Declaring Non-French Bank Accounts & Life Assurance

Banking & Financial Tax & Social charges
1


So - I was chatting earlier to a 'friend' in the local tax office who told me that there is currently a general 'purge' (?) on the non-declaration of overseas bank accounts (opened, closed or used) and life assurance policies (assurance vie) held by French fiscal residents. As you'll probably know, the fines and penalties for non-declaration are pretty huge and are multiplied by the number of years of non-declaration - all the info re fines is on the impots.gouv.fr website.


I know it's only two little boxes on the main 2042 form - bottom of page 4, boxes 8TT & 8UU but..better safe than sorry. If you declare on-line you're prompted to fill in the info about life assurance and attach forms 3916 for each bank account opened, closed or used. They're not interested in the amounts held/invested - just the details of the accounts and policies.


Such fun!


2

For our business we filled in in 2.2 (we are registered as a "Entreprise Individuelle")

3

It just boils down to the little guys don't employ accountancy firms who will tie up government officials in paperwork and contested court decisions for years to come all costing the regular taxpayer. So whateever government we are easier pickings. Plus too may in government write the rules to help tax avoidance by the likes of Amazon and Starbucks. They get the blam but its governments who created the rules that allow avoidance by the heavy guns. Didin't some group of lawyers/tax accountants estimate there is 30 trillion hidden away that is unpaid tax?

4

We have a small endowment policy due to mature soon but are not sure if this comes under the umbrella of assurance vie. Our understanding of assurance vie is a pot into which you would put your house etc. By the time the endowment policy matures we will have paid in more than we will have received. Will we have to declare this when it matures?

5

Well there's no arguing with that Chris.

7

Too late for us now, but try as we may we could not find it and when we asked (probably a ridiculous thing to bother to do) we were told that it is not by the tax office. If you have it, then I am inclined to believe you rather than them on previous form.

8

Sorry Brian... not sure what you are saying.
When you say on paper only are you refering to a particular doc?

The 3196 is available on-line for download!

9

Hi Simon, you are absolutely right about the purge, As part of France’s continuing efforts to combat fiscal fraud, a new piece of legislation was enacted into law on 6th December 2013. This has far-reaching effects, including:

Criminal sanctions for serious cases of fiscal fraud are to be increased to a maximum of seven years imprisonment and a fine of €2 million, when the fiscal fraud is facilitated by:

the use of foreign bank accounts or foreign life assurance policies;

foreign entities, including trusts, set up outside of France;

the use of false identity or false documents; or

artificial or fictitious tax residency.

Undeclared monies held outside of France, whereby the taxpayer cannot prove the provenance, to be taxed at 60%.

If, as a result of failing to declare assets outside of France, a taxpayer does not make a wealth tax return because the ‘none inclusion’ of the assets indicates that they are under the wealth tax threshold limit (currently €1.3 million), the penalty is to be increased from 10% to 40% of the tax due.

The period during which the tax authority can take action to prosecute is to be increased from three years to six years.

Another point is that they do not treat UK Assurance Vie income the same a from a French Assurance Vie,

if anyone would like further info they might like to attend one of the vents on the Tour De Finance which I will be attending the one at Neac near Libourne on the 20th May,

www.letourdefinance.com/

10

A timely reminder Simon. I've declared my bank accounts but have a 2013 foreign investment that "could" be construed as an Assurance Vie. Better safe than (penalised and) sorry.

11

It is not available online! On paper only, we had it because we did previous years and whilst we looked at filling in our returns online this year and enquired about 3916, we were told definitively on paper.

12

I would declare anyway, whatever the amount as you've nothing to loose.

13

No- the dog only had three legs after a nasty intervention by the local protection ring. This made for real problems in the walkies department.

14

PayPal is considered a foreign bank account, domiciled in Luxemburg, but I've read that private PayPal accounts do not need to be declared if the annual "turnover" is less than 10,000 euros. Commercial PayPal accounts, however, need to be declared (we have one for our B&B business) regardless of turnover amount.

15

Huskies know how to deal with climate change ;-) great pic!

16

thanks Alex... doesn't seem to be 3196

17

This could be interesting for my Swiss OH and a few Geneva then home visits over the next couple of months!

18

Ages ago a “fisc” told me not to declare any thing I still had in GB as I had filled in the double tax declaration and they already knew, and it would “confuse them”. Any comments?

19

It was the dog that shopped him! He's got a new, younger one, now on the island but she's not called Tehura.

20

Yes, I'd heard about the application of CSSG/CRDS to foreign dividends - this is a bit of a grey area where the French, because strictly speaking, it doesn't fall under tax law. I understand that there is a challenge being made somewhere at the ECJ, but I only saw a reference in passing and don't have it to hand.