Hello,
I have been struggling to get a health card from CPAM (Assurance Maladie) for 6 months now. They keep asking us the same document again and again or they come up with new papers they have not requested before. I don’t work yet, first I need to be linked to my husband’s insurance. He’s French and always payed his taxes, social security in France, I am a foreign citizen, never lived in France before coming here this year.
Lately CPAM asked for all bank statements of the last 12 months, both for me and my husband, joint accounts, private accounts, current account, saving account, both in France and abroad. As this implies sending them hundreds of pages, we are reluctant to do this. Not to mention the confidentiality, we don’t understand why CPAM has to have access to all this data.
We tried to contact them, they are not answering, not calling us back. The respective admin person has no direct number, the most we could achieve is to talk to a general hotline, where they suggested to follow the contact person’s request and send everything.
Did someone have the same issues before? If so, I would be happy to know how it was solved.
Much appreciated,
Vera
Makes me wonder if its really CPAM asking for this, but maybe it relates to is income and you being linked to him. If a person married to a French national is having problems what chance do us Brits have !!
We joined the French Health Service (ie CPAM) in the old days and they demanded a huge amount of documentation to show we met the resource threshold. I thought that had all gone now, and anyone who lives here permanently is entitled to join without question (once they have been here 3 months if ‘inactif’). The financial question is only then raised to determine whether you have to contribute financially.
Did you fill in the standard form to join? You might have confused the situation if you are trying to be joined to your husband’s account. This system of one person being the beneficiary of another person already in the system (ayant droit) has been withdrawn except, I believe, in a few circumstances such as the severely disabled. It is now normal to join in your own right.
If you want to apply to be an “ayant droit” of your husband then you will have to prove that you are entirely and permanently dependant on him. “Vous pourrez bénéficier des prestations en nature de la Sécurité sociale si vous êtes à sa charge totale, permanente et effective et si vous pouvez en apporter la preuve. Si ces conditions sont remplies la qualité d’ayant droit vous sera attribuée, quelles que soient vos ressources respectives.”
(Edit: thinking about this more I feel applying to be attached to your husband’s account is most likely to be the problem. Is there a strong reason you did this? As if not the simplest thing might be to start again in your own right? If you don’t speak French then explain that you made a mistake to english speaking helpline and see if they can reroute you in the right direction)
Thanks so much for the detailed reply! I think we filled out the standard form but somehow my husband came into the picture too. We might have confused them as you write…I actually wanted to be linked to his account, so that I incur less costs until I start working. We used to live in Germany, where the monthly fee was pretty high (180 Euros) and it was normal to have a family insurance, the wife and kids being linked to the husband.
Seemingly CPAM are trying to establish the income and cash flow levels. Perhaps it might be easier to send them a copy of the last annual tax return. If it is in German perhaps you could send a brief explanation with it, and CPAM will then at least be able to verify the figures by looking at the tax return.
Overall, I would strongly recommend that ALL correspondence with CPAM should be in writing and sent by ‘Recommandee avec Avis de Reception service.’ Phone calls are often answered by staff who don’t really know too much about the intricacies of the system, whereas a letter will go to the desk of someone who actually knows what they are doing. If you don’t put your phone number on your letter then CPAM will be forced to reply in writing, and so the information you receive will be more likely to be accurate.
I don’t think it makes any difference financially. He will pay via his work, and I believe the additional costs for you would be the same whichever way you join. If you are not working then it’s 8% of your income above about 10,000€, and if your income is low as a couple then you will not be charged, or very little. It is unusual now in France for anyone other than children and those mentally incapable to be linked.
Of course if you want to take out the top up insurance (mutuelle) that can be expensive.
I am having the exact same issues as we speak. It has been a constant battle with CPAM since my husband and I moved here last March. He works here but I am not, we are not French, but have the right to live and work in France. I just received my Carte Vitale in June 2021, so it took over a year to get it and in July I got a rights renewal letter, asking for my tax, electricity bills and all bank account statements for the last 6 months. I sent them letters, I called them various times, telling them that I am not working, don’t have any income and that my husband is the only provider.
I also have a private health insurance which is linked to our CPAM accounts.
So, I provided again all the necessary documents, apart from the bank statements. To me this is too much of a sensitive data to send by post. I tried and tried to reason with them over the phone and they just can’t understand why am I arguing this, as this is something normal, and last person I’ve just spoken to just said, ‘print it all and send it by post, as clear as that, otherwise we will terminate your CPAM account and cancel your Carte Vitale’.
I am actually fuming, but I just assume that is what I would have to do…
I hope you managed to sort this issue on your side.
Yes, we had to. Probably three times for some documents…
We were done together. However now they have got rid of the ayant droit system presumably everyone has to be assessed individually. Your OH contributions presumably paid by employers - but does that include cover for you or will you have to make your own URSAFF contributions?
It seems to be normal procedure for inactives to provide financial details to CPAM before they will complete your application. We had to send a small forest of documents several times, and often the same documents, to our regional office and months later (after hearing nothing) we received a request from the head office in Nimes for 6 months of bank statements, investment income statements, etc. This was despite already sending them our French tax returns. We duly sent everything requested by registered post (about 80 pages in total) and received confirmation of acceptance into CPAM about a month after this. The whole procedure took 10 months to get our attestations and carte vitales. We have already been advised by the agent who arranged our mutuelles that likely we will have to send all the information again at the end of each year to CPAM until we have officially reached retirement status.
Hello Marie, we’re based in north Toulouse if you’d like a cup of tea and a biscuit one day. Your concerns are merited so much personal data is asked for now through not the most secure means.
Good question. I don’t think the services are equipped to deal with digital although that must be coming. In principle government services have all completed their GDPR compliance and implemented measures accordingly. So that means sending by mail, manual handover would all appear to be acceptable. In my case I’ve always handed over manually a big file. Since covid more often it’s a send the dossier as they want fewer people in the bureaux.
Apologies but I don’t have a better way than those proposed. Arguably by letter recommended you get a receipt back of safe arrival. But you normally get that for a manual handover.
Going back a few years but at the time I did everything face-to-face as internet wasn’t used at all and they wanted pay slips and everything as the impôts didn’t communicate with cpam or anyone else for that matter. Things have changed enormously and are much simpler now but it is normal for them to demand these things, best thing would be to pop in and see them face to face, so much easier and often quicker too
AdrianTB: