There was a while where I wasn’t working and my current employer kept saying - “we’ll have a job for you shortly” where “shortly” stretched to almost two years in the end (with a couple of weeks temporary stuff here and there). I got within a gnats whisker of saying “this is never going to happen” and looking for another job but not having to go to work did have its upside.
I had just enough coming in from investments to keep SWMBO insisting I sign on but it was a net drain on my savings to the tune of way too much so it wasn’t sustainable unfortunately.
At the moment, looking at all of the various predictions I would have a pension of about 1/3 my current income - which, frankly, would be a bit tight with two houses to run; if I stick at my current job until state retirement age (another 11 and a bit years) I’ll have more like 1/2 of my current salary - topped up with some modest investments that makes retirement look reasonable, not profligate but reasonable - however I’m stuck with keeping at building the pot until retirement.
It’s my own fault, of course. Not paying attention to saving when younger, not starting one career, switching away and then switching back, renting rather than buying when I was working “darn sarf” - had I bought a place and kept it on as a rental I’d be sitting very prettily by now.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, is it not.
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I do have “less cloth” to work with 
Hi Tom , would cost you nothing to try and even if you earn or have earned too much there is still a possibility of help with your mutuelle in the form of an ACS , it’s the same form (cerfa) . Good luck. https://www.ameli.fr/sites/default/files/formulaires/170/s3711_homol_mai_2018_remp_non_sec_version_ameli_et_fiche_daccrf.pdf
On the other hand Bob, some British artisans really do charge (or try to charge) exorbitant rates for some unspecified advantages for their services. I recently had a uote to put a cupboard under a sloping roof. Sliding doors, pretty basic stuff for a decent carpenter? priced at €2000 was also way outside budget. Maybe he didn’t want the job, but if so why not say so? Too small etc.
Yes everybody tries to keep a control on money especially when you are pensioners, and I am no different. This guy has an excellent reputation - mainly in constructing wood balconies for older houses, so maybe the job was just too small. I reconstructed an older wardrobe to the task, pretty basic but looked OK and did the job. However the French artisan came and is providing a quote with the proviso that he couldn’t start the job until the New Year. Maybe an excuse, but probably because like most artisans around here the last thing they have to worry about is lack of work.
It seems to me that if you make a reputation, the work is there. Wouldn’t the same thing apply back in the UK - or anywhere for that matter?
Not that I would ever try to change people’s minds over leaving a place/country they don’t like or just didn’t work out for them, but very often the cause is closer to home.
A French chap I know, told me recently that his son moved back to France from the UK…bought a large house in Charente, that needed some improvement. The electrical work was priced at 46,000 euros, by a local French electrician. An English spark priced it at under 12,000…same job, same spec.
No…I can’t work it out, either!
Was the English sparkie a french registered business paying tax/insurance/social charges and so on?
(I’m presuming son is fully integrated in France, so not a target for a french person to try it on?)
Yes totally legal tradesman
Son is French, like his parents, & moved his family & business from UK, due to Brexit.
Bizarre then. I can imagine some difference, but that’s extreme. We had a whole 3 story house done for around same amount (ie 12k) by a french tradesman.