Gastines3

For lack of bookings ,a good portion of blame can be laid at the door of dear Brittany Ferries. I intended to book a 5 day trip over in the next couple of weeks and I'm just recovering from the shock. Poole to Cherbourg , ONE WAY,car+2, £284, return £320.Add the word 'from' in all their bookings now and yes I do know the cheap days to travel. This was out Thursday,backTuesday. My daughter ,partner and granddaughter had a week in Spain ,flights from Bournemouth and a flat for virtually the same price. B.F. seem to be commiting financial suicide.They still offer the cheap day trip but penalise you for staying longer.The fares increase the longer you stay. Our trips to France now consist of ferry from Dover,usually about the £110 price return,car + 2.then going into Belgium,Brugge/Brussels etc. and doing all the required shoppingin Lille commercial centre on the way back via Ypres/Ghent. B.F. fares must affect the economy of the stores in Cherbourg and also the holiday trade.I fully expect to see the Barfleur up for sale again after this season. Another stroke of genius from B.F. is that they won't allow car passengers to use the Freight ferry Contentin, even in the winter. Regards.

Up-date. Latest advice to him is sack the Accountant,go to Impots with all paperwork and start again.I doubt if he'll do it but I will refrain from offering advice in the future. I will say that we dealt with the St.Malo Impot,Chambre de Commerce and Ursaff and found them more than helpful and pleasant. Also thanks to some advice from'Micky' we registered on April1st and de-registerted on Sept 30th each year,for 6 years with no problems and saved a fortune in citisations. By letting the C.d.C. do the de-registering at a cost of e54, all re-payments were back in our bank very quickly. Thanks for responses. Bonne Chance.

Thanks Parsnips. I will pass on that info.

Sorry fo late response but the Log-in is a nightmare!!! As usual with friends they give you half the details and take bits of advice that suits them!!! When his idea of moving to France to live permanently and carry on his UK business first arose ,my advice was try and do it right not half in half out like many. I did say that by being registered for everything we were in the health system albeit with the plus of the top-up costing e1200 for the 2 of us. It now appears that he went to an accountant and told him he intended to carry on with his business from France,mostly UK clients etc etc. However in the space of 6 months there,the income became almost nil.. Added to this last month he reached 65.It now appears he has got himself into a mess that the Accountant or the Impots are not too clear how to unravel. I advised after becoming aware of the blunders that he forgets the Accountant, goes to the Impots with his S1 and new pension details and throw himself on their mercy and hopefully start anew. The question about the basics before tax was I thought he would be better finding out exactly what he can earn extra to his pension before paying tax and then work up from there. Lesson learnt from this is not to give advice as people don't give you all the facts and only tell you what suits them. Thankyou for your replies. In response to our move back to UK, Family being the main reason,thankfully not financial.Even with that I think we saw more of them on holiday with us in France than we do over here.Returning to the are we have lived most of our lives,Bournemouth, has seen many changes over the last few years mostly being detrimental. Dorset is still a gem and we manage to enjoy most of it. Missing most is the food choice in France.On a recent visit to Sainsbury's we had vegetables from Spain,Italy Guatemala,Egypt,Israel,America,Kenya and even tomato's from Turkey.!!! Don't even think about the fish counters.However the sun is at present shining so that's a bonus. Bonne Chance.

Having moved back to UK 3 years ago I understand many things have changed since I was in the French Tax system.I wonder if someone could advise me the basics to help a friend who is having horrendous problems and payments in France. He doesn't seem to be getting very much help from his accountant. I always got the best advice from the C.d.C. and the Impots but again, he seems to knocking on brick walls.With his house in France being his only home/house,no savings in UK accruing any interest and at present his only income being a UK pension.Therefore income is £5400 into euros. As far as I remember this is not liable to tax,he has been informed otherwise. Also I understood that there was a level of allowed earnt income before tax was payable? At the moment he has had a social tax demand of 3000+ so surely something is going wrong? Trusting someone could help with the basics? Thankyou, andyes my wife and I wish we had stayed,returning to UK after 8 years by St.Malo was definitely a shock how quickly things had deteriorated.