LesLauriers

Will, for an E121 holder who is not working the contributions cease, whoever told you that they continued to pay was talking a load of old rowlocks. I do not know the position of an E121 holder who continues to be employed or self employed, however your scenario of an E121 holder running a gite may affect a number of posters. Anyone care to add....?

"if anybody has a substantial pension in addition to the state pension... then this has to be declared as income and will be assessed for CMU contributions as well as other cotisations." Will, this implies that even with an E121 the payment to CMU continues - is that really what you meant?

I would be the first to admit that I don't always see eye to eye with Miki, and yes he is a bit of a dog with a bone at times, but he does make you think, some topics do need to go through an iterative process in order arrive at a considered opinion and often Miki facilitates that process. Importantly he is prepared to stand up for what he believes in. Sometimes he's right and sometimes he's wrong but, where he agrees that he is wrong, he apologises. You do have to respect his commitment to his views, his commitment to the forum and his commitment to France. Altogether a sad day for the forum, so yes - "Free the St Malo 1!"

I didn't think you got 100% cover unless it was a medical problem on the "list". You are correct.

SB said, "It's not complicated, it just ends up ruining your life!   You spend the winter terrified to use anything electric, and you have to plan your whole life round the red days - all your cooking, clothes-washing, and even your self-washing! And you still get big bills (they seem big to me, anyway!).  I really don't understand it. Tempo saves me 530€ a year against "Base" and 585€ against "Heures Creuses". But it does help if you understand it!

You do not say if you are French or UK tax resident, however as you mention UK inheritance tax then I will assume you are UK resident. In which case the French property will eat into your UK inheritance tax allowance. The gift part would only be taxable if the second person dies within seven years of making the gift.

It is the total amount received, the taxable event occurs at the time the interest was paid not when it accrued. If you were a "French Tax Resident" on that day then it is subject to income tax at your highest rate and social charges of 11%.

Currently, you have to sell the property after the tax year in which you leave the UK and you cannot return to the UK for five tax years after selling to avoid taxation. The loophole was due to be closed in 2005 and may now be closed in 2006 or 2007 latest (perhaps, possibly, maybe).

[quote user="aj_dr"]I was in Finance for 30 years (not as a Financial Advisor) and if you don't pay commission then your unit price is more. aj [/quote] No, this is not correct.

You can go direct and have any mix of safe / risk you wish. No entry fee and .6% or .85% annual charge respectively with a set 15€ charge for changing funds. Take a look at www.boursorama.com.

Once again the Internet providers do their utmost to confuse people, the offer at 25€ a month is only available in those areas where Tele2 have their own lines. In essence that is going to be in the major cities. Outside of those areas the cost is 33.85€ + 2.50€ for the modem + 5.10€ if you do not take  their preselection phone service, a total of 41.45€ a month. Free (www.free.fr) were the company that first introduced unlimited international calls to the unlimited local call package within the monthly cost of broadband and their package costs 29.99€ a month, including the modem router and you do not have to change your FT phone to their preselection service unless you wish to do so. Tele 2 charge you 49€ for terminating the contract, Free charge 96€ less 3€ for each month you have subscribed to the service to cover the cost of the Freebox which is a multimedia player as well as modem router. You really have to read the small print with internet service providers and with mobile phone service providers, the headline rate is rarely all that it seems. All that said - you will always find someone cheaper than Wannado!

[quote user="saddie"] the question is specifically where you can get some sort of near equivelent to an ISA in France regarding the tax situation. [/quote] Cash Isa equivalent: Livret A, Codevi, Lep or Assurance Vie (capital safe) as above. Share Isa equivalent: Assurance Vie or PEA.

Quillan said: "none of them get around paying CDS (sic) on the interest, nothing escapes CDS." There are no social charges on Livret A, Codevi or LEP. Benjamin said: "if you do (take an income from an Assurance VIe) then you end up losing all of the tax free advantages." The tax free advantages remain the same. Tax advantageous savings in France: Livret A, invest up to 15300€ per person at 2.25% interest. Codevi, invest up to 4600€ per person at 2.25% interest. LEP, invest up to 7700€ per person at 3.25% interest. Only available if your tax demand is less than 709€. In all cases there is no tax or social charges to pay and they are excluded from your tax return so do not increase taxation on other income. The are all subject to ISF if applicable. Assurance Vie: no limit on investment, 4 to 4.5% on capital safe investments, no limit on interest on stock market related investments. Capital growth is tax and social charge free until withdrawn. When withdrawn it is only the interest element that is subject to tax and social charges. For example your fund grows by 4.5% and you withdraw 20000€'s, in this case only 900€'s are subject to tax and social charges. After 8 years you can withdraw 4600€'s per person each year, tax free and you can leave up to 152000€'s per beneficiary tax free, over and above your allowances. AV's are also subject to ISF if applicable. PEA as posted earlier.

[quote user="Ron Avery"]So Les  does that mean  for your first tax declaration in France you have to declare details of all the accounts that you may have had and still have in the UK? It is a requirement that you declare all accounts held outside France each time you submit a tax return. The fine for failing to declare is 500€ per account. If you do then have the  tax office staff been remiss in not asking those I have accompanied to the Tax Office and myself as to where and what are the accounts that generate the interest we have declared on the 2047.amd 2042 forms? That's the one! I must admit this form is a new one on me[*-)]     Perhaps because we showed statements tio support declarations etc the tax office staff decided that was sufficient evidence and did not want a separate declaration? In my experience very few French functionaires have experience of all of the rules when it comes to dealing with UK income. The CPAM people seem to be the most confused of all! They insisted that I pay 8% of capital for health cover and asked for what amounted to 38 pages of photocopied info - needless to say I did not pay or produce anything like. Recently a friend received a demand from CPAM for 5500€, after a few letters and a meeting the bill was reduced to 0€. I had the devil of a job explaining that whilst bank interest was paid on the previous years deposits, it was the year in which the interest was received that the taxable event occured. I would imagine that the UK tax offices have people who are equally mystified by foreign earnings, however they are, in my experience, more likely to go and ask, whereas the Functionaire cannot be seen to either "not know" or "be wrong". [/quote]

Opened, closed or used, is what it states and I take used as being any transaction whatsoever. On the basis that there is a 500€ fine for each account not declared, I declare everything!

The EUSTD allows for a withholding tax to be retained where the account holder is not willing to inform their tax authority, however the French tax return demands that you list all worldwide income and states that you will be fined for failing to declare any accounts held outside of France. I suggest that you pay for an informed decision, in writing, before going offshore as eventually you will have to bring the money onshore, which is when the questions could start. I thought that Gibraltar had now agreed to retain the withholding tax.

[quote user="Sunday Driver"]  PS  Gifts are taxable from the day you become tax resident in France. [/quote] This is not a gift, it is an inheritance and therefore the 6 year rule, that Hegs refers to, should cover it. If not, why not?

Paul, Can't answer your specific, but have you noticed that you can set up your own favourites as an EPG and also that you can now remove the adult x rated listings completely. If you go to the Sky info page and press the red button when the dog and duck are on screen it tells you how to do it. The answer to your original question may also be there.

Paul, If by "line classique" you mean the preselection to "Free" of the FT line then as far as I am aware only the billing changes, it is still an FT line. Regarding Free ADSL calls - yes sometimes, but not often, there is degradation of service, but I put this down to the problems I have experienced with the quality of the FT line - on dial up I would often get 9kbps, at best 33kbps, problems became so frequent that the FT engineer gave me his mobile number!  On upgrading to ISDN it was better but again there were problems. On ADSL my speed can vary dramaticaly throughout the day and very rarely the ADSL dies but comes back again, I am a fair distance from the exchange. Overall I find the service from Free to be satisfactory and the inclusive local and international calls a real "win" however it is the all dependent upon the quality of the FT line which is out of Free's hands.

The phone works when the computer is switched off, you have two lines FT & Free. You can buy a box from www.boxtoo.com which, inconjunction with a dect phone set up, will allow you to answer any incoming call on any phone but when you dial out you will automatically use the Free line, otherwise you will have two independent phone systems. I use Logicom and Phillips phones without problem and also use a 1970's FT push button phone without issue, it looks like the ond two tone BT phones from that time.

No. The allowance of 6950 is against the household income and you only get it once.

Social charges 11%. Health charges 8% over the first 6950€.

Dividends are entered on your tax return and are subject to allowances.

[quote user="Holly1"]Hi all, I'm about to take the broadband plunge. I'm tempted by free.fr since their package offers free international calls to UK and Ireland, whereas the other ISPs seem to offer free calls in France only. However, there seem to be alot of complaints about free.fr. I only know one person using them and he is very  happy with their service. If you are a happy or an unhappy free.fr user in a zone non-degroupee please would you post any comments you have about them? Also I would be interested to know if you have kept your France Telecom line because I think in some cases this is optional (but I may have that wrong) Neuf.fr seem to be popular too but don't have such good phone rates. Any thoughts anyone please? TIA Holly1 http://la-plaine.chez-alice.fr/ (registration email address no longer works so please reply here or via the website) [/quote] Happy with Free was unhappy with Neuf and their billing system in that, whilst they agreed to overcharging, they would not refund. Still have FT line as we are non degroupage.

Miki, I'm with BJSLIV on this - that's how it should work, but then again it is FT!