Offshore structures have long played a central role both in the UK tax planning of non-UK domiciliaries and in their wider asset protection and succession planning.

Although in the past eight years or so, various UK governments have introduced legislation which has withdrawn some of the previously available tax advantages of such structures, they remain valuable tax planning vehicles in the right circumstances.

Typically, most offshore structures will comprise of either an offshore trust, an offshore company or an offshore trust which holds underlying offshore companies. We will look at examples of such structures later in this article.