tax-law foreign-relations
Lying on FATCA form
<p>I am a British citizen born to an American mother in Britain.</p>

<p>I went to my local bank in England recently to open a high interest savings account. At one point the clerk asked me if I am a U.S. citizen. Not seeing why that would be his business, I said no.</p>

<p>I understand now that the bank is required to ask this so they can report all their U.S. citizens to the American IRS under FATCA. </p>

<p>How should I proceed at this point?
Did I break British law, U.S. law, or just my bank's terms and conditions? </p>

<p>Your best choice of action is probably to contact your bank and tell them that you double-checked, made a mistake, and do have US citizenship. The longer you wait the worse any consequences would probably be.</p>

<p>I assume your passport has UK as place of birth.  That's key.  If the bank somehow found out you are also a US citizen, they would likely close your account and possibly send your account info to the IRS if that balance was ever over $10,000.  </p>

<p>Pray that the US repeals citizen based taxation (they're working on it), and replaces it with residence/territorial based taxation.  Hopefully it makes its way into the current proposed tax reform bill. </p>
