This year all British nationals living in France – even if they have been here a long time or are married to a French person – will need to have applied for a new post-Brexit residency card.
In order to facilitate this, the French government has set up an online portal for applications that went live in October 2020.
Brits have until June 2021 to make their applications, and by October 1st 2021 possession of a carte de séjour residency card will be compulsory for UK nationals living in France.
You can find out more about the process and how to use the online portal HERE.
Now, three months after the site opened, citizens rights' group RIFT is conducting a survey of user experiences to find out how many people are using it, whether any problems are emerging and – a crucial question – how long applications are taking to process.
You can help by filling in the short, anonymous survey HERE.
Attention all French-resident Brits. RIFT is doing an anonymous snapshot survey about experience applying for new residence permit. Open to all UK passport holders, their partners and dependants living in France and covered by the Withdrawal Agreement: https://t.co/32p9f5OxOK
— RIFT #FBPE (@RemainInFrance) January 17, 2021
All Brits living in France are asked to fill it in, whether they have made their residency applications yet or not.
The data will be used to flag up any recurring issues with French authorities, and also gain an idea of timescales across different areas.
Although all applications are made on a central website, they are then passed to the préfecture where you live for processing, it is is likely that there could be quite wide disparities in processing time depending on each préfecture's workload and staffing levels.
READ ALSO Carte de séjour: How long does it take to get post-Brexit residency?
Prior to the referendum in 2016, I applied for my Irish Passport, as my parents are Irish, and therefore became a Irish citizen.I was born in the UK, and came to France as UK citizen, but have left my UK passport expire.My question, is, do I need to apply for residency in France under the new regulations.
I believe I applied for carte de sejour in November but cannot find any paperwork on my computer.Does this mean I have done something wrong or is this normal.
Trevor Gibbon
We applied for our cartes de S in January 2020 before the old site folded, having been assured that our applications would be dealt with along with applicants using the withdrawal agreement updated site which opened later in the year. Looks like we weren’t bumped to the front of queue. 12 months now since being receipted for applying and still no call-in for prints etc by local prefecture. (Mayenne)
First person without name at top here on 18th Jan. No, you have full EU rights of residency.
I applied for the Carte de sejour on 30th December, got confirmation 30 minutes later then received message 15th Jan for an appointment 27th Jan, I was in and out of the prefecture in 15 mins, they advised my card will arrive at my home in 3-4 weeks,, I’m married to a French man and have worked here for more than 5 years so that helped push my application through, I advised them I was changing my passport from UK to Irish (parents Irish and easier for me to travel around europe for my work) they said they didn’t need to be notified but would be easier for me, so guess that is due to movement for EU citizens, hope this helps but if you need any further info let me know and I’ll try to answer,