Ok, first some background info: My wife and I purchased a cottage in Brittany in February 2020 with the intent of living there. We moved our things over from Jersey and then decided to go visit our daughter in Australia for a couple of months, leaving everything still in boxes. Little did we know that just a few weeks later…
…COVID happened…
Fast forward 2 years to when we were finally allowed to travel again, and we found the house pretty much as we’d left it. By this time, however, we’d fallen in love with life Down Under and decided that Europe wasn’t in our future plans, so we sold or gave away most of our belongings in the Brittany house apart from a few boxes which we had shipped over to OZ (that’s a story for another day!).
Anyway, the point is, our knowledge of the french system is pretty poor, and our language skills are diminishing all the time.
I checked our bank account this afternoon from our home, and I was surprised to see over 4,000 Euros were taken from our account yesterday. The reference states Avis Tiers Dententuer (SATD), which I have found out is the judiciary system removing money from our account to pay some over fees (tax?). My question is, how do I found out about this unknown debit? I’ve contacted the bank but haven’t heard anything yet. I don’t recall ever getting a tax number back in 2020 (though we did set up a bank account), and I’ve never received a letter or email of any sort requesting payment, so I’m struggling with how to find out more.
Thanks, Jeremy
An ATD by the tax administration is generally only ever acted upon after the tax authorities have already communicated, or tried to communicate, in some way, the debt due, and the deadline for the reminder of payment (with any late payment fine) has been missed.
Somewhere along the line, the local tax administration will have sent, or tried to send, one or more bills, and these have remained unpaid. If they were returned to the tax administration as NPAI (n’habite pas à l’adresse indiquée), e.g. by the post office, or a neighbour who might have received them erroneously (sometimes the post office deliverers are quite lazy, especially during the holidays, as they use temporary contractors) then this can quickly result in the tax administration considering you a bad payor.
The problem is how to prove that that is the case. The inital tax demand letters sent by the tax administration aren’t registered, so they could have gone missing and you would have no way of proving that. The post office will deny any liability.
The bank may not necessarily be able to find out much more detail, as usually, these orders only specify the debitor and the amount, and are imperative, i.e. the bank can not refuse to honor them.
Your best bet would be to contact the local tax office for the property in question. As you say that you don’t have an account with the tax administration, you might have to create one, or else try and use their telephone, or public-facing email, service if they have one.
Thanks, that’s a very useful answer. It sounds like we will need to go to the office office in person, as we have no tax documentation whatsoever, in particular, the numero fiscal.
Did you set up any mail forwarding arrangement? And have you ever had a tax fonciere or habitation bill? Which should have reference numbers you can follow up.
And how are you paying utilities like rubbish electricity and water? That could be another nasty surprise if not.
But agree with others that this sounds like unpaid property taxes.
We used to get these for employees who owed the fisc money for taxes and had to take it out of their wages and pay the Tresor Public direct. Its how they get the money in and you have to comply so as the OP was not around, his bank account was used to pay it off as they have the right to help themselves if the debtor has been given plenty of warning.
Sorry to hear about this. I hope you get it sorted soon.
It has got me wondering. If someone leaves France permanently, when is it safe to close down your French bank account?
Presumably you need to keep it open until you’ve paid your last tax bill (so if you left now, for example, your last assessment notice would arrive in August 2026).
I seem to remember some guy on here a while back, who was having trouble paying a French tax bill because he didn’t have a French bank account. I can’t recall the details but there was some mention of not being able to just pay a bill with, say, a foreign credit /debit card. Or Wise.
On second thoughts, I think there’s no problem paying from a UK bank account because we’re in SEPA.