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BREXIT

Reader question: Can I be resident in France and the UK?

We're now approaching the deadline for Brits who were resident in France before 2021 to apply for residency, but there is still much confusion about how the system works.

Published: 22 June 2021 09:31 CEST
Reader question: Can I be resident in France and the UK?
Home is not just where the heart is. Photo: Patrick Herzog/AFP

Question: We live in the UK and have a second home in France where we typically spend around 6 months of the year. We don’t want to limit our stays to just 90 days out of every 180, so why can’t we apply to be residents of both France and the UK? If we apply for a carte de séjour in France will that solve the problem for us?

Pre-Brexit, there were plenty of people who split their time roughly equally between France and the UK and considered both places home.

The flexibility accorded by EU freedom of movement, coupled with the fact that France and the UK – unusually within the EU – did not require EU citizens to register for residency meant that people didn’t really need to spend too much time thinking about which country they were officially ‘resident’ in.

Sadly, those days are over.

Brits who were living in France before December 30th, 2020 and wish to continue living here must apply for a residency permit – known as a carte de séjour – and must do it quickly. The deadline to apply is September 30th, 2021 – extended from an earlier deadline of June 30th. Find out how to apply HERE.

Brits who live in the UK and own property in France now need to either limit their stays to 90 days in every 180 – find a full explanation of the 90 day rule HERE – or get a visa for longer stays.

READ ALSO How to get a visitor visa for France

But what about those who want residency in both?

Unfortunately, it’s more complicated than that. The Withdrawal Agreement carte de séjour is for people who live in France – if you declare residency that comes with other other obligations such as filing an annual tax return in France and consequently the loss of certain rights in the UK such as access to the NHS as a UK resident.

Residency in France gives you other rights such as the right to work and – useful in a pandemic – the right to return home even if the borders are closed to most other travellers.

Residency in immigration terms – ie where you live – is not the same as tax residency. Tax residency can become automatic after a certain number of days in a country, while immigration residency needs to be applied for.

It is estimated that up to 25,000 Brits living in France have not yet applied for residency – people who do not apply within the deadline and continue to live in France become undocumented migrants, with all the associated problems.

READ ALSO What happens to Brits in France who don’t register before the September 30th deadline?

Member comments

  1. The info above is out of date in certain ways. As a result of changes in the last few years, the UK now allows access to the NHS by non-resident Brits as long as they remain citizens. If you have an S1 and register for a Carte Vitale the NHS pays for your health care anyway. This ‘dual access’ has long been the practice in the EU anyway for many nations. Whether or not you should remain registered with your previous local GP is a moot point but I suspect nobody will care very much either way. In any case, for public health reasons, access to GP services and A&E are free in the UK whether or not you are registered with the NHS or a UK citizen. The main exclusion used to be for planned treatments such as operations and courses of e.g. radiotherapy but the UK government has now recognised that people may prefer to have these done in their ‘home’ country and allows this. Problems will only arise if you become a citizen of another country.

    1. NB I’ve checked the source of my information in the above that NHS treatment remains free even if you are covered by an S1 and it was in the covering letter from the NHS that came with my S1 form just over two years ago. It says that a charge will only be levied where there is a statutory one such as for prescriptions. But I would assume that the ‘free for 60 plus’ rule trumps that as well.

  2. Thanks Iain, that is my reading of the situation too. It must be right that if you have paid into the NI pot until retirement, you can not only receive your pension if resident in France but if you still retain a residence in the U.K. you will receive the same NHS services as a permanent U.K. resident when you are in the U.K.

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For members

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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