Dear members, in the course of my research, I have received some contradictory and confusing information about whether or not I will be able ... at any point ... to enter the national health system. To obtain my long stay visa for France, I need to provide evidence of private health insurance. No problem. To extend my stay in France, I must apply for a carte de sejour. My understanding is that this will be issued to me if I demonstrate good character, have sufficient financial means and possess private health cover. My question is this ... as a self-funded retiree (no government pension) must I pay CSG on my global income (superannuation) if I have private health cover? If I must, then would I not be entitled to join the CMU? Or, do I need to wait five years before I can apply to join the national scheme?
Hi Tony
We have just gone through this process after we made our first renewal of our Carte Sejour. Our accountant has told us that as we are unable to access the French system ( we have to rely upon private health cover), we will not be subject to the normal cotisations for the CSG and there is something quite clear on this in their tax regs. We still have to pay other Social contributions, but this saves us about 8.5%
We were informed that we would need to keep the private cover up for 5 years (tax years) after which we could apply for permanent residency. After that, we could apply to join the French system, but it is not guaranteed to be accepted and unless we can show that we cannot keep up the private cover, we would be expected to do so.
Hope this gives some guidance
Graham