Pension Questions

larkswood12 · April 23, 2026, 9:18am

Um, maybe check out this thread? Which has been quite active recently.

Does working in France always make you ineligible for an S1? Health Care & Carte Vitale

Sorry, this is a spinoff from another threat. A friend worked in France briefly many moons ago. He then moved back to the UK and worked there for years. Then he retired to France. He started drawing his teensy French pension. In addition to his UK state pension. On reaching age 65 and applying for his UK state pension, he was automatically issued with an S1. But since he was already in the French healthcare system he returned the S1, saying he didn’t need it. He only recently woke up to the advantages of having an S1. And contacted the UK authorities to see if he could get his S1 back. They said no and explained that because he had a French pension, he wasn’t eligible. Are they correct?