Individual residence and foreign income

Residence and more-than-six-month tests

Section 2 includes an individual who resides in Solomon Islands, allowing temporary absences the Commissioner considers reasonable. It also deems residence where aggregate presence exceeds six months in the calendar year, or the Commissioner is satisfied that the individual intends such residence. Six months is the statutory expression, not an invented 183-day substitute.

Employment-contract alternative

Residence can also arise where the individual is present, or satisfies the Commissioner they will be present in the year, to fulfil a contract of employment exercised wholly or mainly in Solomon Islands for a specified period of at least six months. The definition's proviso allows the Commissioner to treat an individual as non-resident after considering the contract's nature and payment method, notwithstanding satisfaction of paragraph (a).

Residents and non-residents have different scope

Section 3 charges a resident on income accrued in, derived from or received in Solomon Islands or elsewhere, including business, employment, investment, property and pension categories subject to the Act. Non-residents are charged on income accrued in or derived from Solomon Islands. Inland Revenue expressly tells residents to include foreign income in their returns.

Work location and mixed business income

Income from employment exercised in Solomon Islands is treated as locally derived whether paid there or not. For a resident carrying on a trade, profession or business partly inside and partly outside the country, section 4 deems the whole income from it Solomon Islands-derived. An overseas payment account therefore does not determine source or remove the charge.

Limited relief for foreign tax

Section 44 provides a resident relief where foreign tax is paid or payable on the same income, limited by the lower statutory effective-rate calculation. Sections 45–46 separately govern relief under tax arrangements and capped credits; an applicable arrangement displaces section 44 unless it provides otherwise. Foreign tax is not an automatic full refund.