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EXPLAINED: Do you have to pay duty if you bring furniture from the UK to France?

Brexit has ushered in a host of extra rules and restrictions on imports to France from the UK, but what is the rule for people bringing household items - either if you're moving to France or just want to bring a few items to your second home in France?

Published: 16 April 2021 10:20 CEST
Updated: 24 September 2022 06:08 CEST
EXPLAINED: Do you have to pay duty if you bring furniture from the UK to France?
Hundreds of thousands of relocations happen within Switzerland every year. AFP PHOTO LOIC VENANCE (Photo by LOIC VENANCE / AFP)

Moving house within the EU is pretty simple – load up a van with stuff and cross the border. But since the UK left the EU, bringing any goods from the UK to France has become a lot more complicated.

So what’s the deal if either you want to move and bring all your possessions over, or you just want to shift some furniture or household items to a second home in France?

Well, there are quite a few things to consider.

Banned items 

Firstly certain items are banned altogether. These are mostly explosives and certain types of weapon, which hopefully won’t feature in many people’s removal vans, but there are some breeds of dog that are illegal in France. Find the full banned list HERE.

Restricted items

Then there are certain items that cannot be imported without extra paperwork such as veterinary certificates.

This includes a lot of different food products so if you’re planning on emptying your kitchen cupboards to bring, check very carefully that none of the foodstuffs are on the restricted list. It also covers flowers and plants, if you were planning on bringing garden supplies.

READ ALSO Bovril, tea and ham sandwiches . . . what can you bring from the UK to France?

Alcohol and tobacco

There are limits on the amount of alcohol and tobacco you can bring in to France from a non-EU country – check HERE.

Cash

If you’re carrying more than €10,000 in cash you need to declare this to customs officers when you cross the border.

Pets

The EU Pet Passport no longer covers any trips from the UK for dogs, cats or ferrets – find out the new protocol HERE.

Household goods

As well as limits on certain types of items there is also a rule on the overall value of the items you are bringing with you – specifically you need to declare and pay duty on items whose total value is more than €430.

Obviously most people’s worldly goods will be worth more than that in total, but there is an exception for people moving to France.

The rules say that you are exempt from paying duty if you are moving to France and bringing your household goods which you have owned for more than six months, and you have been living in the UK or another non-EU country for at least the preceding 12 months.

There are some conditions on this, however.

The rules as published apply to all arrivals from outside the EU, many of which (such as Americans moving to France) are handled by commercial shipping companies by air or sea.

If you’re using a commercial moving company they will likely ask you for the paperwork whereas if you’re loading your stuff into a van and driving yourself things could be less strict. As this is a new area it’s difficult to say exactly how stringent checks will be. As ever with items connected to French bureaucracy, we advise having as much paperwork with you as possible to avoid problems.

You should have:

  • Two copies of a detailed inventory of your items with their value in euros
  • Receipts for any items published in the last six months 
  • Documentation showing your right to residency in France, such as a visa, carte de séjour or the passport of an EU country and documentation showing your new address (eg house purchase deeds or paperwork)
  • If you’re importing high value items you may also need the Cerfa 10070 form, these are generally defined as objects listed separately on your household insurance. 

You need to transport goods within 12 months of the date of your change of residence – so if you want to make several trips to bring items over then that’s fine, but the inventory you present on your first trip must include all the items you intend to import. 

You are not allowed to sell any items that you have imported duty-free for the first 12 months of your stay in France.

Full details on the French customs website.

Second home owners

So what about if you’re not moving, but you want to bring over items for your second home in France?

Bad news here, French customs states that: “Goods intended to furnish a secondary residence are no longer admitted free of customs duty and VAT.”

So you can still bring items over, but if they are worth more than €430 you will have to pay customs duty on them.

You will need a detailed inventory of the items you are bringing and their value, so that customs agents can calculate the duty that you owe. 

Member comments

  1. We have lived in France for 16 years but expect to return to UK soon where we have a small flat. We will need to take several van loads of house furnitire etc back.
    It is all at least a year old and mostly much older. What are implications when crossing border France/UK?

    1. Sorry this is not an answer only an addition to your question. I need to bring back to London about 40 pieces of my own art work, mainly flat picture objects, no value that I’m aware of, and wonder if there are any limits, rules or problems relevant to this? I’m also looking for someone to do the transport as I don’t have a car…!!!

  2. We bought some outdoor furniture last summer in the uk for our apartment in France (2nd home) and obviously have not been able to go due to COVID. Will we still have to pay duty even though it was purchased over 6 months ago

  3. im taking some furniture to France and know i will have to pay the import duty, but i arrive in Spain and drive into France.
    So do i fill in French documents even though i will dock in Spain?
    Any ideas of where to find out?

  4. Just wondering if anyone reading this can share their experience?

    I have had the bulk of my possessions in storage for about 3 years. I was making plans to haul it all across in 2020 (ie before Brexit) but then the pandemic happened.

    I’m not worried about paying any customs fees as I’ve owned everything for a long time. What I am wondering is how “detailed” they expect the inventory to be. Will “a box of cutlery” be sufficient? Or will I have to itemise everything ie 12 spoons, 12 forks and 12 knives?

  5. So first visit back to our second home in NOrmandy since pre covid and pre-brexit implemented. Confused to say the least! Can we still take things like our carpet washer over and diy gear which we will be bringing back with us……

    Would love to hear any recent similar experiences please??

    1. Hi Joandy123, we are in I believe the same situation as yourselves, we recently travelled over and took some kitchen units and were threatened with a 1000 euro fine, but they eventually let us off. Whilst we appreciate that maybe we will have to purchase materials in France, we would prefer to bring over tools etc that we need and then bring them back. However, we are finding it quite difficult to find out if we will be able to do so – have you had any luck finding out what you can do? Heather

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LIVING IN FRANCE

5 things Brits in France need to know about swapping driving licences

Now that the dust has settled from the somewhat chaotic post-Brexit period, the system for swapping a UK driving licence for a French one seems to be running fairly smoothly. There are, however, some things that UK licence holders need to know.

Published: 3 May 2024 17:20 CEST
5 things Brits in France need to know about swapping driving licences

This article is aimed at holders of a UK or Northern Ireland driving licence who are living in France – tourists, visitors and second-home owners can continue to drive in France on a UK licence and do not need an international driving permit.

British students who are studying in France on a student visa can continue to drive on their UK licence during their studies – if however they settle in France afterwards, they need to follow the below process for swapping their licence. 

1 You’re special

Well, maybe special is over-stating it, but the system for holders of UK and NI licence holders is different to that of other non-EU nationals, and also different to the system for EU licence holders.

The reason for this is that a pragmatic post-Brexit agreement was (finally) reached between France and the UK, in order to avoid the chaos that was triggered when thousands of Brits in France all tried to swap their driving licences at once.

Unlike almost all other post-Brexit agreements, this one applies both to people who moved to France before the end of Brexit transition period in 2021 and those who have moved here since. 

The below terms apply to everyone who has a UK or NI licence, regardless of their nationality or when they moved to France. 

2 But you still have to swap

It was technically always the case that Brits who were living in France should have swapped their licence for a French one, just as other EU licence holders do now, but in reality many people lived here for years or decades without ever exchanging their licence and there was little or no enforcement of the rule.

That has now changed and you must swap according to the following timetable;

If your UK licence was issued after January 1st, 2021 – you must swap within one year of moving to France.

If your UK licence was issued before January 1st 2021 – you only swap when you meet one of the following conditions;

  • The licence itself or the photocard is within six months of its expiry date. For more people the photocard expiry will come around first, but UK licences also require renewal when the holder reaches the age of 70
  • Your licence has been lost or stolen
  • You have been ordered to exchange your licence by a gendarme after committing a driving offence

For people who are exchanging because the licence is about to expire, it is important that you don’t start the process until your licence is within six months of the expiry date – early applications will simply be rejected.

3 It might not be as much of a nightmare as you think 

Unlike the old days when licence swaps were done by préfectures, the whole process has now moved online and is run through a single, central system.

The online portal for requesting a swap is known as ANTS and you can find it HERE.

If you haven’t used it before you will need to create an online account, or if you already have online accounts for French government services such as Ameli or tax declarations you can login by clicking on the France Connect button.

Once logged in, select Je demande l’échange ou l’enregistrement de mon permis de conduire étranger (I request the exchange or registration of a foreign driving licence) and fill in the details requested on the form such as name, address etc.

You might be pleasantly surprised by the fact the form itself is relatively straightforward (as French admin forms go), asking basic questions such as your personal details and the details of your driving licence.

You will have to upload supporting documents, but these are likely to be things that you already have to hand including

  • Proof of ID (passport or carte de séjour)
  • Proof of address (a recent utility bill or attestation from your utility provider)
  • If your driver’s licence is in a different name to your passport, you will need to supply your full birth certificate

You will also need to supply a photo – you can either use the internet-enabled Photomaton booths – find your nearest here – to create a digital photo with the required security code, or you can use the normal photo booths to print out a physical photo and send it by post after you have made your application. 

Once completed, you can use the ANTS site to track the progress of your application and upload any other documents that are requested.

4 But don’t leave it too late 

If you’re applying because your licence is about to expire then you cannot apply until you are within six months of the expiry date.

But it’s a good idea not to leave it until the last minute as the whole process does take time – things have improved massively since the dark days of 2020 and 2021 when people were waiting for years and their licences expired while they waited.

But it still takes time – the current average for a straightforward application with no extra documents required seems to be between four and five months, although processing times can vary, especially over holiday periods.

It’s therefore a good idea to make the application fairly soon after you enter that magic six-month window.

Once you make the application you should get an automated response acknowledging receipt – this is usually sent by SMS and/or email, it’s a good idea to check your spam folder if you don’t get the email.

Don’t panic if you don’t then hear anything for the next few weeks or even months, this appears to be normal. If your application is complete and there are no outstanding queries or other documents required, the next step will be a request to send in your old UK licence.

You send this by post (recorded delivery with a signature is strongly recommended) and at the same time you can download an Attestation de Depot de Permis de Conduire (certificate of deposit of driving licence) – you can use this to prove your continued entitled to drive in the period between sending in your old licence and receiving your new one.

Your French licence is then sent by registered post, and the window between posting the old licence and receiving the new one is usually not more than a month, you 

5 Help is out there 

If your application runs into problems or you have an untypical situation or find the ANTS website hard to use, don’t panic – help is available.

The Facebook group Driving in France – French Licence Applications is a good place to start with comprehensive guides and knowledgeable admins who are quick to respond to questions.

You can also chat to others in your situation and get updates on how long processing times seem to be.

If you have problems using the online system, your local France Services office may be able to help.

You can also head to The Local’s reader questions section, or email us at [email protected] if you have questions.

Digital licences

You might have heard about France’s new digital driving licence – unfortunately this is only available to people who have French citizenship (including dual nationals).

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