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On March 3, 2016 ACA’s UK chapter held a one-hour meeting with more than 40 members and supporters at Somerset House in London. The purpose was to introduce ACA’s Executive Director, Marylouise Serrato, who was visiting from ACA’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. and in doing so give members the chance to hear first-hand some of the issues we are focusing on, including amending FATCA to allow Same Country Exemption (aka Safe Harbour), abolition of the NIIT tax (in the words on Charles Bruce, ACA’s Legal Counsel “one of the purest forms of double-taxation”), and our efforts to amend legislation approved in December 2015 allowing the IRS to revoke passports in the event of unpaid taxes.

On a more positive note, ACA’s new partnership with the State Department Federal Credit Union was announced to wide acclaim. Eighteen months in the making, the ACA-Members/SDFCU account will give Americans residing overseas (and back home in the US) access to banking services in the US even though they might have a foreign address.   

Besides the useful and informative speech by Marylouise, a highlight of the evening was a video “Update from Washington” produced by Charles Bruce touching on several of the points mentioned above, which was followed by a Q&A session. The event formally concluded with comments from Stacy Hilliard, Founder of Taysha Consulting, who together with Emily Walker Landis and others have started their own initiative to defend the interests of overseas Americans in advance of the upcoming congressional elections. We thank Stacy and Emily for graciously allowing us to use their facilities at Somerset House.

Many of those who attended the meeting met afterwards for drinks hosted by ACA at Tom’s Kitchen in the South Wing. By all accounts a fine evening.