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Tax and TIN conundrum


Aitch
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Just had a letter from my French bank, CA, with the heading,

‘ Infomation client sur les comptes déclarable dans le cadre de échanges automaiques d’infomations à de fin fiscales’.

Having translated it, it would appear to be a notification by the bank to the French Tax Authorities under the ‘umbrella’ of possible Tax evasion and/ or money laundering safeguards. They also regard me a someone who has the quality of being a resident of one of the EU countries, (which I am, uk), but not resident in France which might be their interpretation. Having sold our house and with every tax paid, Foncière, d’habitaion, SdE, and TVA throughout, let alone Notaires fees etc. they are asking for a TIN (Tax identification Number). I have never heard of this. Can anybody enlighten me as to its disclosure? In view of the fact that we had our house for 15years, the bank will only disclose the details for the year ending 2016, and the following years (2017 onwards etc.). We currently have 3 accounts (We use them for our French holidays), of which they will supply the details for mine, my wife’s, but not the joint account. I cannot understand this reasoning. Anyone received a similar letter or enlighten me?

Thanks

Aitch
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We have recently had similar from a UK bank requesting a TIN (or equivalent tax identification number) proving that we are indeed declaring for tax in France (where we are full time resident).

Tax disclosure between countries has begun to take hold to prevent people from hiding from the authorities and not paying their taxes. [ I know one person who does exactly that and by being mobile throughout the year hopes that he can avoid be classified as resident anywhere.] Banks are therefore being requested to prove to their local tax offices that clients with addresses in other countries are indeed resident there and paying tax there.
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Why are you asking the French bank for détails of your accounts?[8-)]

 

They are asking you for your UK tax reference number, give it to them or if you dont have it give them a random number with a couple of letters preceding it and continue with your life.

 

Andy thinks that they are passing on said info to the local tax office, maybe they are but I doubt it, all they are doing is showing compliance themselves, a box ticking exercise, they ask you for a number and they keep it on file (even if it is fictional), job done.

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Thanks for the responses. I am not asking them for my bank details, they are asking me to provide the TIN. I agree that they might be on a box ticking exercise. As for residency, we have always been UK resident, but used our �maison secondaire� for over fifteen years. Perhaps they think that having a �maison secondaire� means that we were resident in France. Judging by all the taxes we paid, it might will have been easier if we had. I now have to find my UK tax number, but reluctant to give it to them, as sure as h*ll they will find something obscure to tax me for.
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Like Chancer I doubt that the details will be fed back and the feedback to the tax authorities will be along the lines of:

We have received adequate replies from everyone except........

The excepts will then feature in the tax investigations.

Not so sure about making a number up since many of these numbers now have check digits embedded that are used to make sure that the bored oik inputting the information to the "system" has not made a mistake. I have no idea whether the TIN has such check digits or whether the banks have access to the check digit decoding to see if a number is valid.

Regarding extra taxes Aitch, the French have all the information they need already to apply any taxes, they don't need your UK TIN to close any tax impositions.

Assuming your letter was similar to ours and they allow other numbers other than the TIN, you could supply your NI number instead. However since the UK uses TIN perhaps you do not have an option. Try as I might I could find no reference to a TIN on our tax documents here in France and so bombarded them with the host of other numbers that the French authorities so love.
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Aitch, you are just having to prove where you are fiscally resident, in case you are wriggling out of French taxes.

I too am a second-home owner, but UK resident. I have had these requests at least twice over the years from the French bank where my account is held.

Give them your UK tax reference number or whatever it is they want. As stated above, it's a box-ticking exercise so they will keep badgering you till they get it.
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and so bombarded them with the host of other numbers that the French authorities so love.

 

Good strategy.

 

I had been living happily off the radar for maybe 8 years before they got wind of me by the Lycée where I taught as a bénévole deciding to pay me €200 to show their appreciation, I got  a letter from les impôts inviting me to submit a tax return, I wrote back with a very detailed and (intentionally) confusing letter explaining my (overly) complicated residency situation and asking if I really needed to submit a déclaration for a de minimus  sum, it worked and I heard no more.

 

A couple of years later when I wanted to do several backdated returns the contrôleur was perplexed that I had slipped through the net, he laughed when he realised it was him that had sent me away with a flea in my ear in 2005 saying that it was a mistake, he had misunderstood my situation, but he was concerned that they had subsequently caught up with me only for me to slip away again, he found my letter and said that rather than try to respond to it the woman had decided to classé the dossier and he pointed to the rubbish bin!

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I am resident in UK. Our house in France was sold two years and from time of purchase, to the time of sale, every conceivable tax was paid, so I know I can hold my head up. I certainly didn�t earn anything in France and we didn�t have any loans either. What was left of our �sale money� we now use for our French holidays. I don�t fancy the idea that the French Tax authorities will come back and say, �you owe us�. Our Notaire checked everything, so I feel that there is nothing there to perhaps worry about, but the letter I received certainly put an element of doubt in my mind. I�ll have a look at the two other links from pomme, a little later. Thanks
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Its nothing to do with whether you have paid all your taxes or whether you are earning or have earned in France and the letter will not have made any indication of that except to an over-fertile imagination or perhaps Google Translate

 

Its all supposedly to do with money laundering, you are allegedly a foreigner yet you hold a bank account in France, the authorities require the bank to request a TIN number from you, thats it!

 

When CL were sending me similar letters not asking for a TIN number but for the ins and outs of a ducks ar5ehole they dressed it up as a "know your customer" exercise even using the English words.

 

 

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GRRRRRR!!!!!

Did not need reminding of the disgraceful way our french bank has been with this palava earlier in the year, or was it last year!

Not everyone in the UK has a TIN, as not everyone does self assessment...... apparently an NI number will do for the form, ALTHOUGH I looked up on the EU site and it is quite clear that if there isn't a TIN, then just let the bank know that the person concerned doesn't have one......... would MY bank accept that, would it rollocks!!!!!!!!!! still fuming....... can you tell, in fact I may just make their day and call them about it now.

 Other details, I know nothing about.

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I love getting into the "vous me demandez un truc impossible" exchanges, usually when someone is insisting on me showing my carte d'identité.

 

I also love the look on their face when after reluctantly accepting my permis de conduire I give them my old tattered UK papaer license without a photo, they usually copy every single number that they can see on it [:D]

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