Araucaria

It's nice hearing from someone like Chancer with positive and sensible views! If the EU is truly committed to the idea of  "free movement of labour" - and it's a principle that I think is very valuable - then it ought to be easier for people of working age to move around in the EU - they shouldn't be constantly tripped up by rules that clearly haven't been thought through. At present we've got something like "free movement of pensioners" - not that I disapprove of that, but it seems a touch unfair on the younger generation. Currently much of the bureaucratic paper-pushing is based on the idea that when a young Brit steps off the ferry at Calais he has at that point already made up his mind that he'll either be staying for a holiday (of less than 8 weeks if it's a Child Benefit bureaucrat) or has decided to stay permanently. Or at least sufficiently permanently for it to be worth his while to jump through all the hoops that settling in France (or any other EU country) requires. But often life just isn't that simple. It's only since the 19th century that the state has begun to control so many aspects of our life: where we are "legally" allowed to live, where we can "legally" work, what services we are "legally" allowed to offer, what changes we can "legally" make to our houses, when we can "legally" light a bonfire, whether we can "legally" manage without insurance, what we can "legally" say in public, whether we can "legally" enter the country we were born in without a passport ..... the list is almost endless. Personally I don't think all of this is really progress. But what do I know?

This has been very useful to me, and I hope our friends (or friend's friends) will find it useful too. I was interested in practical issues rather than moral ones ("cheating"). I was particularly not interested in the income tax side: if the Foaf's were to get enough income from renting out a house to pay tax on it, I don't think they'd need answers to most of these questions. In the UK a couple can earn up to £20,000 - if it's split equally between them - without having to pay any tax, and I've seen on this forum the trouble you can get when you try to make the French tax office accept that you are liable to tax on UK income if you don't actually pay any. In the circumstances continuing to make UK tax returns and not making a French one for that year seems a no-brainer. One of the things I'd be interested in would be actual experience - has anyone found themselves subject to any French state attention after staying in France as an inactive person for more than three months? Healthcare might of course trigger some enquiries, but I think the Foafs could manage for a year with their EHICs. There doesn't really seem to be any kind of official three-month limit, and how would it be enforced if the EHIC was valid? Quillan's helpful comments about S1 treatment might come in useful if they do decide to stay - Mr F has been employed in the UK for a long enough period to qualify. I must admit that when I read Paul T I wasn't entirely sure whether he approved or not: [quote user="PaulT"]Sound very precarious and a wonderful example for their children. They way to influence Anglo France relations. Wonder what the children will say at school. As for the UK school saying they might not accept the children who spent 6 months at school in France back seem very narrow minded. The children will take back stories of another culture - perhaps their French teacher might not be too happy, especially if they are British - 'that is not the way they say it in France'.[/quote] but the way things went with my daughter last year was an entirely positive experience, I'd say for everyone (which is why I was asked these questions by the Foafs). Our grandchildren now have friends of their age in France, they speak a limited amount of French with an absolutely perfect accent, they got on well with nearly all the other children and their parents, and established a good relationship with the (two) teachers - it's a very small school. The teacher who drew the short straw for the extra language lessons was after all paid extra for it, and she had previously had Russian children in the class so it wasn't exactly a novel experience for her. The children really liked her and I'd guess she was happy with them. On the health side, by the time you're at primary school in the UK you've had most of your vaccinations, and the school was quite happy with the UK record of vaccinations. I can't recall now if they went to the doctor but they are normally healthy children and the EHICs seemed enough for a short stay. The difference with our grandchildren is that their house in the UK wasn't let out and they and their mum had a perfectly good UK address all the time they were away. That would be a little more difficult for the Foafs, but they do have parents living in the UK so I expect something could be done. Child benefit is something they might need to worry about, but I can't see that spending a year in France when the main wage-earner is involuntarily unemployed should mean that their children should stop receiving (UK) Child Benefit. But if it shouldn't be claimed in these circumstances, I wonder what would  be the date to stop claiming it? How long is a holiday? I can see that if you do decide to stay that would be the right time - but it would be daft to reject it in November and then go back to the UK in December and try to start claiming all over again. Please keep the comments coming - and if I've not replied to a point anyone thinks is important, do come back and have a go at me. There have been a lot of comments and I may have missed something that really matters.

[quote user="nomoss"]Can one send kids to school here if not resident? [/quote] That one at least I can answer myself, as my own daughter spent six months here last year with her two primary-school-age children. They were welcomed at the local school, made good friends, and were even given extra free lessons in French by a helpful teacher: that was after they were professionally assessed for their language needs up in Aurillac, our prefecture. The only bit of paperwork that surprised me was the need for them to have assurance scolaire, but at least that was cheap. So the answer is definitely yes - my daughter made it quite clear she was only staying for two terms. But I don't know if it would be different if Mrs Foaf said she planned to stay a full school year. The main problem with my daughter's visit was with the UK education authority, who weren't keen to guarantee that the children could go back to the same school after six months away (but they did). I'm grateful for all the other replies: thank you all. I didn't give a lot of information and that has misled some posters. Mr Foaf's employer is already nearly a month late with Mr Foaf's June salary, and that employer also hasn't paid the rent on their offices which will be shut to them very shortly (the end of this week, unless the money turns up). It's a job where Mr Foaf can work at home (IT) and he can do some - though maybe not a lot of - job-hunting while in France, for a job in the UK. He certainly didn't/doesn't plan to quit, but the writing is definitely already on the wall. I'm not sure that either of the Foafs would be seriously looking for work in France, but they would take any opportunities they found. I've heard (but I have no statistics) that there isn't that much unemployment in the Cantal, though that might well be because the local unemployed go elsewhere and add to someone else's statistics. I know getting a salaried job locally is difficult but there is work for the self-employed, and Mr Foaf might well be able to work at a distance. That's not really the point of the year away: I think Mr F (while job-hunting) would rather be unemployed in congenial surroundings than where he lives now. He's been looking for alternative work for a while now and nearly all of that process has been over the internet and by phone. I imagine he'd spend a fair amount of his time seriously learning to speak more than just basic French. They wouldn't be renting in France - the dilapidated accomodation I mentioned is a near-ruin they actually own. It's worth next to nothing at the moment. The problem is that I am a pensioner and by now I think I know pretty well exactly the problems that face someone in my own circumstances. I have much less idea about the problems that face a family of working age with small children. Again, all comments will be really helpful.

A friend of a friend (call her Mrs Foaf) is considering a trial move to France: stay here a year, and see how things go. If things don't go well, they'd move back to the UK. I'd be very grateful to hear about anyone's practical experience of the pitalls. This might sound a bit fanciful (or quite stupid if you prefer), but Mr Foaf is working for a company that looks like it's about to go bust, and rather than spend a miserable year looking for another job in the UK, he'd prefer to try his luck here. The Foafs have two small children, one just primary school age, the other younger. Mrs Foaf does a bit of childminding in the UK. They could let their house in the UK for a modest amount, so they wouldn't be absolutely penniless. That's one reason for the year's stay: it's tricky to let a house for a shorter period. I am fairly sure they'd have to cut a few bureaucratic corners: not tell the UK government they'd left the UK, and not register as a taxpayer in France (if their only income was UK-source rental income, even if this went wrong they'd have very little tax to pay in France). They'd make sure they got their car MoTed before they leave, and they'd use it here and keep it legal in the UK. I don't think they'd expect any state support while in France, beyond sending their children to school - another reason for trying their luck: children learn a foreign language more easily when they're young. They would have some extremely dilapidated accomodation available (nicely situated opposite the primary school in the small village) which they might be able to add value to by making some inexpensive repairs. I'd be grateful for any help and suggestions.

[quote user="gardengirl "][quote user="powerdesal"]Shouldn't every driver be capable of changing a wheel themselves rather than calling out a rescue service ?[/quote] Why on earth should that be so? I've never changed a wheel in my life, never actually needed to - and wouldn't dream of starting now! Surely anything that occurs when out driving that needs putting right is covered by the fee paid to the call-out company. I've rarely needed to call AA or anybody out, but that's what insurance is for - when that time comes. [/quote] When I changed a wheel a couple of years ago in an underground carpark, the nuts were so tight I had to jump up and down (and I mean literally) on the flimsy wheelbrace supplied with the car. After that I bought one of those extending bars with a reversible 17mm/19mm socket (less than €10) - it will undo even the wheelnuts that have been overtightened by the helpful chap at the garage. But going by my own experience I wouldn't expect the average motorist to be able to change a wheel with what is supplied by the car manufacturer. And then there's my "new" car, a Citroen Xsara Picasso. The wheelbrace is stored in a special plastic box that lives inside the spare wheel, and the spare wheel is in a cage under the back of the car. Other owners of this car say that if you get a rear wheel puncture that gives you a flat tyre (as opposed to a soft one) it's impossible to lower the cage far enough to get the wheelbrace out. So I think calling out the local garage would be a sensible choice then, too.

[quote user="woolybanana"]Orange say they have got their fingers in the dyke but the data is still out there somewhere, and not in the hands of a charitable organization.[/quote] Do we take it that "d y k e" is banned on the forum? How will the Dutch manage?

[quote user="f1steveuk"] Not having a tester could I (baring in mind none are connected!!!), connect these wires in a circuit with a 12v car battery (which I do have a spare one of) and just use a 12v bulb ? [/quote] Testers - multimeters - are very cheap, and everyone should have one. That said, what you suggest will certainly work, but please please make sure that you have turned all the 240v electricity off at the meter first.

DD - I should say up front that I don't know the answer, but I hope this will help anyway. Taking a deposit wouldn't give rise to an accrual of income: that would happen if someone was in your property already but hadn't yet paid the rent. My dim memory of one of the differences betwen the UK and France was that France was much more wedded to a receipts basis - so if in France you hadn't yet received any rent for a lease that had actually started, you wouldn't accrue for it and pay tax on it. Local tradesmen seemed to work on that basis: I recall one man at least who didn't put his bill in until the first of January, for work he'd done in December, so as to defer the tax by a full twelve months. I'm pretty sure that if the deposit is - in whole or part - refundable, then you don't need to treat it as income until it stops being refundable. And I'd stick my neck out and say that even if in law the deposit isn't refundable, if in practice you do refund in certain circumstances (to maintain goodwill) you'd still not bring it into account until the guest actually turns up.

One of the (empty) houses we went to see before we bought the place we now live in could almost have been staged NOT to sell. The piece de resistance was a dog, obviously dead for at least a week, chained up outside the front door!

[quote user="Frederick"][quote user="NickP"]If they can get any money out of my kids and family for using my holiday home, I hope they let me into the secret? Listen this is just another French bureaucracy "lets think of something else to clog the statute books with" idea. Everyone will do what everyone always does with French legislation; and ignore it. [:D][/quote] I know how you feel Nick............I get mine to do the gardening and other jobs . [/quote] How?

[quote user="Théière"][quote user="Chrissie"]this is one of the ones with non-removable bars but, yes, you can put cross bars on over the top. [/quote] I doubt that, they would have been fitted with bolts so will be removable, It maybe they were bolted from the inside but doubtful but even if they were a car repair shop could remove the headlining and remove them for you and fix what ever you want. [/quote] Some Berlingos have roof bars where you can detach the bar from the mount (the mount on the outside of the roof) and replace the bars cross-wise where before they were lenthgwise (or vice versa). The mount for the bar stays in place. Others have roof bars that can only be moved (or removed) by unbolting them from inside: those ones can't have the original roofbars put on cross-wise. I think Chrissie knew what she meant by "non-removable" and so did those of us with one or the other type of Berlingo.....

Chrissie I am fairly sure that only some of the Berlingo models have roof rails that can be unscrewed from their front to back position and turned through 90 degrees to go across the car instead. I think - others may know better - that it's just the models with all the roof storage compartments inside the car. The allen key (or perhaps it is a torx driver?) for doing it slots into a niche inside the compartment under the roof that's accessible after opening the tailgate. If in doubt, instead of looking on the roof, look inside that storage compartment - if there's a small metal key there you can swap the rails around. That said, I am pretty sure all Berlingos (including ones that already have the lengthwise roof rails) have the little reinforced bits on the roof that let you put your own cross bars on as well - they go over the top of the fitted rails. I have mixed feelings about my own Berlingo. The tailgate is very handy, but it is heavy to open and shut, and quite a stretch to reach the strap when it's open. That said, unless you are very tall you're unlikely ever to bang your head on it when it's open. The 2.0 HDi model is quite powerful, and gives reasonable fuel economy. But ... it's noisy. At slow speeds it's rattly, and when going fast you notice the engine noise. And the rear seats are surprisingly uncomfortable - a consequence of the clever "fold down flat" arrangement. The bit you sit on is a just a bit too small for adults. On the other hand a Berlingo is hardly a temptation to car thieves.

[quote user="KathyF"]Another change that may well affect people moving abroad is the reduction next year from 3 years to 18 months for the period during which your previous home can remain your principle private residence for tax purposes, so avoiding CGT on its sale. In what is still a slow market in many places, that could well hit quite a lot of people who have had to move before being able to sell.[/quote] A pedant writes ...... "principal" ......

[quote user="You can call me Betty"]And besides, it just levels the playing field: France taxes sales of property by non-residents, why shouldn't the UK? [/quote] I know that's a rhetorical question, but at present UK residents pay capital gains tax on the sale of any and all assets if they realise a gain, and non-residents don't pay UK capital gains tax at all. They are going to have to write new tax rules to impose a CGT charge on sales of UK real estate by non-residents. But suppose you don't buy the house directly yourself: instead you put your money into a company in exchange for the company's shares, and the company buys the house. Then when you want to sell you don't sell the house: instead you sell the shares you own. So in addition to a tax charge on non-residents' UK real estate you'll also need a tax charge on non-residents' company shares where the value of the shares reflects the ownership of UK real estate. In then becomes an interesting game of deciding how you charge tax on the sale of company shares, and how you collect the tax. If you want to avoid obvious loopholes it won't be easy to do.

What I've seen the papers (so, of course, it's probably wrong) is that the charge won't apply for sales before April 2015, and even then it will only be tax on the gain since April 2015. So any expats with UK property would be sensible to get it valued as of April 2015.

[quote user="The Riff-Raff Element"][quote user="Quillan"]Moles have really nice soft fine fur by the way.[/quote] When I was, oh, about seven years old I was presented with a pair of moleskin trousers and I recall thinking "how ever many moles did they have to skin to make these?" [/quote] Moleskin trousers should be made out of cotton....... not moles' skins.

I am still not sure that you get absolutely the best rate from CurrencyFair (my transfer yesterday - 5th December- was done at the rate of €1.1976), because it's very difficult to do a fair comparison - the rate changes all the time. But it does appear to be better than the people I used previously, who would often give me two or three centimes less than the Reuters published rates. The maximum rate yesterday was (I think) €1.21. On the other hand: 1. CF don't make any separate charges. 2. They do the exchange very quickly indeed: the money left my UK account yesterday and it's shown today on my French account as a credit on the 5th (ie the same day). 3. They will happily accept a regular order: I have a standing order each month to pay them, and they transfer it automatically to my French account without me needing to remember. 4. They don't seem to give you a bad rate if you're doing a small transfer (but again it's difficult to compare). And of course I can only approve of the business model, peer-to-peer transfers.

[quote user="parsnips"][quote user="PaulT"]http://tinyurl.com/ngavee8[/quote] No, but I have recently switched to "Transferwise"  from my pension payer's contract with "Western Union " and am absolutely delighted .   Transfers are consistently made at an all-in cost of about0.06centimes per £.   Take a look at their website. [/quote] Paul T's link is to the Transferwise website, Parsnips...... I've recently started using CurrencyFair which is a Peer-to-Peer FX operation. So far their rates have seemed pretty good too.

[quote user="confused of chalus"]One reason for keeping an English bank account is so English pensions can be paid in there. ......[/quote] Absolutely right. Although the DWP will happily pay my state OAP in euros to a French bank account, my two occupational pensions - both from schemes run by large companies which had/have substantial European operations (and one of which is now actually owned by a major French group) - can only be paid in sterling. I have asked them from time to time to reconsider but the answer is always no. Both of these companies to my certain knowledge have substantial numbers of pensioners living in the eurozone. So in my case at least I have absolutely no option but to keep a UK bank account, however much I might be committed to living here in France.

[quote user="sweet 17"]Book was MILES better than the film. Forsythe writes very well, in proper sentences, and not in text-speak like lots of modern books these days.  Plus he can tell a story and make it exciting as well as credible. [/quote] I've not seen the film, so I can't comment on that, but I thought quite a bit of the book's plot was rather creaky, and some bits of the narrative were totally mysterious. Fr'example, can you explain this bit? Investigating the timetable of his assassination he had consulted a calendar to discover that dusk fell on August 22nd at 8.35, seemingly plenty late enough even if De Gaulle was late on his usual schedule, as indeed he was. But the calendar the Air Force colonel had consulted related to 1961. On August 22nd, 1962, dusk fell at 8.10. Those twenty-five minutes were to change the history of France. And I don't think that dusk "falls" either, it's night that does that. Unless you're a Swedish heavy metal band, of course. He probably means sunset, but how there might be a 25 minute difference from the previous year beats me.

[quote user="nomoss"] You can't, and every government has to have a cause which will raise indignation to divert attention from their incompetency. Argentina has the Maldives, Spain has Gibraltar, Scotland has the Brits stealing their oil, and the UK has johnny foreigner coming over to cheat the honest Brits[:D]     [/quote] Argentina has the Maldives ????? That'll be news in Malé.

Looks a bit like there aren't any Rodez-Stansted flights after early November, either. My memory isn't as good as it was, so I can't recall whether this complete cancellation is the same as last year. I know Ryanair have had winter flights on this route in some previous years.

[quote user="dave21478"]..... chock the wheels or if possible jack it up and leave it on axle stands to prevent flat spots. ....[/quote] Dave - A quick look on the internet seems to suggest that if you do get a flat spot on a tyre as a result of leaving your car parked for an extended period, a short drive that warms the tyre up a bit will get rid of it: it'll just be a bit vibration-prone at first. Other people suggest parking the car with each wheel on a bit of styrofoam - the kind of plastic your new computer comes packed in. It's a lot less trouble than using axle stands.

And check the antifreeze - or get a car with an aircooled engine .....

[quote user="andyh4"]Because it is only valid for the first 5 years of the mortgage and you have to be fiscally resident to claim it.   So if you take out a mortgage, but are a second home owner for the first 5 years, then you will get nothing.  I do not have a problem with this personally, but I can see how it could be a disadvantage if the decision to buy or not to buy is in the balance.   (incidentally I got one years worth out of the fiscs for the reason stated above.  Not to be sniffed at, but then I knew I was coming to France permanently from the day we decided to look for somewhere to buy.)  [/quote] Thanks Andy - you do seem to see it the same way I do. I am not quite sure, though, whether Idun hasn't got something else in mind, but what it is - no idea.