Yes, to your first question - if you take a lump sum (or withdrawal) from your UK pension, the schemes that I’ve had would happily pay into your bank account whether in France, UK, subject to satisfying them about the usual anti money laundering ID checks. From there you can then pay into Nalo etc. I very much doubt a UK pension scheme would agree to pay directly into an institution like Nalo, they want a bank account in your name.
I was specifically referring to lifetime transfers between spouses… Unlike the UK, such transfers are taxed in France, once the €80k limit is exceeded.
Hi SBcamsci, After scanning rates online I found that XE.com came up with the best rate - very close to the ‘official’ rate. The transfer was very quick, less than 48 hours. For bank accounts I opened an account with Credit Agricole when I purchased my property in 2015 - no great problems at the local branch despite my limited French. Their online banking is also relatively easy to use and covers everything I need.
Out of interest - when you want to access your UK account in France, do you need a UK registered phone to receive a code. I’m just wondering whether I have to have a GiffGaff pay as you go that I charge with £5 every 6 months to keep my telephone number alive.
I’m with Lloyds TSB too - so hopefully all will be well there!
Hi - apologies - does that mean that if we shift a private pension into drawdown in the UK and then move to France and get the money paid via the pension company into a UK bank account and then via Wise into a French bank account - then we can’t (if in France) shift the crystallized pension from 1 drawdown provider to another drawdown provider (ie if for instance they offer lower maintenance fees).
I guess if the worst comes to the worst and there’s something we can’t do in France, we can rent a cheapo place somewhere in the UK to sort it out? I hadn’t thought I’d need to do this - but it’s do-able, I guess?
Can you go back to England on a 6 month rental agreement or shorter and do it that way?
So return to being a UK resident. At least a pretend UK resident for as short a period as you have to?
Yes you are right.For us it wasn’t a question of shifting to a better provider, it was shifting to ANY provider of drawdown or annuity. At the moment you just can’t transfer that sort of thing in the UK. Dave Lawson can advise on transferring to something different altogether, but as far as pensions are concerned, you are stuck. At least you’ll be able to set it up in the first place provided you do it before you leave the UK.
EDIT: I’m surprised you managed that @mark - we would have had to declare we were resident in the UK when the question came up - just a UK address didn’t work.
Hey! George1 - I think we have to pay Social charges on top of the Income tax in the system you describe, so I think the percentages are 9.1% social charges + 7.5% flat rate tax. So that’s quite close to the 17.2% social charges if we’re below the income tax threshold and just pay Social Charges in France on draw down. Does that make sense?
Having said that, it seems like a good idea - do you think we can push that transfer through ourselves or would we need a financial advisor? I’ve had only pain from financial advisors in the UK - we’re not particularly rich - and their charges are astronomical for next to no work.
Just with some simple maths - I guess it’s whether we’d choose?
500k pot - 25% tax free lump sum - £375k remaining taxed at 17.2% minus Form S1 if we take less than the income tax threshold (I’ve been told this is 30k Euro per annum by the tax office in Auch for a married couple).
Or 500k pot - 16.6% tax on the lot.
So - I think we pay less tax by taking the tax free lump sum but we have more flexibility if we transfer the lot at once? 17.2% £375k vs 16.6% £500k in this example.
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Edit - I’m getting an error message for posting too intensively here - so will give it a while and then respond to the other messages.
Many thanks to all!! for taking the time to post.
PS Does anybody know if there are high interest savings unlimited threshold accounts in France (we can get >4% ish here in the UK)?
Free current accounts (an online one is good)?
And free current counts with a free debit, free visa card + free cheque book facility in France?
I’ve been with ‘La poste’ and Credit Agricole-Britline years ago - and in both cases, the current account had an annual charge and the debit card had an additional charge.
All very strange when coming from the UK, where companies pay us to open current accounts and pay us to take credit cards!!
Although you can become resident the day you arrive planning to stay, the tax authorities will usually expect a 12 month period to make you exempt from stuff. For example if you want to return to sell a house as a CGT exempt principal residence.
No. Lloyds is quite happy with my FR phone number. I don’t have a UK SIM any more, tho’ I might get another because I’m fed up with paying over the odds to call UK from FR.
I had a GiffGaff and then IDMobile SIM for the 5 years I was living in Spain and only gave up ID here recently when I calc’d I’d be €3/€4 p.m. better off with one a/c with Reglo [€5.6 p.m.]
But they wanted a min of €5 a go for a FR > ex-FR ‘top-up’ which only lasted 60 days, rather than simply adding the cost of a call to the monthly bill.
I never had any bother from either UK company for going long periods of no UK-based calls. I only called UK from time to time - Lloyds Bank, Scot Wids and a couple of pals.
My new a/c with Boogie [€1.99 p.m.] keeps my FR number, which works with HM Gov as well as the UK banks.
When my wife finally decided to get rid of her UK number we discovered that Smile (Co-op Bank) wouldn’t send codes to non-UK 'phones. However, once we asked the question they now send codes via email instead
I am probably not the best person to ask about this, as I don’t pay any social charges on my pensions, through being privately insured for medical expenses. We were going to join Assurance Maladie after our first 3 months, as most do. We then realised that there were substantial social charges savings (@8%) from remaining privately covered, at least until exhausting all withdrawals from pensions. Obviously the social charges savings need to be offset against the costs of medical premiums and actual medical costs. For us, it’s still a ‘useful’ saving. It is definitely worth considering this approach if you have sizeable pension(s), which seems to be the case with your reference to 500k, whether £ or €.
One other factor. France has a special additional tax rate for very high incomes, and those taking lump sums need to bear this in mind… It’s the “contribution exceptionnelle sur les hauts revenus” and adds 3-4% on top of existing taxes for amounts in the 250-500k range.
I’m with Britline and the above charges are still applicable as you mentioned. This is very standard in France. For example I pay about 95€ a year for banking, including 2 debit cards (68€). Your free banking in the UK is presumably part paid for by all the folks borrowing on credit cards - which are basically N/A in France…That said, I get fantastic service from Britline ever since opening our accounts as a second home owner, and particularly as a resident.
I tried to open an online French bank, but gave up because they wanted to see the Livre Famille to prove that my wife had changed her maiden name legally. Interest rates for walk in banks are standardised with Livret A and LDD accounts. 3% for Livret A, not sure about LDD. There are better rates for long term deposits, and all the banks offer a choice of Assurance Vie’s which are investment accounts/life insurance schemes.
We’re thinking of contacting the UK using whatsapp (ie for free on our home broadband) and so more or less having no mobile phone contract.
Lebara (for mobile phone data) is cheap in the UK, I may try and see whether its French equivalent is similar.
I believe there’re a new range of cheap home broadband providers. When we were last in France (years ago) - there were only 3 or 4 companies (SFR, Orange, Bouygues) and they were all the same place and expensive! hopefully there’s some change in that market now. Would be lovely to get home broadband for 20E per month :-).
Wow is that Bouygues - what do you get for the £2 pm?
