year of arrival still counts as one of the four. The relief covers earnings for duties performed outside the UK, apportioned on a just and reasonable basis, which for most people means overseas workdays over total workdays. It no longer matters where you were paid: HMRC confirms relief is available whether the income lands in a UK or an overseas account. Then two deliberate steps on the SA109: an X in box 40 to elect, and an X in box 41 to claim. Our guide to the new Overseas Workday Relief rules covers eligibility, and the FIG regime guide the shared test.
The numbers: boxes 44 to 49 and the cap
Box 44 is your total qualifying employment income after qualifying deductions. Box 46 is the part of it relating to duties performed outside the UK. Box 47 is the financial limit, the lower of 30% of box 44 and £300,000, and box 48 is the relief you claim, which cannot exceed box 47. Box 49 is the total OWR claimed for the year and must be completed or it will not reach your tax calculation. Take an executive with £350,000 of qualifying employment income for the UK part of a split arrival year and 26 overseas workdays out of 130: box 46 is £70,000, box 47 is £105,000, so the full £70,000 is relieved, saving £31,500 at the additional rate. If you qualify under the transitional provisions for pre-April 2025 arrivers, tick box 43 and leave box 47 blank. Our SA109 walkthrough covers the rest of the form, and why the SA109 cannot be filed online explains the software point.
Records, cost and deadlines
HMRC's standard for the apportionment is just and reasonable, which in practice means contemporaneous evidence: a day-by-day workday calendar, flight and hotel records, diary entries showing what was done on overseas days, and payslips and bonus letters supporting boxes 44 and 46. A log reconstructed from memory in January is the weakest position in an enquiry. The election has a price: you give up the Personal Allowance and the CGT annual exempt amount for the year, the same cost as a FIG claim, so on a modest package with few overseas days run the arithmetic first. Deadlines run on two levels. The 2025/26 return is due 31 October 2026 on paper or 31 January 2027 through software, and the election and claim can be made in a return up to 31 January 2028. Our guide to FIG regime record keeping sets out the evidence, and the split-year guide covers arrival-year attribution.