french addresses - stupid question

[squidge]

ok..... this has been bugging me for ages..... and today i feel brave enough to display my utter brain thickness to you all...

the question is this:

how do the french know who lives in which house? they can get pretty close by seeing who lives in the nearby houses from looking at the names on the post box 'stacks' on the roadsides.....but that only gets them so far.

we're (hopefully) finally making the move down south next week to pick up the keys to our new house. as far as i can see, squidgie and mark's new address can't be anymore than:

squidge & mark

village name

postcode

...... how do france telecom, deliveries etc etc know which of the 150 odd houses is ours?! oh gawd am i being really stupid?!

squidge [Www]

 

 

 

[Cat]

I'm in the same situation squidge.

The postie will know all of the names of the people on his/her round, so no problems with mail delivery.

France Telecom and other utilities will identify you by your customer number, delivery drivers will phone you for the "first house on the left after the poubelles" type instructions that they will need to find you.

For Tax d'habitation etc, your property is also known by its cadastral plan number, I believe.

Often there will also be a hamlet name in the address, or if you are in a small town it may be something like "le Bourg".

You could always give your new house a name, "chez squidge" has a nice ring to it [:)]

 

 

[Mark]

[quote user="Cat"]

You could always give your new house a name, "chez squidge" has a nice ring to it [:)]

[/quote]

I'm going to call it 'Colin'.  Or we could do that thing some English couples do by merging their two first names into something oh-so-elegant, and call it 'Squark', or 'Marge'. [I]

[Teamedup]

[:'(]  NON we don't do that, we don't village name, post code. We postcode and village/town/city name together ie

John Smith

Le Revard

73155 Val d'Isere

 

  the postcode is always like this,all on the same line, just like on french envelopes.

Around here there are 'villages' that are lots of little hamlets, each with it's own name/'lieu dit'. And even in the bigger villages there are quartiers that have their own names/lieu dit too, like Le Bourg or Servette etc etc. Our village started naming roads years ago and it was probably a good thing as the village has expanded, but before then we had two forms of lieu dit to put as our address.

Just shows how much the posties pay any attention to the marked address though. We got a letter addressed to a completely different name to ours and not an english name, ours is, it was also addressed properly to an address in another village several miles away. The only thing that it had that might have made the postie think of us was an english stamp. I took it into the post office and they tried to give me it back and told me it was mine. The clerk knew my name, knows where I live and can read as far as I am aware. Sometimes I think I am the only sane person in a mad world, or maybe the only mad one.

 

[Will]

[quote user="Cat"]

delivery drivers will phone you for the "first house on the left after the poubelles" type instructions that they will need to find you.

[/quote]

How dare you give away our location on a public forum [:D][:P][;-)]

[quote user="Cat"]

Often there will also be a hamlet name in the address, or if you are in a small town it may be something like "le Bourg".

[/quote]

I am always amused by the certain brand of British in France who get house name plaques made in England to put on their gate posts, saying 'Le Bourg' (well, that's their house name according to the phone book...)

[quote user="Cat"]

You could always give your new house a name, "chez squidge" has a nice ring to it [:)]

[/quote]

In all seriousness, the French authorities don't take too kindly to you giving your own name to a house. Though neither do the British - I remember somebody I knew in Brighton who fell foul of the local council when he decided to change the name over his door from 'East Lynn' to 'Firkham Hall'.