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Tax advisor needed


Graham
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Hello and Happy New Year. I think I am resolved to seeking professional help regarding taxation forms to complete in France (and the UK). Can anyone recommend and English speaking advisor in the Gard area. My French home is in Barjac so Uzes can be reached easily as can Ales.

In case in the meantime anybody can offer advice these are the rather complex circumstances.

I am now 61 years of age. I purchased a house in Barjac in September 2017. Since that time it has been my main place of residence and it is intended to become my permanent home. I am retired and during this time my only income has been my UK occupational pension. Most of the wintertime has been spent at the address owned by my wife in the UK. The house in France cannot yet become the permanent family home because she continues to have care responsibilities for her elderly Father. During or after April this year my main income will continue to be my UK Police pension but there will also be some income in France for the first time from two gites in Barjac.

I am sure there are more complex situations but I am finding it difficult to work this one out for myself especially as my ability to speak / read French is still very poor

Thank you in advance

Graham Wilson

https://www.villapastisbarjac.com/

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Hello and Happy New Year to you too :-)

Basically you need to clarify where you "live", and it sounds as if in fact your family home is in the UK even though you spend a lot of time in France as a visitor. France's criteria for residence are:

Under French law

Unless international tax treaties state otherwise, you are considered to be a resident of France for tax purposes if you fulfil at least one of the following criteria :

"Your household (including your spouse, civil partner and/or children) remains in France. This may be the case if you are living temporarily or for most of the year in another country for professional reasons. If you are single without dependants, then your tax residence is defined as where you live most of the time.

or

You have a professional activity in France, as an employee or otherwise, unless this activity is secondary.

or

The centre of your economic interests is in France. In other words, France is the location of your main investments, your place of business, the location of your professional activities, or the source of the majority of your income."

https://www.impots.gouv.fr/portail/resident-de-france-residents-france#English%20version

and from what you've said you don't meet any one of those criteria.

Therefore France does not regard you as fiscally resident. The UK's residence criteria are a lot more complicated, you have to count "ties" and how long you've spent where, but I'm pretty sure that HMRC will regard you as tax resident in the UK because you will likely have too many "ties" to be considered a leaver. So, future income from your gites in France should be declared by you to the French tax office as as a non resident; the gite income you earn during 2019 should be declared in April/may 2020.

That is how it seems to me at any rate.

So I don't actually see any complexity, no need for a tax advisor, just carry on as you are, the only thing is that spending extended periods in France may become trickier after Brexit. Under the EU freedom of movement directive, EU citizens are entitled to stay in another EU country for up to 3 months as visitors, but this isn't monitored so in effect you can stay as long as you like. When we become non EU citizens we'll probably be limited to 90 days in every 180 days in Schengen as visitors, and I guess we'll be clocked in and out just the same as as all other third country nationals.
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Have you been spending time in France because you want to establish residency before Brexit? If so what other steps have you taken, are you registered with the French health system? Have you applied for or even got a CdS? If you are saying that you moved to a France in 2017 you should have completed a tax return here in April/May 2018, if you moved in 2018 your first return will be made in 2019. The process will be complicated by the fact that your wife spends her time in Britain as taxation in a France is based on the worldwide family income.

In the first instance you will only have to concentrate on the income from the UK as any income from your gites will not come until the 2019 tax year.

It’s worth pointing out that your income will also include interest on U.K. savings and you will be required to declare all your worldwide bank accounts on a separate form as part of your tax return. If those accounts are shared accounts with a non Ftench resident that could get complicated.
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Sorry but I don't see it. "The house in France cannot yet become the permanent family home because she continues to have care responsibilities for her elderly Father. " sums it up for me as far as the French side goes - I don't see France regarding him as resident if the family home is in the UK,

On the UK side, he appears to have at least 3 "ties" to the UK - 1. UK resident family, 2. accommodation available to him, 3. resident in previous tax years - so for 3 ties, spending anything over 16 days in the UK would make him resident as per the statutory residence test.

https://home.kpmg/content/dam/kpmg/pdf/2016/01/statutory-residence-test-flowchart.pdf
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Hi ,

    It is worth noting that even when french resident, a UK police pension remains taxable only in the UK, although it has to be declared in France along with french taxable income  like UK bank interest and french gite rents.  .  The french tax calculated on the whole amount will be reduced by a credit equal to the extra tax calculated on the police pension.   This should result in a low french tax bill.

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Thank you all for your comments so far. I am hoping that this April it will be a simple declaration to the French authorities that my only income was in the UK and that tax was paid in the UK – but I do not know which form I need to submit.

April 2020 will be more complicated because I will have the income in the UK from my Police pension and a small income from the two gites.

Until this point the house in Barjac will be treated by the tax authorities as a holiday home but this year it is my intention to embrace the French health system and start the ball rolling towards the necessary paperwork to reside in France.

Graham

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Graham I agree with Eurotrash .. for the moment your centre of life is still the UK, you are not yet resident in France. So your declaration of income to the French tax authority will comprise simply your income from the holiday accommodation you let out as a non-resident.
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I see why the OP is keen to make a case for being resident asap, but if he hasn't yet applied to join the French healthcare system and has presumably been using his UK-issued EHIC up to now, then filling in a French tax form for 2018 wouldn't help at this stage .

When you're accepted into PUMA you get a document called an attestation de droits, and this states the date when your health cover commenced. The start date can't normally be backdated to a date prior to your application being received (in fact your PUMA cover in France can't overlap with your NHS cover in the UK - before accepting you onto PUMA, CPAM need confirmation from DWP that you are no longer entitled to heathcare under the NHS). So if in fact his health cover was provided by the UK and not by France throughout 2018, which sounds to be the case, then he won't be regarded as having been legally resident in France during 2018, regardless of whether or not he fills in a French tax return this April or not.

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  • 3 weeks later...
[quote user="Graham"]Hello and Happy New Year. I think I am resolved to seeking professional help regarding taxation forms to complete in France (and the UK). Can anyone recommend and English speaking advisor in the Gard area. My French home is in Barjac so Uzes can be reached easily as can Ales.

In case in the meantime anybody can offer advice these are the rather complex circumstances. Tax advisor near

me Virginia, USA.
 

I am now 61 years of age. I purchased a house in Barjac in September 2017. Since that time it has been my main place of residence and it is intended to become my permanent home. I am retired and during this time my only income has been my UK occupational pension. Most of the wintertime has been spent at the address owned by my wife in the UK. The house in France cannot yet become the permanent family home because she continues to have care responsibilities for her elderly Father. During or after April this year my main income will continue to be my UK Police pension but there will also be some income in France for the first time from two gites in Barjac.

I am sure there are more complex situations but I am finding it difficult to work this one out for myself especially as my ability to speak / read French is still very poor

Thank you in advance

Graham Wilson

https://www.villapastisbarjac.com/[/quote]

Advise a good tax consultant!

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