EuroTrash

Surely the point about NormanH's 'family' is that they've been here for 'more than 7 years'. I.e. they were here before the 5-year rule came in. So... different rules.

The way it seems to happen in practice is that when you register you have to pick the activity on the list that best describes what you do. Then your cotisations are charged at the rate applicable to that code. The list is here (sorry you'll have to cut n paste, my browser doesn't do hyperlinks on here): http://autoentrepreneurinfo.com/liste-code-naf Sometimes you have to think a bit laterally because the codes tend to be either very very specific or very very vague, 8211Z? 8219Z? 8299Z?

I presume you mean including the prélèvement libératoire for tax. I would guess 20.5% but that is a guess, I am saying that because I am registered primarily as a journalist, secondarily for translation and editiorial services, which puts me under the code for 'autre création artistique' and I pay 20.5. Audio transcription sounds kind of similar. But you should probably check with URSSAF, it's probably important to get it right. I don't really understand where you are coming from - is it for yourself, if so what are you registered as?

NormanH makes a good point about healthcare (although in practice, people sometimes do seem to get the whole lot refunded under their EHICs). As a UK resident you could take out holiday insurance to cover any shortfall and also any repatriation costs.

a) a euro less than I need to pay my bills b) exactly what than I need to pay my bills c) a euro more than I need to pay my bills Charles Dickens understood.

Keep it to five and a half months, it will be a lot simpler. Officially there are not degrees of permanence - either it's a permanent move or it isn't, no such thing as a 'more permanent move'. Officially, 6 months of a year in France makes you resident here and liable to fill in a residents tax form and you don't want that yet. Not that anyone's likely to be keeping tabs on you, but it keeps your conscience clear. Check with your car insurers how long they provide full cover for European use. It varies a lot from one insurer to another, but there are plenty that offer 6 months. Enjoy.

"Budfrog wrote the following post at 15/10/2012 14:59: Of course nothing will happen if it is only the UK that deems that it violates a persons human rights for healthcare to be withheld ... however if Brussels decides this to be the case then France and all the other member states will have to fall into line. IMO NI and Tax contributions paid should be taken into account ... but that is just a personal view and in itself would disadvantage those who had not contributed. As with most systems there are ways around it ... and it's the honest straightforward people who usually end up by paying the price. " I don't think the question was about healthcare being withheld, was it? simply, the OP thinks it violates human rights to have to contribute a small proportion towards the cost. Why ''free' non-urgent medical treatment should be a human right, I'm not really sure. It's very generous of the UK to provide it but it doesn't make it a human right, and the UK may not continue to do so for much longer.

"the bill can be sent to your UK address but you then have to pay it ( they even include an SAE with the bill ), then, having got the receipt, you have to phone Newcastle to ask for a claim form, when the claim form is received you return it to Newcastle with the original receipt. The money then gets credited to your specified account." Alternatively, if you have insurance you send the bill to your insurers and they sort it all out for you :)

If you went along for non-emergency treatment but didn't have a passport and couldn't identify yourself, I can't see you getting past the reception desk. Have you been to a French hospital or even worse a Spanish one? If computer say no, answer is no.

If a UK EHIC holder is treated in a French hospital, they are not charged on the spot. They take details of your EHIC card and enter it onto their computer and you don't have to pay anything on the spot, the bill is sent to you UK address and I believe you pass it on to Newcastle. I suspect that if you couldn't produce an EHIC, you would have to cough up however many thousands of euros it was on the spot. I don't know if you would get a reimbursement if you didn't have a valid EHIC card at the time of the treatment. Certainly you wouldn't be able to claim anything back via CPAM while you were still in France, as the process involves having your EHIC checked. Maybe you could claim from Newcastle , but you would have some arguing to do first.

I know woolyb's tongue is in his cheek, but I don't think French doctors can keep EHIC patients off the books because they have to write out a feuille de soins. A French doctor tried to explain the system to me once - he had trained at Guy's in London so he knows how both systems work, and he went into so much detail that he lost me completely. But as I recall, the gist of it was that French doctors do not have targets and quotas to meet. Unlike UK doctors who apparently are paid by the NHS relative to the number of patients they have on their books and not per appointment, French doctors get paid per appointment and keep their own books, so patients aren't either 'inside' or 'outside' the system, they're all just patients. So whereas UK doctors presumably love having patients on their books who never go to see them, French doctors are interested in people that makes appointments.

I thought the whole point of choosing a medecin traitant was because under the French system, you get a higher reimbursement from your caisse when you use your medecin traitant than if you don't. You fill a form in, you and the doctor sign it and you and send it to your caisse, and they register it. I don't see how this would come into the equation for getting treatment under an EHIC. Who would you send the form to? Do French doctors have a list of patients? I don't think they do, they will treat anyone who comes along, at 23 euros per head, which the patients then reclaim from whatever source. I think French doctors are going to get awfully confused if lots of non-resident Brits who don't have carte vitales start turning up and asking to register with them.

Be officially resident in France and get no cost healthcare, dream on - or am I missing a trick?

I'm not understanding this either. Surely the 46 days is counted from when the fine is issued, not from the date of the contravention?

Living on a shoestring in France is harder than living on a shoestring in the UK (speaking as one who has done both). It sounds as if you may not have a full NI contributions record in the recent past, and that being the case if neither of you is retirement age you would not be entitled to health cover in France under an S1 issued by the UK. Which, if you are 'inactif', will mean you have to take out full private health insurance (obligatory, not optional) and that would eat into your £8000pa big time. Alternatively you could register as a business, pay cotisations equating to up to a quarter of your income, and qualify for healthcare that way, though if you don't have good health a topup policy would be a good idea. You probably wouldn't pay income tax but at one stage or another, depending on what business regime you go under, there will probably be business taxes to pay. If you are resident and on a low income you will probably get a reduction on taxe d'habitation. However, if you plan to live long term in a caravan, you should really get permission for that - technically you can't just stick a caravan wherever you like and start living in it, even it it's in your own garden - and you might find that you get a taxe d'habitation bill for the caravan as well. Check it out first to avoid issues in the future, and buy the maire a drink - sometime communes are relaxed about these things and sometimes they have sharp teeth and bite. Another thing to consider is that depending on where you are 'resident', that is the country in which you declare your worldwide income, so if you are in France there could be social charges on investment income etc. You need to look into it carefully but my gut feeling is that you would be better off in the UK where you get 'free' healthcare and presumably nothing to pay to the government in the way of taxes. As far as I can see, the main financial advantage of living in France could be the reduction in taxe d'habitation, and unless your bill is very high your social charges and medical costs would likely wipe that out in no time.

Bizarre that Dordogne and much of Normandy are the lowest band, or am I reading it wrong?

"I still do not get it. Why would UK rental income suddenly be exempt from french income tax, when it is income????? A very simple explanation please from someone." I think the answer you are looking for is 'double taxation treaty'. The income has (or should have) already been taxed in the UK. So it's not a case of 'there is no income tax paid on overseas earnings for french residents'. There is income tax on it, but in most cases, the income tax is payable in the country where it is earned. (If you live in the UK and rent out a gite in France, it's the same in reverse.)

This thread has got very confusing. Does this help? http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/international/tax-incomegains.htm "Rental income from property in the UK If you're not resident but still receive rental income from the UK, you will pay UK tax on that income. This type of income is dealt with by HMRC Non-resident Landlords Scheme. The scheme requires either the tenant or your letting agent to deduct basic rate tax from the rental income they pay to you if your usual home is outside the UK. You may need to complete a tax return to tell HMRC about the rental income and the tax already paid. You can make an application to receive rental income with no tax deducted. Find out more in the guide below." Does anyone actually do that? As I understood it, the basic principle is that HMRC taxes all income generated within the UK, whether you are resident or not, but then having paid tax in the UK, the double taxation treaty ensures that you don't pay tax twice over. But you have to declare it in France even though it isn't taxable, because all world-wide income has to be declared so that it can be included when calculating your revenu fiscal de référence.

[quote user="powerdesal"]Interesting but what on earth is '' a unique continental atmosphere '' in respect of a ferry ?[/quote] Well on the two occasions I have used them 'a unique continental atmosphere' seems to mean 'a very empty boat'. There can't have been more than 2 dozen passengers. Early days I know but they need supporting, I do hope they survive.

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I hope you managed to cancel the insurance? French car insurance doesn't lapse if you don't pay the renewal premium like UK insurance does - it remains in force until you cancel it, which normally requires giving the insurers a copy of the cert de cession. Failing that, it stays insured and they keep sending bills and expecting you to pay.

You wouldn't be billed for TF in any case, the owner pays that. Whether or not you pay TdH depends on what it says in the contract (really you should get a contract even if it's a fairly informal arrangement, for exactly this reason, so that everyone is clear on who is going to pay what - avoids misunderstandings and possible bad feeling later). Normally for furnished holiday lets the client never pays TdH even if they do happen to be there on Jan 1st.

Just to echo, France is not Utopia any more than the UK is purgatory. Being discontent with the UK does not guarantee that you will be any more content with France once you've seen it for what it is. You need to love a country and then it is easier to excuse its warts, but that doesn't mean you have to be blind to them. E.g. if I was self employed in the UK I would be paying about £12 a month in NI contributions. Last quarter in France I paid around 800EUR cotisations on roughly equivalent earnings. It doesn't make me unhappy and it doesn't make me want to go back to the UK, but you can't help being aware that it's very much swings and roundabouts, and which you choose depends on what your priorities are.

It's tough luck about the house, but I don't think you can reasonably expect a buyer to say 'no' to someone who has a pen in their hand ready to sign a contract. A bird in the hand and all that, what percentage of viewers make an offer, so the odds on you deciding to buy must from their point of view have seemed pretty negligible. And from your point of view you might have looked at it and decided not to buy it, would you still say you'd lost £250? FWIW, I did buy a campervan, and I had extended trips to France in it, and when I decided it was time to buy I spent about 3 months touring the region where I wanted to live. It was very enjoyable, it gave me plenty of time to look at places and get a feel for them, and the house that I ended up buying has turned out pretty much perfect for my needs. As other posters have said, if you're planning on moving here as an inactif (i.e. early retiree) make sure you've got your health care sorted. And don't move here thinking life is cheaper - I don't find it cheaper, apart from being able to be mortgage-free which of course does make a big difference. But if France is where you want to be, don't let anyone put you off - it's your life, do what will make you happy.

A more serious reply to the OP - though she has probably worked it out for herself - I think you'll struggle to find many clients amongst the expat community. It takes a certain type of person to become an expat and I doubt there is much crossover with the average client that you get in the UK. Expats tend to have their feet firmly on the ground and they believe in themselves and making their own destiny rather than listening to external influences, they have already made at least one life-changing decision, and a lot of them know all about trying to match reality up with expectations and predictions. No offence but I think that apart from a few bored affluent housewives who are starved of English female companionship, you might find them tough cookies to crack. However, you could start by taking out adverts in the expat newspapers and magazines? There are a handful that are widely read.