Getting PACsed

Legal Advice
#1

I plan to get a civil partnership (PACS/Pacte Civil de Solidarité) either this winter, or early next year. All the paperwork just has me down. Some of these certificates, I'm sure do not even exist in my home country (certificat de coutume)


I understand why they are strict on this, (imagine, I married someone here, and took half their worth home to a husband i had hidden away in another country), but, do they REALLY ask for all these? I heard people say that they were "let off without all the papers".


i'm not saying I want to dodge doing the work, it's just, In my home country, (Ireland), we don't have civil partnership, you're either married, or not, and therefore I'm not sure that my embassy can provide that. It's bad enough I have to go home to get a brith cert.



anyone been through this process?? anyone know how it works..


aslo, what happens then, we give all this to a lawyer, and they process it for us? Or we have to go to the courthouse?


any help would be greatly appreciated.


Thanks.

#2

I've gone home to get my birth cert sorted, and have applied to the embassy for the certificat..... i guess it's actually taking the time to GET the paperwork done (as opposed to messing around on facebook) which proves hardest.

Thanks for your reply, I feel better about it now> I think I was being dramatic,lol.

#3

Have been through the Pacs process. It is not as bad as it seems. Once you have your paperwork you simply arrange a date with the local Tribunal, turn up sign the documents infront of an official voila! To simplify it you might go to a notaire, who will charge, but we only paid 50 euros, but he rang the tribunal for us and got an appointment, he also persuaded them that we didn't need a translated copy of our birth certificates. So a good 50 euros spent.

#4

thank you so much for taking the time to get those links. hopefully a trip to Paris will sort it out, but in my experience with the Irish Embassy, they are a money making profiteering "business" They charged me 25 euros for the wrong document once. A document I had the department of education post me for about 4 euro.

I guess the only way to progress is to get things done, start the ball rolling.. most of it starts with downloading and posting request forms for forms..

Thanks again, your advice has calmed my nerves a little.

#5

You have to apply to the Embassy in Paris for the certificat de coutume. The British Embassy (don't know if it is the same for you) supply a declaration that this does not exist and most Mairies will accept this. If not, then you have to get the certificate which is possible but very complicated and long. When I married my British husband our Mairie were cool about it, on the other hand other people have had to produce the certificate - check with your embassy - the British info is here.

How the PACS actually works I'm not sure.

Here is some more info from the Irish Embassy and info on PACS here. Doesn't look too complicated.

It is better to have all the paperwork and not need it than to hope you'll get away with out, surely you know tha France loves her paperwork!

#6

i can do all the legal stuff in French, it's just the idea that, getting PACsed for two french people is one thing, but, when one person is foreign, they ask for three extra bits of paper, all stating the same thing.. that I am free to marry, and not already married.

I'm not going to go down the road of getting a lawyer that "specialises in anglophones", because, firstly, I'm sure it'll cost more, and secondly, I am just not the sort of person who does it. I often pour scorn on people living here who insist on doing things in English, like booking hotels, or ski lessons. I feel like, to live here, one must integrate fully.

We've done the first step by asking at the Mairie what we need, and, my partner, being French, only needs one or two things, but i need these PLUS three extra bits,as far as i can see from the factsheet she gave me in the mairie.

#7

i am not aware of the hurdles imposed; there is, however, a French lawyer Jean Taquet, who specializes in legal problems of Anglophones. You might want to visit his site and/or contact him. A friend got PACS'd and the problems apparently not overwhelming, but then her partner was French.