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Overview
Sam Carver is a Partner in the Private Client team and a trusted adviser to international families, trustees, family offices and private wealth advisers on complex personal taxation, trust structuring, succession planning and asset protection matters.
With extensive experience advising ultra-high-net-worth individuals and multi-jurisdictional families, Sam specialises in the creation and implementation of tax-efficient trust and holding structures designed to protect and preserve wealth across generations. His practice frequently involves cross-border succession and tax issues, particularly for internationally mobile families and those with connections to the UK, Europe, the United States, the Channel Islands and Switzerland.
Sam is particularly well known for his work with professional trustees, advising on trust governance, restructuring, distributions, succession issues and complex tax planning. He combines deep technical knowledge with practical commercial advice, helping clients navigate sophisticated international wealth structures and succession challenges.
Expertise
Sam specialises in:
- Personal taxation
- Trust taxation
- International tax planning
- Succession planning
- Asset protection strategies
- Wealth preservation structures
- Offshore trusts
- UK trusts and fiduciary structures
- Non-domiciled individual planning
- Cross-border tax issues
- International private wealth planning
- Family trust structures
- Trustee advisory work
- HMRC disputes and investigations
- Trust restructuring and distributions
- Philanthropy and charitable planning
- Estate planning
- Wills and succession structures
- Powers of Attorney
- Court of Protection matters
- Family business succession
- Art and heritage asset planning
Reported Cases
- Advises international families on the creation and implementation of tax-efficient trust structures to protect global wealth.
- Acts for trustees of offshore and international trust structures with beneficiaries resident in multiple jurisdictions.
- Advises non-UK domiciled individuals and internationally mobile families on UK tax exposure and wealth structuring.
- Represents clients in complex disputes and negotiations with HMRC.
- Advises trustees on trust restructuring, trust division and trust termination exercises.
- Has advised on Public Trustee v Cooper blessing applications, including matters involving advisers across eight separate jurisdictions.
- Advises families relocating to and from the UK, US and Continental Europe on succession planning and tax implications.
- Regularly advises on succession and governance planning for UK family businesses and high-value estates.
Qualifications & Accreditations
Sam trained at Denton Wilde Sapte (now Dentons) and qualified as a solicitor in 2000.
He joined Berwin Leighton Paisner (later Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner) in 2001 before joining Payne Hicks Beach as a Partner in 2020.
He has over two decades of experience advising international families, trustees and private wealth structures across multiple jurisdictions.
Awards & Accolades
Spears 500 2026 ranks Sam Carver as ‘Top Recommended’ for Tax & Trust Lawyers with a focus on Trusts and tax planning.
The Legal 500 UK 2026 highlights Sam Carver as a ‘Recommended Key Lawyer’ for the ‘Personal Tax, Trusts and Probate’ category.
Spear’s UK 2025 ranks Sam Carver as ‘Top Recommended’ for the ‘Trusts and tax planning’ within the ‘Tax Lawyers’ category. (Page 288)
Sam Carver is listed in the Spear’s Tax & Trust Adviser’s Index 2024 as a “Top Recommended ” Tax Lawyer.
Sam is ranked as a “Top Recommended Tax Lawyer” in the Spear’s 500 2024 and the Spear’s Tax Adviser’s Index 2023.
- Spear’s Tax & Trust Adviser’s Index 2024 – Ranked Top Recommended Tax Lawyer.
- Spear’s 500 2024 – Ranked Top Recommended Tax Lawyer.
- Spear’s Tax Adviser’s Index 2023 – Ranked Top Recommended Tax Lawyer.
