Sorry if you all know already!!
Gouv.fr.fr will soon make applications more accessible via an online apply for your CDS, website.
“France will launch a new online platform in October so Britons can apply for their carte de séjour residency permits, the French PM has announced. However campaigners fear the new system may still struggle to cope with the demand”.
Whilst it is welcome news I do wonder whether they’ll wait until the 1st of November before allowing people to apply as it’s possible the UK will still be in the EU.
Bearing in mind the confusion/chaos still be felt in some quarters … by those trying to access the ANTS automated system… it might be best to wait and see how things pan out…
There will still have to be another way for folk to apply, who cannot use a computer for whatever reason.
…yes…they won’t make it an all www application, but it will surely help with the physical chaos of queueing/rdvs etc. I think the best plus could be that the huge diffs between nationwide prefets, might vanish altogether, if they plan some kind of centralised admin?
. Haha! NOT, though, if it means the same peeps/same cross officials or human failings, already encountered by some, at whichever local prefet has already screwed up. My lady with eyes out on stalks, I can’t imagine she would have been any more pleased to deal with my info, via a stuffed up computer, instead of face to face. She was OK, poor gal, I think, in retrospect, it must have been her first day, first hour, on the job! And I with my pidgin French, could have been her worst nightmare.
If it still takes any given Prefecture 8 months to process the application (in my case, and even longer for my wife, who’s still waiting), having a website through which to apply doesn’t really make much difference does it ?
We attended the outreach meeting in Caen last week, and were told the there would be a window of 6 months to make your application in the event of a no deal.
New IT system, 6 months window. I don’t think so.
Andy
Like the new customs management system the French have introduced at ports that manage traffic to the UK - the French union of customs officers has already said that it is as yet untried and untested…
Im so sorry, I understand the awful stress of that situation.
I wonder, for all those finding their local prefecture to be unresponsive/difficult, if a bit of lateral thinking/doing is possible? Somewhere in the realms of possibility?
That is… To make a temporary move, and apply to a different prefet?
Is that feasable? I dont know all the rules. .
When I was most anxious about my local Prefecture, with its airport style body checks/armed guards/ tragic looking, anxious queues, someone I knew, talked about offering me temporary guardianship of a house, very far from my home, down south.
Their offer was unconnected to my, then, despair of never obtaining the essential docket.
A much smaller, country town.
I didn’t take up the offer, but wondered…
Maybe it is similar to taking a driving test, in UK? (Although, Perhaps those rules have changed, now…?)
I.e.
There was no way on gods earth I wanted to take the driving test in London, or any large town, and chose instead the smallest possible town, with only two sets of traffic lights. And very little traffic, after DIY driving lessons, around a people, and traffic free, lake road.
I passed., Very peacefully.
Is there a way to apply to a more friendly prefet?
Those towns normally only have a sub Prefecture and will/do not deal with CdS for non french, unless somebody knows different?
One person posted that he had no problem and fairly rapid for his CdS, maybe we should all go to his Prefecture 
From reading lots of desperate …and contented posts on the RIFT forum,
about successes and failures, and other reports, my impression so far, is that apart from the correctness/validity of anyone’s application in particular, there seems to be considerable difference in style and speed of how applications are managed. There must be more than one smiling, welcoming prefet in the land!
It is a total waste of time even trying to get a CDS before the 31st of October.
Is that official Tim? Or a guess?
Think about it logically Jeanette, there are about 30 working days before the Brexit deadline and the French government has already set-up a dedicated on-line system that could be live in 14 days time, why would any prefecture use valuable man power to start an application for a card that could be redundant on the 1st of November?
I’d side with you on that one Tim, certainly if you haven’t yet applied for anything. It seems highly unlikely that anyone in any Prefecture is going to be processing any Brit’s new application if the new system is coming online in the next month.
Tim and Alex. Its all good to think on…
No sense in trying to forget it, that’s too much like being blindfold, marching along the edge of a cliff …just for fun.
However…
Thinking logically, needs a lot more solid information than I’ve got!
What I’ve got …is a bunch more docs to print, fill and return, or maybe not…with a new rendezvous arranged at the Prefet…
But its all arranged for 29th of November, so dunno what happens in that Limbo gap, after a possible “no deal”…
So…
I’m giving up on logic AND guessing along with divining, tarot, tealeaves and shamanism, until the cops come to shift me over the border, or… fund the trip to Berlin? Better not go for a too long bus ride.
They may send me back again…
All night buses are good, cheap accommodation, thinking on…
What is the rdv for Jeanette?
Tim, you made me laugh. The answer to your q. could be “a lemon”?
I really have no idea.
I suspect a plot.
But if I cock a snook, and don’t go…what then?
The EU rules are there for everyone to read…ie…that CDSs are not obligatory, if, like me, it turns out you have EU nationality. Not just Brit, that is.
But, nevertheless, there remains the possibility, that someone might decide to challenge or question the right of absolutely anyone, to be here. So, to be on the " safe side"…or, to put a noose round my neck…maybe I oughtta turn up…again…
Hell.
I haven’t got a clue. Fogies are easily confused.
Still having difficulty in grasping why you need a CdS - You have German Nationality do you not, which confers on you all the rights of EU citizens which includes NOT needing a CdS. Or do you just like the excitement of feeling as one with us poor Brits who actually do have cause for concern. This is the third time you have rehearsed this narrative - please stop worrying unnecessarily about something that is never going to happen. You will NOT be detained as an illegal immigrant and deported back to Germany kicking and screaming. Personally l think in playing the victim you are causing yourself so much unnecessary angst (a feeling of deep anxiety or dread, typically an unfocused one about the human condition or the state of the world in general.) Almost as though, quoting your own words, "you have the weight of the world on your shoulders ".
Dan! Thank you for your wisdom, if only it were, in fact, the truth According to French Law. It is not.
I have read all of the rules, and discussed the matter with N different legal authorities.
The last word, however does not rest with preferred comfy opinion.
But with the prefet, or the Ministre de L’intérieur.
If it cheers you up to tell me I am a dumb old fart, incapable of rational thought or sensible discussion with Those Who Know… Feel free.
Set up a cardboard effigy, of me,
and buzz maggotty pommes at it. I’m OK, with that. 
Dan…one more small point you overlook.
If, in fact, it is true that I don’t need a CDs, do you suppose the blokes at the prefet go to the trouble of thinking about different sets of documents, on my behalf, and then, thinking…hmmm hmmm we have to invite this old gal back again, or maybe she will Cause an international incident, demanding her CDs, when we’ve not fixed one for her…?..
The PREFET? THEY NEED EXTRA, UNNECESSARY WORK?
I should maybe take along a group of French pals, all demanding CDSs too? And the cat, and the cows from the next door farm. I mean…they really don’t know, who should and should not get a C D S… do they?