dreamcommuter

Thank god some of the immigrants are returning back to blighty!

I have no involvement in this one - just thought it was interesting for others A policeman working in Bolton and living in Bordeaux - why don't you watch it click here and comment on it if you feel you want to ;)

You can see it online at the following:   Click here 

 if you missed it you can catch the repeat Wednesday morning at 2:30 a.m A take off of "Dream Commuters/BBC2" February 2007   REPORTAGES 13:30 Magazine de reportages France - Angleterre : ma double vie, Ils ont un pied en Angleterre et... Wednesday Mercredi 19th December early morning - set your recorders! REPORTAGES  02:30 Magazine de reportages France - Angleterre : ma double vie, Ils ont un pied en Angleterre et...   For those with DSL you can watch it online click here P.S.  Sorry about the formatting of my message earlier  

John is absolutely right.  It's an individual thing.  It seems the Brits are always moving houses (unlike most French) whether it is in the UK or now in France.  We know an English couple who are retired in France that have already moved twice in the last 4 years.  They moved to be half an hour from their old property!   Are we Brits always on the move?

Thanks for the email. New job offer?  Perhaps from the BBC [:)]

[quote user="Will"]I have spent 5 years with our main home in France and another house in England, working for English publishers. I have both worked from home (telecommuting) and been office-based in England, travelling back to France at weekends. Neither is as easy or stress-free as the programme made out.[:D][/quote] I'd be interested to learn whether you did one (work full time in UK and came back at weekends) or the other (telecommuting from France) or did a bit of both?  It's not so clear from your statement.  Also, had you thought of doing alternate weekends like I do to make your commute less stressful?  I get a 4 day holiday in France with the family after busting my **** working for 10 days in UK!  Doing a weekly commute is much harder (and more expensive for flights, parking, train-ing or taxi-ing) I tried that at first but found a better compromise! I'm sorry I can't enlighten anybody on the taxation in Spain and this is a French related forum so its only important for those thinking of moving further south.

[quote user="Will"] Oh well, that's OK then. I can go back to France almost full-time and tele-commute from there safe in the knowledge that the BBC says I do not have to pay tax and cotisations in France. [/quote] You can't go back to France almost full-time and tele-commute.  Your primary work place must be in the UK.  This is why the owners of an internet business frenchconnections.co.uk had to return to the UK.  The French authorities are cracking down on this - BEWARE 

Thanks MB and Russethouse.  Fortunately our move has been a success for us but also we have known others who have not been so fortunate and have returned to the UK!  Beware, there can be many pitfalls as Will identified earlier.  Do your research.  DC

In response to Russethouse: There were a lot of good reasons we moved to France. It was a personal decision for us. We were way over mortgaged on our property and had no money (running into dept). We had 2 small children so felt cramped in our cottage. We had started to pay for nursery if my wife worked which was costing us more than she was earning so she gave up her job. Yes we borrowed too much money from the bank for the cottage but made a significant gain if we sold and so for much less money we looked further a field! We sold in UK at 285 and bought at 180 in France (releasing 100K from or mortgage) My grandmother was French. We like the French architecture, culture, food and way of life we saw in the Lot. We both spoke French. It wasn't a very difficult decision to reduce our mortgage to next to nothing and use half the money we used to pay for the mortgage to pay for my commuting and expenses.

Will is quite correct in identifying that there are potential pitfalls in moving to France and working in the UK.  Also by 'telecommuting' you can run into some serious tax and bureaucratic problems by spending too much time in stress-free France (especially if the main business is registered in the UK).  I think the owners of frenchconnections.co.uk had to return back to the UK to run their business!

Hi Will and anybody else I may be able to fill in some gaps: I was one of the people featured (Albas, SW France) by the BBC  in the programme and sorry to hear if it was considered misleading.  I didn't produce it but IMHO I think the fact that 3 stories (plus the other filler) were squashed into 29 minutes meant that some bits had to be taken out during it's production!  The emphasis of the programme was meant to show the huge increase in number of people actually doing it. I've tried to summarise some points below (at least from my prospective). 1.    I have been commuting for 7 years now, so yes I did buy my house in 2000 for £180,000 but I did also sell in the UK for £285,000 the same year so it is all relative as prices have risen consistently in both areas by about the same amount. 2.    I spend 9 or 10 consecutive days working in the UK and then 4 or 5 consecutive days with the family in France so I do get in my opinion more quality time with the family than the majority of commuters in the UK.  It's like taking a holiday every 10 days!   3.    There are additional cost associated with the commute that were not shown in the televised programme (believe you me, they were discussed and filmed but ended up on the editors floor).  Flights, airport parking and accommodation in a bed-sit right next to the office in the UK (yes, I sold my house in the UK so do not have 2 homes!), etc..  has been costing me an additional £600 per month for me to commute.  I pay all my taxes in the UK and in France and it still must be economical if I can continue to do this (there may not be much disposable income left but the quality of life in France, the freedom for the children, the schools, the weather, the food and the lifestyle all make it worth it!).  We can afford to go out more in France to restaurants and food and wine are cheaper (although the gap over 7 years has closed somewhat).   4.    The fact that we know the French language has made a huge difference to integrating with the local community.  Everyone who lives in France understands that it is easier to integrate into a local community than in the fast pace of the rat race in the UK.   5.    I am lucky that I have the flexibility at work (I set up the mapping business with a colleague in the UK) and technology allows me to take: 5 weeks in the Summer off work to be with the family, 2 weeks in February to go on holiday to the US to see my wife's parents (some may have recognised my wife's accent although she had lived/worked in the UK for 20 years previously as a UK resident and paid her UK taxes!), 3 weeks at Christmas and 1 week at Easter.  Yes, I have made a sacrifice and miss my wife and children when I am not there but do hope to retire to France sooner to compensate.   6.    For all those who think all commuters are burning up more airline fuel than we should be,  there are those of us with an environmental background that are actually trying to do something about it even if it is only on an individual basis.  We contribute to a carbon fund, we are initiating a project to plant some oak trees in the Lot and we now pay taxes to Gordon Brown that exceed what most carbon calculators estimate to compensate for the emissions (How Gordon Brown spends the money is another topic of discussion).  Also when I'm in the UK I rent next to the office so I commute by walking there.  We all want to protect the livelihoods of our children.   I hope this fills you in on some of the detail left out.   If there are any other topics I may have missed then I would only be to pleased to help.  I will also contact the BBC programme makers with any feedback and point them to this site (if that is OK with the mediators).