Leaving Australia: the checklist to tick off before you board

Packing is the easy bit. The admin you skip in the last fortnight is the admin that bites you from a time zone where nobody answers the phone.

The short version

• Work out whether you'll stay an Australian tax resident. It drives almost everything else, from bank interest to your tax return [1].
• If you become a foreign resident, tell your bank and give it an overseas address, or it may withhold tax at 47% on your interest [2].
• Have a HELP debt and moving away for 183 days or more in a year? You must update your details with the ATO within 7 days of leaving [3].
• Medicare doesn't follow you overseas, and your super generally stays locked in Australia until retirement age [4][5].
• Decide what happens to your vote: stay on the roll, register as an overseas elector, or come off it [6].

Start with the big question: are you still a tax resident?

Before you close a single account, think about your tax residency. Leaving Australia does not automatically make you a foreign resident. The ATO applies four tests, and the main one, the "resides" test, looks at your physical presence, intentions, family, work, assets and living arrangements [1]. Someone who leaves but keeps their house, partner and car here can easily still be resident.

You don't need to have it nailed down to the last detail before you fly, but you do need a working answer. It decides:

• how your Australian rent, interest and dividends are taxed
• whether you lodge a full tax return next year, and what goes in it
• what you tell your bank and your super fund

We cover the tests properly in our guide to tax residency after moving. If the answer is genuinely unclear, that's the moment to book a tax adviser, not after the first return goes in.

The money admin

Your Australian bank account

Most people keep at least one Australian account open. You'll want it for rent from a property, super later on, tax refunds and paying Aussie bills. Before you go:

• Make sure you can log in from overseas. Many banks send one-time codes by SMS, so either keep your Australian number alive or switch to an authenticator app.
• Update your residency status once you know it. For foreign residents, interest is generally subject to 10% withholding tax and unfranked dividends to 30%, often cut to 15% under a tax treaty [2].
• Give the bank your overseas address. The ATO warns that without it, your payer may withhold at 47% [2].

HELP and other study loans

A HELP debt doesn't disappear at the airport. If you intend to live overseas for 183 days or more in any 12 months, you must update your contact details and lodge an overseas travel notification within 7 days of leaving [3]. After that, you report your worldwide income each year. For 2025–26, if it's at or below A$16,750 you lodge a non-lodgment advice; above that, you report and may owe a repayment [3].

Super

Your super stays where it is. Leaving Australia is not a condition of release for citizens or permanent residents. You generally get access at preservation age (60 for anyone born from 1 July 1964) once you retire, or at 65 [5]. The useful job before you go is tidying up: find lost accounts, consolidate if it suits you, and check the insurance inside your fund still makes sense. Our super article has the detail.

Health cover: Medicare and private insurance

Medicare doesn't cover you while you're overseas, so you need a health plan for your new country before you leave [4]. That might be a work policy, the local public system, or international health insurance. Australia has reciprocal health care agreements with 11 countries, but they're aimed at visitors needing urgent care and often exclude people who move there to live and work [7].

Services Australia keeps a citizen's Medicare enrolment until they've been away five years without returning to live [8]. After that, you re-enrol with your passport and proof that you're living here again.

If you hold private hospital cover, think before you cancel. Lifetime Health Cover adds 2% to your premium for each year over 30 that you didn't hold cover, but time spent overseas for a continuous year or more doesn't count against you [9]. Ask your insurer about suspending versus cancelling, and keep a copy of your clearance certificate.

The paperwork table

Here's who to tell, and when.

Voting and the electoral roll

You have three choices with the Australian Electoral Commission [6]:

1. Stay on the roll for a short trip using the overseas notification form for absent voters.
2. Register as an overseas elector if you intend to return within six years. You can do this up to three months before leaving or within three years after.
3. Come off the roll with the form for people moving indefinitely.

If you do nothing, the AEC starts removing your name from the roll about a month after you've left. Our voting guide explains each option.

Mail, phone and documents

Australia Post can redirect mail to an overseas address, but you must apply in person at a Post Office. In 2026 the standard rate is A$74 for one month up to A$370 for 12 months, and some items, such as parcels and Express Post, can't be sent on [10]. Many expats redirect to a trusted friend or family member instead, then go paperless everywhere they can.

Before you board:

1. Passport. Check the expiry. Many countries want six months' validity left on entry, and renewing from overseas through an embassy takes longer.
2. Phone number. Decide whether to keep your Australian number on a cheap plan. It's the key to most two-factor logins.
3. myGov. Make sure you can sign in from overseas, and that the ATO, Medicare and Centrelink are linked.
4. Driver's licence. Renew it if it expires soon. Some countries let you swap it for a local one; others make you sit a test.
5. Originals. Scan birth certificates, marriage certificates, degrees and references. Pack the originals or leave them with someone you trust.
6. Power of attorney. If you own property or run anything here, think about who can sign for you.
7. Will. Update it, or at least check it still reflects what you want.

What can wait until you land

Not everything has to happen before you go. These can usually be done from overseas once you know where you're living:

• registering as an overseas elector (you have three years) [6]
• consolidating super accounts through ATO online services [5]
• reporting HELP income, which is due by 31 October after the end of the income year [3]
• updating your address with super funds, insurers and the AEC

What can't wait: your tax residency thinking, the HELP notification, your bank login, and any health cover for the first weeks abroad.

Sources

1. Your tax residency – Australian Taxation Office
2. Interest, unfranked dividends and royalties (foreign residents) – Australian Taxation Office
3. Overseas repayments of study and training loans – Australian Taxation Office
4. Before you leave Australia – Services Australia
5. Conditions of release of super – Australian Taxation Office
6. Enrolling from overseas – Australian Electoral Commission
7. Reciprocal health care agreements – Smartraveller (DFAT)
8. Australian citizens eligibility for Medicare – Services Australia Operational Blueprint
9. Lifetime Health Cover – privatehealth.gov.au (Commonwealth Ombudsman)
10. Redirect mail – Australia Post

Keep reading

• Are you still an Australian tax resident once you move?
• Your super while you live overseas
• Keeping your Australian bank, number and accounts while abroad
• Voting from overseas: staying on the roll