I know that health insurance has been covered a lot, however, I wanted to find out how other people have obtained health care after their S1 has run out.
Ours ran out in January of this year and all our health provisions have been stopped and the CV's are not functioning.
Our income is from renting out 2 properties long term, so income fluctuates depending on if we have tenants or not. The last two years income was below the accepted income limit for France so in the final months of our S1 we were able to obtain CMU Complementaire. This has also stopped!
I am quite happy to pay for the French health insurance and don't want to rely on the state; the income from the 2 houses all year is enough for us to live on and would put us over the minimum limit so that we would pay our health contributions. Unfortunately the limit is based on previous years income, which for us is below the minimum limit.
We cannot afford the 5000 Euros for full private health care which does not cover us for pre-existing conditions. This is a major problem for us as OH was hospitalised for 6 weeks last year with a blood clot on the brain and now has to have 6 monthly MRI's and consultations - about 1000 Euros each time. I also suffer from depression and OH has arthritis! When we first moved over here our monthly prescriptions bill was 90 euros!!
Does anyone have any ideas as to how we can get health insurance without paying more than 50% of our income? I am quite happy to ignore the minimum income limit and pay the 8% to the French health care system if anyone has any ideas on how to do this!
Having gone through the rigmarole of getting my new partner registered here for health care, I understand the residency issue, but my point was to simply indicate the difference in normal contributions to the social security regime as opposed to those levied by the government in a disguised form of taxation for savings products :-)
Yes, he/she should have mentioned this possibility to you, assuming that all the facts were/are known (he/she is your accountant after all!). However, some accountants prefer the "don't ask, don't tell" approach :)
You are quite correct Alexander. but as I said before it is more about habitualle residency than anything and proving that you are perm resident here, ie you can prove that you are paying income taxes here. In most cases they will ask for your avis de impot as proof. If you pay your tax in the UK you will still have one of these showing that under dual taxation you have been reimbursed on the French side and will therefore show as nil. If you are liable to pay your income tax or tax on you pension in the UK for example on civil service pensions, this does not negate the obligation to declare here with proof of tax being paid in the UK.
Probably not, as assurance vie is considered a savings product for tax purposes and the social contributions you pay on these are not the same as your standard health care contributions - from memory, you pay CSG (contribution sociale générale) and RDS (remboursement de la dette sociale) on life insurance products. They are general levies that are not attributable to your personal contribution to the health system as a worker or retired worker - but don't quote me on that ;-)
I read about the recent changes on AI and received the email below from a guy that had just been accepted into the system as you have. Seems the French are conforming to the EU directive as promised.
Copy of Email.
I have attached a copy of the application form and the French Health Circular. On the form it tells you what you need to attach to it. Basically you will need copies of birth certificates, marriage certificate, avis d’impots, proof of address (i.e. EDF bill). I know that some people have been asked for translated copies of their birth certificates. It seems to vary from department to department. The application has to be taken to your local CPAM and they are responsible for sending it to Nimes. I was accepted before the central office was set up and my application took 6 weeks. It will almost certainly take longer for your as they have to send it off. One other thing you will need is a letter from DWP at Newcastle that they will no longer provide health cover. They will send this letter to you in English and French. You need to put the French copy with your application as one of the criteria is that you have previously been covered by a member state. I don’t know the amount of time before your S1 expires that they will issue this letter. The telephone number for the Overseas Health Team is +44 191 21 81999.
You will get lots of people telling you that it is not possible to get into the French Health Service until you have been resident in France for over 5 years. I know that’s not true and if you look at the second page of the application form where it says “Qui y a droit” you will see it clearly states the criteria is 3 months.
Just wanted to say thank you to all of you that posted constructive replies, much appreciated, and it took away the stress of not knowing where we went next.
To update you all:
1) We obtained a letter from the UK DWP in french that states that we will not get any more UK funding; this we sent to the CPAM offices. The DWP will provide this to anyone in the same position, so I would recommend obtaining it 2 months before your S1 runs out to try and avoid the problems we have had!
2) Our CMU Complémentaire still works!! Our accounts on the Ameli.fr website clearly state that we are covered by this and shows that my last prescription bills were fully paid. Phew! Our carte vitales are still not up to date, but hey, we have the attestation wecan use and at least we know that the health providers are being paid.
3) We have started the process of registering as artisan AE's. I mean started as I think all the paperwork they want may take some time, and we only opted to be 'petites réparation, petit bricolage' under the reparation business nature! If anyone has gone through the pain of registering as an AE artisan your comments and advice would be most welcome.
We opted for this because (and I hope I am right!) the work we do to put the houses back into order at the end of a tenancy can now be put on devis and factures for our tenants and we can rightly claim the money for doing this work, which we had previously not been able to do (unless the tenant agreed to this). We still get the money from their security deposit, only now it is documented for both parties. This also means that should we need to invoke our GRL insurance for work to be done, then we can submit the devis to do the work ourselves and ensure it is done to our standards and quickly!
If anyone sees a flaw in that plan please let me know (apart from the obvious that we do the work!).
Tracy, my société (me) pays my (and OH and the kids) mutuelle. My accountant needs the yearly statement to write it off as expenses under the loi madelin and deal with the tax element. Speak to your accountant sharpish ;-)
Catherine there is nothing slanderous about my comments, Did you tell the caisse that you were renting two properties to tenants,before you asked for state assistance from them ??, you do not get CMU whilst you have assets, if you have got CMU, they can easily put a lien against your property, to recuperate the social aid. Check with your caisse if you do not believe me !!
MIchael, you have made your point, but in a very aggressive way. Please tone it down, if you can't do that your account will be suspended. This is your final warning.
Catherine was seeking help and guidance from SFN members regarding her healthcare rights and did not deserve to be accused of not declaring her income. Personally I think this comment Michael is out of order and you should retract it.