Thanks.
The fact i am paying tax gets me through the door to health care though does it not (after 3 months)
No. Employment gets you healthcare but pension income does not. You have to apply for PUMA and when accepted make contributions based on your income.
http://www.ameli.fr/assures/droits-et-demarches/la-protection-universelle-maladie_charente.php
No. Read David’s link.
It is also worth noting that you will not make your first French tax return until the April/May of the year after you arrive in France. After three months residency the French authorities will have no evidence of your being a French resident/taxpayer.
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As said - no. David’s link explains. Tax is tax. To qualify for healthcare you need to pay healthcare contributions (think NICs in the UK). Don’t confuse the two because they are separate. Everybody who lives in France pays income tax (subject to earnings) but each person qualifies for healthcare via one of several routes depending on status - employed, self employed, job seeker, economically inactive, retired, retirement S1 from another EU state, workers S1 from another EU state. Whichever route you qualify, decides which caisse you deal with and the procedure that has to be followed, how your contributions are calculated and paid etc. As an inactif, if you don’t apply and prove that you are eligible, you won’t get.
Thanks. Been given some duff info.
Will read link when i get home.
Do you know what level the contributions are at ?
8% of total worldwide household income over a certain figure, approx 9600€ ?
Also note that it’s based on income in the previous tax exercise, so if you have only just retired and your income’s taken a dip, you may find your first year’s cotisations are based on your earnings before you retired. Some people get caught out by this.
Just had a look and all is now clear.
Thanks for the help.
First viewing trip is next week. Hoping to move to the Charente region later this year or April next year
Thanks. I assume that is doubled up as i am married.
Will be interesting for me as i own a ltd company so my income is topped up with dividends.
Two tips.
- Check out the weather in the Charente
- Rent before you buy
Nope - it’s not doubled up. In France you’re taxed as a household - not individually. So the rates and reductions quoted to you by David and Anna are per household.
Foreign dividend payments are taxed at your nominal rate (less an abatement / allowance) for income tax plus 15.5% for social charges (no abatement allowed i.e. payable on gross amount). Lots of info online.
It’s a shame you don’t draw a salary (instead of dividends) from your Ltd company in the UK. That way you would have been entitled to a workers S1 based on your continuing NI contributions. This would have meant free (non-contributory) affiliation to the French health system , with the UK picking up the tab!
Ok. Thanks
Possibly but not necessarily. It’s not obvious from what he’s said that he returns to the UK to carry out work on a regular basis.
Worst case scenario, if HMRC turn down the S1 application on the grounds that Dave has insufficient ties with the UK and is no longer entitled to continue paying NICs, he would be classed as an employee based in France, and his company would be obliged to pay full employer cotisations on his salary, ie approx 45%.
To get a workers S1 you normally need to be either on temporary secondment to France and intending to return to the UK with a set timescale, hence it’s not worth making you swap social security systems when you’ll be swapping back again a year or so laterr; or you need spend the majority of your working time in the UK which in practice means spending three weeks per month or three days per week working in the UK. People who live/work in France and receive a salary from a UK employer, aren’t normally eligible for a workers S1
True we dont know Dave’s full circumstances - I was simply mentioning it as an option. I was UK based for work and lived in France for many years - no prob with the S1! In any case - I was talking about working in the UK and living in France (not working in France).
Absolutely, it’s great if you qualify… but I think HMRC knows how desirable they are and they’re pretty strict on issuing them. Maybe the rules have changed or maybe they’ve tightened up I don’t know, but these days they seem to reject more applications than they approve. Once you stop being UK resident then unless you can demonstrate that your bum is firmly in the UK when you do your job, they tell you you’re no longer eligible for NHS cover and you must affiliate to the social security system of your country of residence.
Does one get any refund from HMRC as we will have already paid tax on this?
Hi Dave
If your UK Income is taxed at source (UK) and subsequently declared in France:
As was explained to me by the French Tax folk many years ago…
"we look at what Income Tax you have paid in UK… and… if it is equal to ours… nothing more needs to be done… if less than ours… YES, you will have to pay some French Income Tax…
If you have paid more Income Tax in UK than we (France) would have charged… NO… you will NOT get a refund from France…"
Presumably, it is still the same these days…
If you end up in a situation where you have in fact paid tax twice on the same income in the same tax year, eg supposing due to an error in how you filled your forms in, or due to tax years overlapping in the year when you move, you end up being taxed by HMRC on income that is actually taxable in France, then yes you can claim a refund from HMRC. But you have to wait until you received and paid your French tax demand in order to prove to HMRC that you have in fact paid tax in France, then wait for them to process it. Implausible as it sounds, I have a notion that they add interest to the refund, or maybe it’s the fisc that do that, or maybe I dreamt it.
Just seen this. Wonder if it applies only to earners ?
Basically what it’s all about is the introduction of a PAYE system for employees, which up to now has never existed in France. AFAIK it won’t affect anyone other than employees.