Hi everyone, first post on this fabulous forum. My Wife & I are moving to France in April/May to retire. We have our S1 forms but we are trying to find out how we register with CPAM to get into the French system. Could anyone help please? There seems to be a lot of paperwork to sort out but we know it will be worth it.
You can’t do anything until you get here but there’s a fairly simple form to fill in and a number of documents to provide. Then it’s a matter of waiting.
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Exactly so. And generally best to take the documents rather than post them.
And keep copies (lots) of everything and throw nothing away.
Apparently our office won’t take them in person, they simply point you towards the postbox.
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With my feuille de soins I take a photo of me putting then envelope in their post box…
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And where possible keep the original and hand over the copy.
I pitched up at the local office in St. Lo, very early in the piece. It was my first engagement with FR bureaurocracy. Asked if I had a RdV I said not. However, after a few minutes wait I was summonded to the presence, all ‘docamenti’ was in order and that was it - job done.
It then took 4 months for the C.V. to arrive …
A very warm welcome to Survive France, @David_Mayhew . It will all be fine but it does take quite a long time. Roughly which part of France are you heading for? The Prefectures and CPAM offices etc etc are rather different from area to area and people may be able to give you more specific advice.
I would echo what everyone has said about copies of documents and @DrMarkH is quite right - give them copies and keep the originals if at all possible.
Have you got a bank account set up? They will need details of that for payments. It will all be fine, so please don’t worry!
Must-haves include a decent printer and scanner 
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Thank you @AngelaR . We are moving to the 36300 department (Indre) near to Le
We are actually coming over next week for a few days, hopefully to try & register with the local CPAM office. We have a couple of good friends who have offered to introduce us to their English speaking doctor.
We hope to open a French bank account whilst we are over there next week.
The other thing we need to do is find a good vets so that we can bring our dogs over.
Does
Does seem like a lot of hoops to go through but we are so looking forward to our new life in try his fabulous country!
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I thought we could register with the French health system straight away but one needs to be here three months before being able to do this. We bought private health insurance for six months costing £1500 for both of us as we couldn’t satisfy ourselves we would have any health cover otherwise despite having S1s. It took us a fortnight to set up a bank account (Britline). Can’t do much without a French bank account. There is plenty of paperwork but the rewards are worth the effort. We have another month and a bit before we apply to CPAM.
With an S1 you don’t need to wait 3 months.
You can set up a Britline account now, @David_Mayhew
That’s not what we were told by Amelie John. We were also told that despite what it says on the website, details of CDS registration are required though this won’t affect applicants who have a visa.
Not to be a wet blanket, but when do you actually become resident? Even with an S1 the CPAM may well need you to confirm you are resident. And you can only be within the social security system of one country (which doesn’t mean that with an S1 you can’t get medical care in the UK).
So are you ready to become non-resident in the UK with all that implies?
They were wrong!
I really don’t want to sound grumpy but this really isn’t the case as I’ve said over and over. The only thing you still can’t do to my knowledge is CPAM as their system is still hard coded for an FR or MC IBAN, but otherwise it’s perfectly possible to live here full time for many years without a French bank account (source: me, I did for many years). Most fonctionnaires or customer service people will still be stuck in the ‘computer says no’ mindset if there is an issue but with very little pushback will almost always find it’s perfectly possible. Now that the likes of Revolut, Bunq, N26 etc have local FR IBAN accounts the final hurdle has been removed.
Of course that’s not to say many wouldn’t prefer to have a local account with the ability to visit a branch or get one of those ridiculous chequebooks some still seem to use, I don’t begrudge people doing whatever makes them most comfortable, but it’s absolutely not essential in 2025.
When we bought French car insurance from FAB we needed a French bank account . They did however accept a UK card for health cover.
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Yes, I won’t speak badly of our legendary insurance guru but there are still businesses with odd legacy rules, but I just tend to vote with my feet to those who do want my business. Groupama and AXA have never said anything about it to me, so that’s where I went. I wonder whether it was really a French account , or just a French IBAN needed.
The problem is as a newcomer one doesn’t know any better. I’m not clear about your response Jane.