The title of this month’s column can be understood in many ways. As an expression, it has come to mean the end, after which people leave.

I admit that I like challenges. This one started when a reader commented in an email, “You don’t include the Band or Eric Clapton in your music choices!”

I am not a fan of The Band or Clapton, although I acknowledge that they are great artists. I consider The Band to have been very underrated, deserving of much wider fame. What I like so much about this comment is that Clapton admired The Band and it was an influence on his career, even though just looking at their respective fame, many would guess it was the other way around.

This short statement shows that my reader is a pretty savvy connoisseur of that era and musical style. I am also interested in them, as the titles of my column show. I am always curious and want to learn more about what was happening between 1965 and 1975 in England and the USA. Not long ago I watched several biographical films on musicians including Marc Bolan, David Bowie, Eric Clapton, Ian Anderson and I must add the Irishman Rory Gallagher, to mention some of the best known. They had a definitive impact on the international rock and roll scene in the 1970s. That is how I ended up choosing this title.

From Wikipedia:
“The Last Waltz was a concert by the Canadian-American rock group The Band, held on American Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976, at Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. The Last Waltz was advertised as The Band’s ‘farewell concert appearance’, and the concert saw The Band joined by more than a dozen special guests, including their previous employers Ronnie Hawkins and Bob Dylan as well as Paul Butterfield, Bobby Charles, Eric Clapton, Neil Diamond, Dr. John, Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison, Ringo Starr, Muddy Waters, Ronnie Wood, and Neil Young. The musical director for the concert was The Band’s original record producer, John Simon.

“The event was filmed by director Martin Scorsese and made into a documentary of the same title, released in 1978. Jonathan Taplin, who was The Band’s tour manager from 1969 to 1972 and later produced Scorsese’s film Mean Streets, suggested that Scorsese would be the ideal director for the project and introduced Robbie Robertson and Scorsese. Taplin served as executive producer. The film features concert performances, intermittent song renditions shot on a studio soundstage, and interviews by Scorsese with members of The Band. A triple-LP soundtrack recording, produced by Simon and Rob Fraboni, was issued in 1978. The film was released on DVD in 2002, as was a four-CD box set of the concert and related studio recordings.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Waltz

It happens that I saw the movie when it was first in theaters in France, and took some high-school friends with me.

As an expression, “the last waltz” in English is similar in meaning to “le dernier tour de piste”, or last lap. It seems as though every day brings another piece of news that makes this feel like the end of an era. The USA as a nation, has already gone through similar crises, such as the Civil War, throughout its history. The recent news of the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg adds to the impression that the USA as a nation is closing a chapter of its life and is ready to open a new one. However, each side of the political spectrum seems to be looking at a very different chapter.

THE DUBLIN SYSTEM REGULATING ASYLUM PROCEDURE FOR REFUGEES
People living in France rarely know the Asylum procedures. This series of international instruments started with a logical approach to the refugee situation by stating that refugees seeking asylum should have their cases heard only in the country where they first entered the EU. The key assumption was that each country would be able to handle all such requests. People can fly into any EU country, but the reality is that people are coming by foot, by sea, by road, etc., and it is the countries on the EU’s outskirts that are most affected by waves of immigration, without any help from the other countries.

www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2020/09/16/sante-environnement-minorites-ursula-von-der-leyen-devoile-son-plan-de-bataille-pour-l-union-europeenne_6052412_3210.html

PACS IS STILL DIFFERENT FROM MARRIAGE
In everyday life, marriage and the pacte civil de solidarité (PACS) look alike, since both give many of the same rights. But there are several key differences. One concerns the procedure to obtain “private life” immigration status. Another issue involves estate planning, as the surviving partner in a PACS receives nothing unless there is a will making a specific bequest.

A situation that often arises concerns the dissolution of a PACS. This is another one of those differences since there is no divorce involved and therefore this must occur amicably. This court case is about the legal responsibilities of the partners, such as whether the financial burden of the relationship should be equally shared or not.

The PACS indeed regulates an official communal life which includes the obligation of taking care of each other in sickness and in health. The article linked below involves a court case in which both names were on the apartment lease but one partner paid the entire rent and other living expenses, and asked to be reimbursed for half when they split up. While one tenant can force another to pay half the rent, the French Supreme Court has consistently ruled that a PACS creates an official couple and therefore it is a communal living arrangement and not a roommate situation. The ruling mentioned in the article, issued on July 20th 2020, once again stuck to this principle: the partner who paid everything was denied the right to compensation from the other one. This said, marriage has the same rule!

www.lemonde.fr/argent/article/2020/09/19/quand-les-concubins-se-separent-qui-doit-quoi_6052824_1657007.html

DETAILING THE PROCEDURE TO OBTAIN THE EMPLOYEE IMMIGRATION STATUS
Since the creation of the passeport talent immigration status, which covers several types of employee, many think the old salarié status is obsolete and barely exists anymore. And yet the vast majority of jobs offered to foreigners do not fit passeport talent requirements.

There are two very different procedures to obtain salarié status, depending on whether the foreigner is already a legal resident of France or lives in another country.

1. The foreigner lives in France
The procedure starts with a scheduled meeting at the prefecture of the foreigner’s place of residence, at which a file is submitted. The vast majority of its contents come from the employer, but the employee is responsible for carrying out the procedure. The prefecture transfers the file to DIRECCTE, the division of the French administration dealing with employee status from many angles. Its main d’oeuvre étrangère (foreign labor) office is responsible for deciding whether to grant the right to work as an employee. Since it has a clear right to veto any request, it is critical to know how to block it. The legal timeframe for responding to a request is two months, but since there is no penalty if it takes longer, that is quite common.

If the decision is positive, a letter is sent to the employer, the employee and the prefecture, which carries out the last part of the procedure and produces the related carte de séjour.

2. The foreigner lives elsewhere
The employer starts the procedure by submitting the file to the local branch of DIRECCTE to have the labor contract approved and receive approval for the request. Again the two-month period applies, but with the same lack of consequences if it is exceeded. Then the file goes to the branch of the OFII (Office Français de l’Immigration et de l’Intégration) in the département where the employer is based, where according to the guidelines it is reviewed for about ten days; in my experience it takes two weeks, which is pretty much the same. After that, the file goes to the French consulate nearest to the foreigner’s place of residence. He/she is asked to submit a request for the visa to be issued. This kind of visa is called VLS-TS, which means it lasts for one year and the foreigner only goes to the prefecture a year or so later. Upon arriving in France, the foreigner must validate this visa with the OFII, in order to secure his/her immigration rights.

http://www.ofii.fr/recruter-un-travailleur-etranger

OFFICE CLOSED FOR CHRISTMAS
The office will close for three weeks over the Christmas holidays, starting on Friday December 18th in the evening and reopening on the morning of Monday January 4th. As always, I will be reachable by email for emergencies and important matters. The service I offer of receiving mail for clients will continue while the office is closed. Of course, Sarah or I will honor prefecture meetings already scheduled, as well as a couple of other engagements.

THE EVOLUTION OF COVID-19 IN FRANCE
As I was drafting this issue, the numbers of people infected with the coronavirus, testing positive, being sent to the emergency room, and dying, were all increasing sharply enough that people were talking about a second wave. At the very least, local authorities, mainly mayors, are issuing regulations to fight this trend. There is nothing too alarming, however. The statistics I was able to access as I wrote this issue were as follows: 78 deaths on September 23rd, 143 taken to the emergency room on Sept. 21st and 783 hospitalized as of Sept. 22nd.

For this month’s Q&A, I thought it would be interesting to answer two of the questions I received during the first lockdown in case even stricter regulations arise. I do not expect another complete lockdown to take place throughout the country, as many different parts of France are barely affected. It is mainly the large cities that have problems, so there could be temporary lockdowns in one or more cities.

Significant restrictions, announced by Olivier Véran, the French health minister, are currently in effect. Here is the list for Paris:

Private parties
10 people maximum This new restriction concerns parties, weddings, raffles, volunteer events, birthdays and communion events. Burials and funerals, on the other hand, are not included on this list.

Large gatherings, concerts
1,000 people maximum Unless there is an exemption, stadiums, performance halls, convention centers and the like cannot accommodate more than 1,000 participants at the same time (compared to 5,000 previously).

Party rooms and multipurpose rooms
Closed All party rooms and multipurpose rooms used for festive and community activities are closed.

Gatherings in public spaces
10 people maximum This restriction includes gatherings on beaches and in parks.

Working from home
Encouraged Without imposing restrictive rules, Véran called for teleworking to be used “as much as possible”.

Major events
Prohibited This measure applies to local festivals, student parties and other such events.

Bars
Early closure Bars and cafés must close by 10 p.m. (or even earlier in the event of a prefectural decision).

Restaurants
No new restrictions The previous rules remain in force: physical distancing is required, and customers moving around restaurant must wear masks.

Sports halls and gymnasiums
Closed Sports halls, fitness clubs and gymnasiums are closed until further notice.

Establishments open to the public that have no “strict sanitary protocol already in place”
No new restrictions The previous rules remain in force: physical distancing and mask wearing are compulsory.

Best regards,

QUESTION

TRAVELING BY CAR DURING LOCKDOWN

We are leaving next week for Normandy but we have not received our cartes de séjour yet. Our appointment with the prefecture on 10 March went well, but then everything closed down one week later.
We understand that our récépissé (which expires on 9 June) has been extended due to the pandemic.
We would like to know if there is something we need to do now, or if we continue to wait for the text message from the prefecture that our carte de séjour is ready for pickup? We heard about a form to complete for getting the card mailed to our house. Would that be an option for us? I looked at the site, but did not complete the form because I wanted your advice first.
We worry that we will get settled in Normandy and then receive the text message that our cards are ready and not be able to travel back easily to collect them.

QUESTION

RENEWING VISITEUR IMMIGRATION STATUS

We’re an American family in Paris – my wife and I and our two children –on a long-stay tourist visa. We received our visa last August, valid for a year. We went through the OFII procedure and plan to renew before expiration.
I’m sure there’s reason to believe that even under normal circumstances, nothing in France is “easy.” However, now the circumstances are even less normal than usual. Would it be possible to receive from you the list of documents and details of the current procedure? We’re in Paris and will be for the foreseeable future (obviously!!).

From Wikipedia
“The Grapes of Wrath is an American realist novel written by John Steinbeck and published in 1939. … Set during the Great Depression, the novel focuses on the Joads, a poor family of tenant farmers driven from their Oklahoma home by drought, economic hardship, agricultural industry changes, and bank foreclosures forcing tenant farmers out of work. Due to their nearly hopeless situation, and in part because they are trapped in the Dust Bowl, the Joads set out for California along with thousands of other ‘Okies’ seeking jobs, land, dignity, and a future.”

Many may wonder why I chose this title when the US economy is good and there are no longer large numbers of people from middle America hitting the road for a better future in California. Set amid the Great Depression, this novel talks about not being able to earn the bare minimum to live and the despair of having to leave everything behind while holding onto an unrealistic dream.

But, to extrapolate, there are people in the USA on the right as well as the left hoping for things that are not realistic. The presidential campaign has already started and it feels like it is now in full swing when the actual vote is about a year away. Given the extreme polarization of American society, whether President Trump is reelected or a liberal Democrat wins, are we sure it will not create a crisis of the magnitude of the Great Depression, with its related migration, acts of despair and defiance of law and order?

One thing is certain, I see wrath coming out of Washington and many other parts of the country every day. I understand and agree that some expressions of great anger can be legitimate, considering what the other side of the political spectrum is doing. My point is that I see a cumulative effect of these expressions of anger, and I wonder how far it will go and what will happen if it reaches a breaking point.

France is not in a much better situation. After witnessing the gilets jaunes demonstrating Saturday after Saturday, in recent weeks we have seen members of the police forces taking to the streets of Paris to protest, while uniformed colleagues are also there to control and manage the demonstration. Does anyone else see this as a complete absurdity? Who would have thought that police would potentially commit violence against other police? It did not happen that day, but a later demonstration of firefighters ended up with a significant amount of violence. Many do not realize that Paris firefighters are military personnel, constituting a regiment. So let this sink in: soldiers fought police in the streets of Paris.

Are the grapes of wrath that far from us, or could this kind of crisis happen again?

DOES A VEGAS WEDDING COUNT IN FRANCE? 
Las Vegas has long been known as the capital of speed weddings and extravagant ceremonies. In the USA, everybody knows this and understands that such weddings are legal. Couples may have various reasons to get married there. Eloping is not one of them in our modern society, at least I hope not.

I would like to review a decision of the French Supreme Court that may astonish many Americans. Two French young adults, who were dating at the time, traveled across the USA. While in Las Vegas they thought the wedding ceremonies were fake, since they were so different from what is done in France. So, for fun, they got married. After their return to France, they did not register the marriage certificate with the French administration. Even when they had a child, it was registered as being born to unwed parents.

Several years later, the woman got married in France to another man. After 17 years, the husband came across the Vegas marriage certificate and asked that his marriage be annulled, as French law prohibits bigamy. The Versailles Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court both refused to annul the French marriage. When it comes to applying the law, the logic used was shady. At the same time, I can see why they ruled this way, since seeking an annulment after 17 years shows a significant level of bad faith, especially as the wife claimed her husband had always known about the Vegas ceremony.

On one hand, the court recognized the formal legal validity of the first wedding, stating that France must take at face value all legal American weddings and is bound by the US definition of a legal wedding. The certificate existed and the husband argued that it proved bigamy without a doubt, which is true on the face of it. But the court also reviewed the situation in another light. Is a couple married when both spouses are sure they are not, and behave accordingly? In short, the court contested the existence of the first marriage because neither of these two people had ever intended to be married.

My take is that the court did not want the husband to benefit from his proven bad faith and get away with not paying alimony or the other financial consequences of going through a French divorce.

www.lemonde.fr/argent/article/2019/10/12/quand-l-epoux-decouvre-que-sa-femme-s-est-deja-mariee-avec-un-autre-a-las-vegas_6015231_1657007.html

Below is the pertinent section of the Court of Appeal decision on l’intention matrimoniale:
En revanche, la cour estime que les « conditions de fond » qui, aux termes de l’article 146 du code civil, exigent « le consentement » des époux, n’ont pas été respectées. Le « consentement » implique que les époux aient eu une véritable « intention matrimoniale ». Or, la cour considère que Catherine et Thomas « ne se sont prêtés à la cérémonie qu’en vue, manifestement, d’atteindre un résultat étranger à l’union matrimoniale ».

ARE THERE GOOD AND BAD IMMIGRANTS?
I want to share a recent exchange I had with a reader, as it shows the extreme complexity that exists when dealing with immigration. It is very common for foreigners sitting at the prefecture to complain about harsh treatment after having been called back three times or more for insufficient documentation. They see other people with thin files walking out of the prefecture after being approved, and conclude that the system is rigged, that certain categories of foreigners have more rights than others and that they are being discriminated against. I want to be very precise, here; on that level at the prefecture, there is almost never a personal discrimination, or even one based on citizenship or origin in the world. Therefore it is exclusively a perception that some foreigners have, that other foreigners with the same legal ground, have more rights than others. The next comparison is even worse for me as it opposes large categories or people indiscriminately. The most common one I have seen is comparing homeless veterans with asylum seekers, as well as stating the dreamers have more rights than people currently crossing the border with Mexico.

It is painful to me to see such claims, as they have a wide and long lasting impact without any good ever coming of them. It is a very human thing to do, comparing and wondering why discrepancies exist, challenging the notion that certain people have more rights, as if despair and hardship can be measured with a scale or a ruler.

This exchange below and the following testimonies are poignant because they show how emotional this issue becomes when one is personally involved.

1st COMMENT
I’ve been reading your newsletter for several years. I greatly admire your professional write-ups. Being an American lawyer myself, I admire your understanding of the administrative hurdles you describe, especially since these are things one does not learn in law school.

What puzzles me is: tens of thousands of immigrants, sans papiers, illegals and “in between”, are in France, and many of them receive generous benefits, such as medical care. Some may be here in good faith, but some may be pique-assiettes or freeloaders sucking what they can from the system. Indeed some of those people don’t respect France, but they somehow get along and may even obtain legal status by hook or crook. Children born in Syria to French jihadists are automatically considered French, no questions asked, while my spouse born in Châtillon-sur-Loire to naturalized, hard-working Spanish parents, schooled and raised in France, was not considered French but had to apply for citizenship and had a rocky road to get it, and sometimes the problem resurfaces.

Getting to the point, it is difficult to understand why the French administration lacks the discernment to be flexible for a well-intentioned lady PhD from Pakistan to allow her to stay with some legal status when they let much less qualified and potentially dangerous folks filter into the country. Why raise hurdles for a well-meaning, highly-educated Pakistani lady, knowing that there is such a thing as administrative discretion? I know one cannot count on one’s papers landing in a sensible bureaucrat’s inbox, so one has to give clean legal advice, as you do, and not count on “understanding” bureaucrats, but it still is puzzling given the situation.

Best wishes and thank you for your newsletter from someone who may be a future paying client and I have passed on your newsletter to some who may have become such.

MY ANSWER
Thank you very much for your message. As you are a lawyer, the answer to your frustration is the definition of the law and how it is applied.

As I explained in the 1st Q/A there is always a significant difference between the rights a person has and the rights the person can exercise, based on his/her ability to prove those rights. In other words, the justice system is by definition unjust, and this injustice must be accepted by the people who go to court seeking justice and hoping the court will make it right. Some people prove their rights with few documents, while others must bring excessive documentation to prove their rights.

Another issue directly linked with your profession is that the law applies equally and uniformly to people who fit the same profile. For example, people who have obtained asylum status have different rights from native French people, who in turn have different rights from undocumented aliens. So your wife, who was born in France, was asked for a multitude of documents to prove the status she was asking for. It makes sense because she has access to these documents. Asylum seekers who left with nothing can only rely on a handful of documents and their request will be reviewed on their testimony.

That said, the chance of obtaining asylum seeker status is rare, while for a person born in France to naturalized parents, France has 100% of the paper trail, regardless of how hard it may be to find the documents.

When it is a file for a client, we can keep our distance and treat this as a job – there is no emotion involved about which document is needed or why this one is hard to get. But when it is our file or, worse, that of our spouse and children, we take it personally because we have a protective reflex concerning them. That is the flip side of our job.

The key thing is not to compare the pain, suffering and distress of one part of the population with another. Mostly in the USA, but also in France, I have seen people comparing sans-papiers with French-born homeless people, and refugees and with homeless veterans, as if the government had to choose one over the other.

I believe there is a need for budgetary decisions to be made so that one population is not held up in opposition to another, one group slandered because the other is presented as being more deserving. But neither of us is sitting in the US Congress or French Parliament to pass laws. We can only witness decisions we agree or disagree with.

My church helps the homeless a great deal and allocates a significant budget for this. The refugee team, which I am involved with, is smaller with fewer means. I tend to choose the underdog, a pattern in my life that was strengthened when I served in the French Army. I am proud of what the church is doing and the diversity of the people we help.

I am truly sorry for what your spouse went through. In 1994, the first time I went to city hall asking how my American wife could become French by virtue of being married to a French man, the civil servant told me with a straight face that even if I had been able to fool the French army into thinking I was French, he would make sure I would not fool his office, since I could not prove to his satisfaction that I was French. He pushed just about all my buttons and smeared my wife as well. It took me about 10 years to get over this. So I am no better when it comes to this sort of thing. I took it very personally!

THEIR RESPONSE
I have enjoyed reading the past issues you were kind enough to send. My husband is French, while I was born and raised in the USA. A few years ago we moved to France to be closer to my husband’s family. We are here to stay. While I love living here, I am 53 and as you brilliantly wrote in one of your issues, I am starting all over.

Thank you for your thoughtful response. To tell the truth, I suspected what your answer would be but I pushed the “send” button too quickly. After writing my message I hesitated about sending it and consuming your valuable time.

It was quite unlawyerly and too emotional of me (particularly for a lawyer) to wish that officials might be more discerning and flexible so as to allow people of obviously good qualifications and who apply in good faith to have some leeway. It was a wish that they could use their administrative discretion and sort out the wheat from the chaff, if you will, so that honest folk applying could get a fair shake. I know that those who apply cannot expect to receive that kind of treatment and should definitely not count on it. They have to thread the needle and submit the right documents and comply, to the letter, with whatever rules or laws prevail and hope for the best.

By the way, next year I will need to apply for my fourth ten-year carte de sejour. I am apprehensive about doing it. I’ve stood in the rain and snow many times, starting 5 or 6 in the morning, only to be told as I reached the promised land at the front of the line outside the prefecture at 9am in Montpellier that they were not accepting any more applicants that day, no more numbers to hand out. I could come back and try another day. Maybe start at 4am.

Now the appointment system online is clogged by illegal operators who immediately make bogus appointments and sell them. If you are caught buying an appointment it is illegal and dangerous. But there is practically no other way to get one. Kafka would have something to say about this situation.

I proposed to an official I know that they set up a table with a person who would validate online appointments after seeing an ID card. This would eliminate the middlemen who have an illegal business selling appointments. The official’s answer? That would be too costly.

NEW STATEMENTS FROM PEOPLE WHO WERE REGULARIZED OR STRUGGLED TO KEEP THEIR IMMIGRATION STATUS
I have continued to receive comments, mostly from people who read the issue last month and wanted their voice to be heard. Because I am mostly helping Anglophones, such people often come from Asia – more specifically, from South Asia and China.

COMMENT #1
Being sans papiers here in France is way too hard. You have to fight the feeling that any time you will be caught by the police. And the loneliness of being away from your family for a long time is a nightmare in your everyday life. You need to be ready to embrace the life that will happen ahead of you.

COMMENT #2
There is this idea that sans-papiers should have a worse life because they are illegal. I believe that this is wrong and offensive. It is wrong because I see French people doing illegal things all the time, illegal parking, speeding, cheating on taxes and social charges, and they boast about it. When I was sans papier, I was supposed to be ashamed and worthless. I was humiliated, taken advantage of by employers, well-off professionals who had no problem being illegal by making me work for them. My illegality was a cross I had to carry. I have always resented being seen as a criminal, when everything in my life was decent. It is true that the procedures at the prefecture can be humiliating, having to wait in line at 6AM to be among those who will have the appointment to renew the carte de séjour. Even when it was happening once a year, can it be compared to living five years with this awful knot twisting my stomach night and day? I understand that there can be some anxiety about going to the appointment at the prefecture. When I went there the first time to submit the regularization request, I could barely move, I was stricken by fear. The odds were real that I could end up handcuffed and sent back to my country. Last but not least, imagine what it takes to get the employer’s French tax documents that prove that they have the means to pay my salary. Nothing was easy, comparisons can be so painful. When I was sitting waiting at the Cité prefecture waiting for my turn to be called, knowing my request for regularization had been approved, I felt that I had as much right to be there with my legal stay, my right to work, as anyone sitting in that same room. Pain, despair, anguish, they cannot be compared from one person to the next. Now that I am preparing my carte de résident request, I am integrated, feeling safe in France. From the day I realized I had been fooled by my employers who brought me to Paris from Hong Kong, and made me a sans-papier to today, I have stayed the same, a decent woman and a practicing Christian. This is what defines me then and now.

In conclusion, I would like to address two issues:
1. Regardless of how secure the foreigner is, how strong the file, how solid the immigration status, many foreigners get panic attacks about going to the prefecture to submit their request. The fear that the civil servant they will encounter has this almighty power over their life and the slightest thing can make them lose their rights can make them sleepless or physically sick. Quite often the fear is irrational and disconnected from the reality of the procedure at the prefecture. For people who suffer panic attacks, however, it is barely controllable and reason has hardly any effect on their condition. Many of the comments I received dwell on this theme of fearing the prefecture’s decision.

2. Nearly all sans-papiers live in constant fear of being caught by the police and deported. This means that this fear also exists with people who think that there is a good chance that they could lose their legal right to live in France. These people who have reasons to fear a negative answer very often have family members, close relatives, friends, who are sans-papiers, who have been caught and deported. Some of them have gone through the regularization procedure and have difficulties maintaining this legal status. Whether sans-papier or not, explaining that the file is there, it is strong, that there is no point of fearing the police since at this stage of the game, the risk of deportation is null, it does not affect the emotional condition, the fear is strong and they suffer from it.

What I describe here about these people living in France, is also true about the similar procedures in the other Western countries that regulate their immigration with strict procedures. Based on my knowledge, the American immigration procedures objectively create even more anxiety than the French ones.

COUNTRY CODES FOR FRENCH SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS
I have explained how the French social security number is constructed almost entirely of codes representing the date and location of birth. I recently found a webpage listing all the codes identifying where a foreigner was born. The page displays them including the code 99, which means being born outside of France. I am not how useful this information is, but I assume some people will want to check their number against this list. For a reminder of how the number is constructed, see the explanations in the June 2005 and March 2019 issues.
www.insee.fr/fr/information/2028273

AAWE “RETIRE & THRIVE” EVENT
The Association of American Wives of Europeans recently held an event called “Retire & Thrive” at the American Church in Paris, where many professionals had booths and offered their services to those who attended. On such occasions I often meet my readers, and this was no exception. Some say they have followed my work for years without contacting me.

After helping put together the tables, I spent time talking to people who had all kinds of questions, not just those about retiring in the French public system. Immigration, getting a pension on both sides of the Atlantic and staying on French public health coverage were some of the topics discussed. I would like to thank AAWE for putting together this event, which was well attended from beginning to end.

I AM THE SPEAKER FOR ANGLOPRENEURS ON DECEMBER 17th 
At the AAWE event, Patricia Smith Zraidi who runs the Anglopreneurs’ Monthly Evening Event asked me to be the speaker for the Tuesday, December 17, 2019 event. It starts at 7 PM until 10 PM and is held at: HD Diner Opéra (downstairs), 25 Bvd des Italiens, 75002 Paris. For more information check the page https://www.facebook.com/groups/anglopreneurs/

OFFICE CLOSED FOR CHRISTMAS
The office will close for three weeks over the Christmas holidays, starting on Friday December 20th in the evening and reopening on the morning of Monday January 6th. As always, I will be reachable by email for emergencies and important matters. The service I offer of receiving mail for clients will continue while the office is closed. Of course, Sarah or I will honor prefecture meetings already scheduled, as well as a couple of other engagements.

Best regards,

QUESTION

DOES OVERSTAYING A FEW MONTHS MEAN BEING AN UNDOCUMENTED ALIEN?

I am an American student who overstayed my one-year visa. I got hired as an au pair but the family didn’t work out. My visa ended this summer. I have been searching for a job since then. Then I found out you cannot work as an au pair on a student visa so I have been wondering if it is possible to change status if an au pair host family wants to hire me? Does the prefecture grant new visas to expired student visa holders or would I have to go home? I am curious because it would cost a lot of money to do so. I finally have a family but I need to be legal again.

QUESTION

DOES PARENTAL FINANCIAL HELP CONSTITUTE TAXABLE INCOME?

I’m having issues with being taxed on money my parents gave me as a gift for rent and living expenses without having my own income in France. Is it possible to ask you some questions about this and get your insight?

ll the leaves are brown (all the leaves are brown)
And the sky is grey (and the sky is grey)
I’ve been for a walk (I’ve been for a walk)
On a winter’s day (on a winter’s day)
I’d be safe and warm (I’d be safe and warm)
If I was in L.A. (if I was in L.A.)
California dreamin’ (California dreamin’)
On such a winter’s day
Stopped into a church
I passed along the way
Well, I got down on my knees (got down on my knees)
And I pretend to pray (I pretend to pray)
You know the preacher like the cold (preacher like the cold)
He knows I’m gonna stay (knows I’m gonna stay)
California dreamin’ (California dreamin’)
On such a winter’s day
All the leaves are brown (all the leaves are brown)
And the sky is grey (and the sky is grey)
I’ve been for a walk (I’ve been for a walk)
On a winter’s day (on a winter’s day)
If I didn’t tell her (if I didn’t tell her)
I could leave today (I could leave today)
California dreamin’ (California dreamin’)
On such a winter’s day (California dreamin’)
On such a winter’s day (California dreamin’)
On such a winter’s day

The song “California Dreamin’,” by John and Michelle Phillips, was first recorded by Barry McGuire in 1965, with backup vocals by the Phillips’ quartet, the Mamas & the Papas. They released their own version as a single the same year, and it became by far the bigger hit.

Among French people, especially those who have dreamed of moving to the USA, California has an iconic status, that sets this state aside from the rest of the USA. It has always been the land one dreams about. In May 1970, the French singer Julien Clerc released “La Californie,” which became a long-lasting hit. It is safe to say that as far back as one can remember, the state of California has nourished dreams of an unattainable better life for much of the world. This separation of the state and the nation in the popular imagination of the rest of the world, is something many Americans themselves have a hard time understanding.

The results of the midterm elections in a lot of the country were favorable to the Democratic Party. It is interesting to note that the state of California is heavily Democratic. So, for some people the election results were reason to rejoice, enabling them to dream that a better future is possible. California has also long been a magnet for people living in other states – and still is, for political reasons as well as well-paid job opportunities. California dreaming, dreaming California is still today, a real thing.

As I write these words, however, wildfires are destroying homes and killing people, and California is weeping over these deaths and other losses. This is a time of mourning. One could hope that such destructive fires will not happen again, but climate change is going to make it more difficult. In much of the USA, it has been really cold. It feels like winter already when one celebrates Thanksgiving with thick snow on the ground. What makes the fires even scarier is that they should not happen when it is that cold.

I could dwell upon the leaves being not only brown but burned to ashes, about the sky being grey and people suffocating from the heavy smoke. But rather than twirling with these lyrics, I pay my respects to the victims of the blazes, especially people who lost their homes, their businesses, a loved one. We should pay attention to them, helping them rebuild their lives and giving them a reason to dream of a better future.

As long as I can remember, I have loved “California Dreamin’,” and still often listen to the albums of The Mamas & the Papas.

HOW CAN THERE BE A FRENCH BLACK FRIDAY?
I already wrote about this last year, and this year is even worse in terms of the advertisements we are being bombarded with about huge sales only on Black Friday. It reassures me a little (but not much) that many French outlets promote Black Friday week, which indicates to me they have a poor understanding of what Black Friday normally means. I also find recent developments regarding the Thanksgiving celebration to be interesting. I cannot imagine the USA going through the season of fall without celebrating it. At the same time, I look with great interest at the fact that the narrative of Native Americans is being heard more and more, and that this celebration is unsettling, to say the least, for them.

FROM MY DECEMBER 2017 ISSUE:
“I was feeling completely exasperated at seeing ‘Black Friday’ advertised everywhere in France (in English!). I wondered how many of people would even know what it referred to. How can you have a ‘Black Friday’ if you do not celebrate Thanksgiving on Thursday? The adoption of this term is totally insane and I believe it illustrates 100% bad taste consumerism. In the USA, many consider ‘Black Friday’ offensive for various reasons, a tendency that has grown with every passing year. Some believe this is insanity in consumerism, citing the craziness when crowds – I would call them hordes sometimes – enter the shops. Others focus more on the idea that family life should take precedence over consumerism, as the day after Thanksgiving is usually a de facto national holiday. There are other criticisms, but I see particular merit in those two.

“France does not celebrate Thanksgiving, and this holiday, unlike some others, cannot be easily exported, as it is part and parcel of the iconic history of the birth of the USA and the infancy of an early settlement in the New World.”

RETENUE À LA SOURCE – INCOME TAX WITHHOLDING STARTS ON JANUARY 1st 2019
I attended a seminar on this topic given by my French accounting firm, as it is now certain that it will go ahead. I would like to explain in a basic way how it will happen.

We could have feared the worst from the French administration, since the deal was locked, sealed and delivered this past September after countless months of indecision.

First, the good news, which shows there have been some significant improvements.

The provision that employees feared most was that their family information would need to be shared with the employer. This is not happening: only the tax office will be informed. It used to happen once a year, when the declaration was submitted. But now, since this information immediately affects the bracket used to calculate the amount of tax owed, the individual must inform the tax inspector as soon as possible. This is a huge relief. It is interesting to see that in France, the tax inspector is more trusted and seen as less of a threat than the employer – a situation that is impossible to explain in only a few words. Just remember that the tax inspector is a free adviser when tax season comes, and an impartial helper.

The other good news is that independents will pay monthly by automated withdrawal, and the amount will be based on what was owed the previous year. The administration has promised that any reported change will be taken into account, and the amount of the payment changed, as quickly as possible. It remains to be seen how quickly that will actually be.

The same rule applies for rental income and other types of revenue that an authority cannot withhold directly.

A NEW IMMIGRATION LAW HAS BEEN PASSED – SOME GOOD NEWS
To obtain employee immigration status, one must be awarded the right to work as an employee. A new law grants this right to all of the foreigner’s potential employers, rather than to just one specific current employer. Previously there was a risk of losing this right when the foreigner changed employers within three years.

Another good thing is that the travailleur temporaire status and designation mentioned on the carte de séjour has been done away with. The evolution was such that it was issued when the foreigner had a contrat à durée déterminée, a short-term contract with a beginning and ending date. Now both labor contracts, the CDD and the CDI, grant the right to obtain the “salarié carte de séjour”. We will see if DIRECCTE issues the same number of authorizations and implements the law with the right intent, or if some short-term contract holders will be refused, when they would have been accepted under the previous law.

A further good thing is the disappearance of the autorisation provisoire de séjour for recent graduates transitioning to work either as an employee or a self-employed person. It has been replaced by a true immigration status called titre de séjour temporaire « recherche d’emploi ou création ». This should reassure employers and facilitate the job search.

Now almost all the remaining bad news concerning immigration is about refugee procedures.

CRIMINAL FAKE MARRIAGE – ULTERIOR MOTIVE MARRIAGE
I never try to guess which couple will last and which will not. There is no way to be sure, and we have all known what appeared to be the perfect couple who ended up getting the nastiest divorce. Because of my work, I often deal with couples where one is an undocumented alien seeking to obtain a legal stay through marriage. That puts a huge strain on the couple if it is not properly handled. It gives one spouse considerable power over the other, as the couple must stay married three years before the foreigner can retain legal residence in France. I have often seen the foreign spouse effectively blackmailed. The other distortion is that the foreign spouse may disappear once the immigration status is achieved for good, giving the impression that there was no love and it was just a scam to stay in France.

Completely aside from the immigration issue, multicultural couples have a much harder time staying together, as it is harder for them to establish the common ground needed for a long-lasting relationship. At the same time, the traditional view of marriage lasting forever is shared by fewer and fewer people these days. In major cities of Western countries, half of all marriages end in divorce, with multicultural couples representing only a tiny minority.

The video linked below is ten years old, and I know the administration has strengthened its controls and now does more investigation to uncover what French officialdom considers fake marriages. It is not just a matter of foreigners paying a large sum of money to get married and obtain a legal stay; that is a felony, for which people go to jail. But there are also couples where clearly the foreigner is not involved in the relationship as someone in love, when the other one seems to be. I liked the comment the policewoman made about the Moroccan woman and the Frenchman wanting to get married. She understood the motivations of each of them, and she seemed to care about both of them, but at the same time she had to apply the law and definitively block the wedding, leaving the Moroccan woman in a precarious situation.

FRENCH CONSULATES WILL NO LONGER OFFER NOTAIRE SERVICE
Starting in 2019, French consulates are dropping the notaire service they used to provide. This might not seem like a huge loss to most of us, but it is for countries in which such a service is not offered privately. It is a big deal in countries where there is no other way to verify the signing of an official document. In such countries, it was a real service that was badly needed: the consular notarization enabled, for instance, real estate transactions to occur in France without the person having to go to France. Throughout my career I have seen more and more transactions done this way. Since the clients are almost always Americans and French notaires often accept notarization by an American notary public, this is a reasonable alternative. Yet even today, I think many rural notaires would not accept such notarizations, as they are not done according to French procedure.

https://frenchmorning.com/notariat-consulaire-supprime-a-partir-de-2019/

FRENCH BAILIFFS SEIZED A RYANAIR JET OVER AN UNPAID DEBT
Here is an excerpt of an article I found on the website www.thelocal.fr:
“French authorities said on Friday they seized a Ryanair plane, forcing 149 London-bound passengers off the aircraft, to get the Irish low-cost airline to repay illegal public aid, the latest in a string of troubles for the carrier.

“Claiming that Ryanair owed them 525,000 euros ($595,000) in subsidies wrongfully paid out to the airline, the authorities sent in a bailiff under police protection on Thursday to seize the plane on the tarmac of Bordeaux airport as it was readying to take off for London Stansted.

“Just under 24 hours later, the no-frills airline relented and paid up, authorities said Friday, allowing it to reclaim its aircraft.”

The French word for bailiff is huissier and when you see a document from them or when they knock on your door, you need to pay attention. Sometimes it is empty threats, but other times they have the power to confiscate things and sell them at auction when a debt has not been paid. Grounding an airplane to get a debt paid is rare, which is why it made the news.

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-46152849

I would like to remind everyone that there is no January issue.

I would like to wish you all
A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR
I am looking forward to the year to come, 2019.
Like many, I feel that 2018 was a very hard year, and
I lost a lot of sleep trying to follow everything that was going on.

Best regards,

QUESTION

REGISTERING A SMALL BUSINESS – AUTO-ENTREPRENEUR

I wanted to ask you some more about auto-entrepreneur status. I have found that there are many different methods for obtaining auto-entrepreneur status (micro-enterprise, etc.). I’m not quite sure why I would get caught, since this status is completely legal. Any information you can give would be greatly appreciated as I’m finding mixed opinions.

QUESTION

WHO PAYS THE PREMIUM FOR PUMA COVERAGE?

Is an American resident of France who receives US Social Security retirement benefits required to pay the cotisation supplementaire maladie under PUMA?

“Ball and Chain” (also known as “Ball ‘n’ Chain” or “Ball & Chain”) is a blues song written and recorded by American singer-songwriter Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton in the early 1960s and best known through the version by Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company, who first performed it at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967.

Some Americans have long looked at living in France with horror because of what they see as an absence of freedom and an omnipotent state regulating every aspect of people’s lives. This was never true, however, and the last 30 years have seen modernization of the French administration, linked to drastic changes in the legal system that have increased the rights of French citizens and others living in France.

Nevertheless, many see the protection universelle maladie (PUMa) as an imposition of this magnitude. Another vestige of the old view that the state knows best is the way French law and courts still limit rights regarding name changes. And there was a time when getting married with a prenuptial agreement was seen as being the prisoner of an institution – wearing a ball and chain. As for the other topics below, I will let you decide if there is a connection.

UPDATE ON PUMA, WHICH TURNED INTO A NIGHTMARE FOR MANY 
I would like to thank the Association of Americans Resident Overseas (AARO) for its help on this issue. They are on the forefront of this, and as far as I know are the only organization actively helping members deal with the problem and possibly lobbying in favor of a change. In particular, I would like to thank Eric Fenster, the AARO member who helped me draft this section.

We had feared that the new system would result in adverse situations after being implemented for about two years without collecting premiums for the coverage offered. In fact, the situation is even worse than I had expected. I would like to highlight some of the worst examples I know of (and I am not sure I have identified all of them).

1 – The 2016 premium came due after all.
In almost all situations, especially in the private sector, people expect to have to pay health insurance premiums on time. For over a year, the impression was given that the premiums for 2016 would not be collected. I was one of the few doubting that this would be true once the administration got its act together. Sure enough, it was announced that January 15 was the deadline to pay the 2016 premium. But this came as a surprise to many.

2 – People have been charged for coverage they do not have.
Since December 2017, foreigners who declare their foreign income in France while being properly covered by a private health insurance policy have received bills from URSSAF for 2016 coverage that they have never had. The reason is that URSSAF, instead of checking the database of the caisses primaires d’assurance maladie (CPAM) to find out who was covered by the old couverture maladie universelle (CMU, which PUMa replaced), got its information from the tax office and never checked if people were covered by the public system.

People who received the URSSAF bill had subscribed in good faith to private medical insurance, and no public authority had given any notice of an obligation to join the public system. Indeed, for nearly two years no one was even able to answer questions from those who had heard about PUMa.

When I learned from my AARO connection that many Americans had received the bill, we began to help them contest it on the grounds that it charged for a health coverage system in which they were not enrolled, even though French legislation stated that payment liability did not begin until the date of enrollment.

3 – People are not being charged for coverage when they need it.
This might sound like good news but it can have very adverse consequences. URSSAF was supposed to charge 8% of the global taxable net income for the year, payable per quarter. It took considerable work to figure out that some income, mainly retirement income, is exempt from this 8% premium calculation. For many foreigners who have retired in France, most if not all of their taxable income is retirement income. So they received a letter stating that they owed nothing.

The problem is that the prefecture insists all foreigners have comprehensive coverage from either the public system or a reputable company and also pay for health coverage. So foreigners who were covered by the CMU and now PUMa must show that.
First, they have sufficient assets or income from a foreign source and that the annual net income exceeds minimum wage (14,000€).
Second, that in the case of being covered by the public system, the income used for calculating the 8% premium exceeds 9,654 euros. If the income on which the calculation is based is less, the foreigner pays nothing for the health coverage.
In the past, the prefecture has always interpreted the absence premium payments, as indicating insufficient income, as they then expect a minimum income of 14,000 euros for the same period. In such situations, the prefecture systematically denies renewal of the carte de séjour based on insufficient funds entitling the foreigner to free coverage. It was somewhat logical to expect foreigners to pay for their coverage. Today, though, many foreigners have an income far exceeding this amount and yet the new way URSSAF calculates the premium results in their coverage being free of charge. The main reason is that pensions are not used in URSSAF’s cotisation subsidiaire maladie (CMS) calculation, i.e., the name of the premium paid for the public coverage.

I have no idea how the prefectures will address this issue. If they do not get new guidelines, I fear the worst, i.e., refusal to renew cartes de séjour. I really feel that one part of the administration is not keeping another part informed, and the refusal to renew the “visiteur” immigration status will come as a very nasty surprise. One can hope that properly documenting the way the CMS is calculated should force prefectures to reconsider their procedures in view of this radical change.

4 – Some people previously covered by CMU never declared their income to France.
Holders of a carte de séjour visiteur can have the card renewed without showing a French income tax statement. I advise my clients nevertheless to show the two first pages of their last #1040 to the prefecture just to prove that they had made an income declaration. But whether these people have complied with French fiscal law is irrelevant here.

Because URSSAF got only tax information from the French tax office and not CPAM, such people never got a letter and were never charged, but they continue to be covered, as CPAM does not verify whether the insured is paying into the system.

How long will this situation last? What are the likely consequences regarding the premiums owed and not paid? I ask the same question about the fact that there was no filing in France even though the person was clearly a French tax resident.

I fear the worst, as URSSAF can easily and rightfully consider this as tax cheating. In this specific instance, to help understand the gravity of the situation, I would compare URSSAF to the American Social Security.

SOUVENIR SOUVENIR – I SERVED IN THE FRENCH ARMY AS AN OFFICER
Even though I lived some years in the USA, as a Frenchman I clearly see several topics with a non-American eye.

I did my military service as an officer, having the rank of lieutenant when I left. I trained a platoon through boot camp. I was on active duty for nine months in a military academy, mainly as a juriste, but doing all the chores like any other lieutenant.

My military specialty was firearms. I trained many soldiers on the full range of firearms, from the traditional long rifle to the fully automatic machine gun.

Anyone who has been in the military has a similar experience of having been surrounded by firearms – that is the norm.

There is one experience I would like to share. The officer of the day, who is on security duty for 24 hours straight, sleeping next to the main gate, is obliged to carrying a loaded handgun at all times. The lieutenants, the youngest officers, most often served as duty officer. We were trained to be tough, and on we duty we knew what to do; military discipline ran our life, especially at such moments.

I can still remember, over 30 years later, the heaviness of this responsibility. It felt like I had about 20 pounds more on my shoulders. I took the duty seriously; in retrospect, I believe that carrying a loaded gun all the time and being the one allowed to use it in case of danger added to the weight. Of course, I never had to use it, but living with this responsibility makes one act in a more responsible, more controlled way.

The day I was discharged was the last day I operated a gun. In all my years of living in the USA, I had many opportunities but I never fired a gun. In my mind and in my life, guns are associated with a military uniform.

I know very well that the US constitution is understood to dissociate the right to bear machine guns from being in the military.

My point is that anyone who carries a firearm should be well trained, should handle the firearm responsibly as it is lethal in a manner of seconds, and should comply with security guidelines. My point of view – which I admit is a French point of view and could be completely irrelevant in the USA – is that the issue should be about the training. Getting a gun license should be like getting a driver’s license. I would go so far as to say that, just as there are several types of licenses, for driving vehicles ranging from a motorcycle to a 16-wheel tractor-trailer, there could be a similar range from permits allowing ownership of traditional hunting guns up to fully automatic machine guns.

FBI CHECK FOR VISA PURPOSES
Asking for French immigration status requires submitting proof that one does not have a criminal background. The French administration asks applicants to prove that there are no criminal convictions on their record.

In the USA, this is done through an FBI background check. The problem is that it used to take a few weeks. Now it takes several months. But in immigration visa requests, the applicant often has just a few weeks in the USA to get such documentation. Many have already settled in France in order to have everything ready to submit solid proof of an address in France and to make it easier to obtain the visa. Therefore, some private companies have managed to speed up the process.

More information can be found on the FBI website:
http://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/identity-history-summary-checks
http://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/identity-history-summary-checks/list-of-fbi-approved-channelers-for-departmental-order-submissions

AARO RECORDED MY 2-HOUR PRESENTATION ON DECEMBER 18
The presentation, on “Coping with French Administration,” is now accessible from my website, too, at http://www.jeantaquet.com/aaro.

I have been happily surprised by the number of people who have contacted me after watching it. I thought that a 2-hour recording was quite long, but these people did not seem to agree.

Here is AARO’s introduction to the video:

French Logic
Jean started the talk by telling the audience that France is logical. This got a good chuckle, but he continued to explain exactly how that logic works. It starts with the French Revolution and having to deal with the old elite (aristocrats) and establishing a fair system for all to be equal under the law. This was achieved with the Napoleonic Civil Code. The way that France can maintain its republic is by treating all equally and that means through identity, not aristocratic rank. Identity is established by name, date and place of birth, domicile, and profession. Your name, your birth certificate, and proof of where you live and what you do. (Reporter’s note: In France, the extrait d’état civil, which is the birth certificate document, contains more than just your birth information, which is why the administration frequently wants to see a recent one.) That is the logic behind the constant request for documents.

The video is accessible on the AARO website at:
https://aaro.org/events/event-reports/641-coping-with-french-administration

Best regards,

QUESTION

WHAT DOES A PRENUP DO?

I am American and intent to marry my French fiancée in France.
We are signing a prenuptial agreement with two major components in mind. First, my business is to remain my property after the marriage to protect the accounts of my spouse from debt and creditors. All earnings and debts will remain with me.
Second, to protect our inheritance from our parents, we both wish our inheritance to remain our own; assets are to remain the property of the inheriting spouse.
Which marital regime would best suit these provisions? Can a regime be created to address ONLY these two issues?

QUESTION

WHAT HAPPENS AT OFII DEPENDS ON IMMIGRATION STATUS

I have a question about the renewal of my titre de séjour salarié. In the list the prefecture gave me to renew my carte de séjour, one of the last things that is listed is a bilan de compétence. After doing some research, I have found that the OFII sometimes does not require this. How do you know if you need it or not? If I do have to do it, it is very expensive. … My job does not require me to do this so it means it would be up to me to pay for it. I have seen prices up to 1300 euros.

QUESTION

AS A MARRIED WOMAN, WHAT IS MY LEGAL NAME IN FRANCE?

While in Brive in the South of France with my husband, I got a message from my son who was staying at our apartment in Paris saying that the prefecture called and said there was a problem with my visa. My son understood they wanted to put both names on my visa, but I only need to have my late husband’s last name as my legal name on my US passport. So, anticipating some serious problems, I asked my sister back in Seattle to get a copy of the death certificate of my late husband. I am afraid that I will need to show them an original document with a seal. The states are so afraid of identity fraud that they make records difficult to access and she might not be able to get it.
Is it possible to convey to them that my last name is the one on my passport and leave it at that? What’s wrong with these people? Can’t they accept that a passport is an official legal document, which should not be questioned?

From Wikipedia: “Déjà Vu is the second album by Crosby, Stills & Nash, and their first in the quartet configuration of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. It was released in March 1970.” This French expression is common enough in English that the band named one of their albums after it.

Many people see the Brexit “leave” vote and the election of President Trump as a series in which the French presidential election could be the next event to come, with populist views winning votes and, in the case of France, a far-right president adopting isolationist policies and severely limiting immigration.

We know that recent polls have been relatively inaccurate and polling agencies are now careful to explain that the margin of error is substantial so the result of the election cannot be predicted. I believe the pollsters are going from one extreme to the other, but maybe that is not such a bad idea. The presidential campaign is now running full blast, with a debate, polls and media coverage, and almost daily findings of illegal conduct by prominent politicians. Feels like déjà vu of the American campaign.

Foreigners too often repeat the same mistakes again and again, thinking they are doing the right thing since it is what they have always done back home. In this month’s column, a non-EU citizen asserts to the prefecture that she has rights and should not be treated in such an unfriendly way being required to,go back there again and again, when in reality she is an undocumented alien and the way she is being treated is in accordance with her illegal stay in France. Another is convinced that since she has not paid for certain services, she is not entitled to them and is outraged as a result, although as it happens the French administration makes it possible to retain the right to services without paying for them for a while – even a long while.

The title Déjà Vu is a reminder that if you feel like a problem is coming up repeatedly, you may be doing something wrong. As a foreigner you will often be wrong, at least at first and possibly for quite some time.

DETAILS ON HOW FRENCH AND US PENSIONS WORK TOGETHER

Another reader comments, regarding the Q&A in February’s column regarding the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP):

“The writer said: “I was, however, shocked to find out . . . my US benefits will be cut by 40% to 50% unless “vous est attribué dans le cadre de l’accord entre la France et les Etats-Unis” ’.

“The writer’s specific case may cause a reduction of 40% to 50% (or more), but the full story of the application and calculation of the WEP is more complicated. It is often misunderstood, but the TOTAL American Social Security benefit may NOT be reduced by a specific percentage. That is because while a French pension generally returns 50% of eligible earnings, the US calculation is ‘progressive.’

“After a person’s best 35 years of earnings are indexed for inflation, the lifetime average monthly wage is calculated. The pension paid on that figure is 90% of the first ‘bend point’/tranche, which in 2017 is $885. (So the pensioner gets 90% of $885 = $796.)

“To this is added 32% of the average lifetime monthly wage between $885 and $5336, and to this is added 15% of any amount above $5336. (There is a maximum pension because contributions are paid only up to a an earnings ceiling, just as in France.)

“This hints at the reason, sought by the writer, of why he is ‘penalized.’ The American calculation system is weighted toward people with a lifetime of low income so as to help assure they are not in poverty once they retire.

“If the worker has earnings unknown to Social Security, such as foreign employment, the calculation is distorted. The person may very well have had a high lifetime income, but the pension would be calculated as if he did not.

“The WEP therefore changes the percentage of return for the first bend point from 90% to 40%. In 2017, the return on the first bend point under the WEP would be $885 x 0.40 = $354 instead of $796. The maximum reduction is therefore $796 – $354 = $442. There is no reduction of amounts calculated for the 32% and 15 bend points.

“That’s the first thing. The second is that the WEP has a limit. The reduction cannot be more than 50% of the foreign pension. Again, this is to protect people with small pensions. So if your writer had a French pension equivalent to $700, the WEP reduction would be $350, not $442.

“The third condition says that anybody with 20 or more years of ‘substantial earnings’ (an amount defined annually) will have the WEP reduction lowered by 5% per year, such that a person with 30 years of substantial earnings in the US will have NO WEP reduction because of foreign earnings. This is not the case of your writer, who has 10 years.

“The fourth point is the most fun. The bilateral social security accords are called totalization agreements. They say that if a person does not have enough units to qualify for a pension in one country, he may use units from the other country. So if your writer had only nine years’ work in the US, where ten are required, he could ‘borrow’ four trimesters from his French employment and thus be eligible for a US pension. This is totalization.

“It is important that the foreign (e.g. French) credits add nothing to the AMOUNT of the US pension; they just make the person lacking units eligible for one.

“As for Americans, the agreement says that if totalization was needed to qualify for the French pension, then there will be no WEP reduction! THAT is probably the meaning of: ‘unless “[il] vous est attribué dans le cadre de l’accord entre la France et les Etats-Unis.” ’

“The agreement’s totalization provision must be invoked to avoid WEP. According to the CNAV, this will happen automatically if application for the French pension is made using the application (form SSA-2490) via the US Social Security website. To make certain of this, the issue should be discussed with the FBU officer at the US embassy.

“I know this has worked, although it doesn’t seem to make sense since only one quarter is needed to claim a French pension, but US Social Security explains: ‘Under French law, a worker can qualify for an old-age pension based on as little as one calendar quarter of contributions but the benefit amount is reduced for workers with less than 150-160 quarters (depending on year of birth). Under the agreement, France will compute an old-age pension based on French credits alone as well as a prorated benefit based on U.S. and French credits, and then pay whichever is greater.’

“On a related matter, Americans receiving US Social Security retirement benefits should know that their US or non-US spouse is usually entitled to his/her own retirement benefit, based upon the primary earner’s record, which is up to 50% of the primary worker’s benefit.

“This is also true for divorced spouse(s) for each marriage that lasted at least ten years and provided the spouse(s) has/have not remarried.

“The spouse(s) can also get a survivor benefit (réversion), which is 100% (unlike the French 54%) if the survivor waits until full retirement age, and is not means-tested. This applies to divorced spouses if the marriage lasted ten years. Unlike France, US Social Security does not pro-rate benefits among multiple spouses; each gets the survivor benefit.

“The WEP reduces a spouse benefit but does not reduce a survivor benefit!”

THERE IS A LIMIT TO A NOTAIRE’S PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY

I frequently find new precedents giving more responsibility to notaires and thus extending their professional responsibility and liability. However, a recent precedent puts a clear limit on how far a notaire needs to go to protect the interests of property buyers.

In 2008, a couple in the South of France bought a mazet or maset, a small rural building of a single room, in bonded masonry (which may or may not be covered with mortar) and roofed with tiles. Such structures are common in Languedoc, particularly in the departments of Gard, Ardèche and Hérault, where until the early 20^th century poor city dwellers used them as week-end houses.

During the course of the purchase procedure, the couple explained that they wanted to upgrade the mazet into a real house. Later they learned that the mazet was not considered a house to start with and therefore could not be used as a permanent dwelling, so their building permit request was denied. They sued both the seller and the notaire for not explaining that their plan was impossible to achieve.

The Cour de Cassation ruled against the couple, arguing in plain terms that you know what you are buying; for example, no one would buy a toolshed and decide to make it into a house. I am sure the notaire had told them that the property was zoned as farmland, which limited its usage. I can understand that foreigners who want to buy cute real estate on the Riviera end up being fooled since mazets look like tiny houses and are at least 100 years old.

For more information (in French), see http://sosconso.blog.lemonde.fr/2017/01/17/avant-dacheter-une-maison-pour-la-retaper-on-verifie-quon-en-aura-le-droit

BEING MARRIED AND CREATING A HOUSEHOLD FOR FISCAL PURPOSES

I have occasionally had to deal with cases where one spouse, often the wife, has settled in France and holds immigration status while the husband continues to work in the USA and lacks any immigration status in France. For the French resident spouse, obtaining a visa and later a carte de séjour is not much of a problem but getting a carte de résident is more complicated, since one must prove a minimum of integration and roots in France. Having a spouse who live outside of France without starting divorce proceedings indicates that ties with the USA are still strong, which can militate against the request. My last such client held a carte de séjour visiteur for ten years before she got the carte de résident.

On the fiscal side, the situation is even more interesting. Tax form 2042, which everybody fills out with their basic information, treats couples who live apart, without a legal separation, the same as divorced couples (although the husband can decide to become a French fiscal resident, since the rest of the family lives in France). When my client first told the French tax office that she was married and that her husband lived in the USA, the tax office considered her to be separated, which infuriated her since they are indeed married and are a strong couple. Nevertheless, she confirmed that her husband lived in the USA and had no ties with France except through her. Finally, she said, the tax office essentially gave up and accepted that she was happily married – but still taxed her as a single woman in France.

Some people do not care much how the administration labels them as long as it does not interfere with their life. I have had clients who pretty much stated, “They can decide what they want; it doesn’t bother me.” Others, like this woman, take the misrepresentation personally but do not want to change their situation. They are determined to set the record straight, even if it does not change anything in their life. I find it very interesting to see how different the reactions can be in this situation.

OFFICE TO BE CLOSED JUST BEFORE SUMMER

The office will close for less than two weeks starting on Thursday June 8^th, reopening on Wednesday June 21^st. As always, I will be reachable by email for emergencies and important matters. The service I offer of receiving mail for clients will continue while the office is closed. This time I am leaving France and email will truly be the only way to reach me while I am gone.

Best regards,

QUESTION

PROPER IMMIGRATION PROCEDURE FOR THE SPOUSE OF AN EU

I am an American citizen married to a Spanish citizen. We now live in Paris, where my husband is working. Although European law guarantees the right for me to stay with him and work here, I have experienced quite a lot of trouble with the local prefecture. I explained to the prefecture that Americans married to Europeans do not need visas to enter Europe. I even have letters from the UK and NY French embassies confirming this. It is also stated on the page of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs (“Nationals exempt from the short-stay visa requirement under Council Regulation (EC) No 539/2001 of 15 March 2001 and holders of a residence permit for family members of Union citizens may travel to France without a visa and apply for a residence permit”), and on the page of the French Consulate in NYC (“Family members of a Union national who does not require a short-stay visa do not require an entry and stay visa, whatever the duration of their stay.”)
 
The Nanterre prefecture, however, gave me an appointment for my carte de séjour only for April 12th. This means that I will overrun the 90 days of my visa waiver stay. What should I do? Is it possible for me to go somewhere to extend it, or should I go in and out of the Schengen area (e.g. London)? I am afraid that it is much more difficult for me to go back and forth to the US.

QUESTION

I found this statement on a French administration website about the new rules for spouses of EU citizens. (The link is below.) I am interested to hear your interpretation of this:

“La demande de titre de séjour n’est obligatoire que si vous êtes ressortissant(e) d’un pays tiers à l’UE/EEE/Confédération suisse et que vous souhaitez exercer une activité professionnelle.

Si vous êtes membre de famille d’un(e) citoyen(ne) de l’UE/EEE/Confédération suisse, vous pourrez exercer toute activité professionnelle de votre choix, salariée ou non-salariée, sans avoir à demander de titre de séjour.

Si vous le demandez, vous pouvez recevoir un titre portant la mention « Carte de séjour de membre de la famille d’un citoyen de l’Union ».

http://accueil-etrangers.gouv.fr/demande-de-titre-de-sejour/vous-etes-ressortissant-e-de-l-ue/vous-etes-membre-de-famille-d-un/

QUESTION

IS IT NORMAL TO GET PUMA COVERAGE WITHOUT PAYING?

In your Dec-Jan newsletter you said you would be discussing the potential problem of URSSAF not billing holders of the titre mention visiteur for the premiums for PUMA in 2016 when they renew their titres at the prefecture. I have eagerly awaited your comments, but your Feb and March newsletters did not mention this.

We have been in the French health care system for several years and have been billed quarterly by URSSAF based on the income declared to CPAM. When the change was made from CMU to PUMA, CPAM indicated that our renewal (Sept 2015) was approved but they did not indicate what the premiums would be and they told me it was up to URSSAF to figure it out. URSSAF indicated that their procedures had not been worked out so they could not send a bill despite the fact that we declare our incomes and have an avis d’imposition. Articles have been written on how basically no premiums were charged in 2016 so the prefecture should be well aware that it was impossible to pay the premiums, as URSSAF could not bill. And the prefecture does not like people to not pay for assurance maladie.

Under PUMA you do not have to do any renewal paperwork; you stay enrolled until you tell them you no longer qualify, so we did not have to do any renewal paperwork in Sept 2016. We have had no problems using our cartes vitales and we have not received nor paid anything concerning premiums.

What has been your experience with this, and what problems, and answers, should we anticipate at the prefecture for our renewal?

Stephen Stills wrote the song “Find the Cost of Freedom ” , which is the last song of the live album 4 way Street by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young released on April 7, 1971.

My son Eric as a pre-teen played this album for about a year after hearing it once when I was playing it. More than 40 years after its release, the album still has a significant impact on people, and managed to outlive the hippie movement, of which this band and its individual artists were perceived as spokesmen.

The question of how much people are willing to give up to be free – which in this context means unattached to possessions and outside of a system – is a very interesting one, which was critical at the time and still resonates today. Today, for over a decade, the question has also shifted to how much people are willing to give up to be worry-free, which is another form of feeling free.

I find it very interesting that the pursuit of freedom in terms of being detached from society and the desire to be worry-free, which makes people even more entrenched in society, are by nature very often completely incompatible goals.

I have no intention of pursuing this analysis, as it is not my area of expertise, but I find interesting that in recent months there has been legislation in France (originating at the EU level) that increased the right to choose, i.e., the freedom to decide, about more than one topic. The choice of which laws apply to one’s estate, the freedom to travel in and around Paris in public transport and the freedom to marry are some of the examples I chose as topics for this month’s issue.

At the same time, laws lowering the maximum one can pay in cash, and maintaining the monopoly of notaireson several critical aspects of people’s lives such as buying real estate, signing a prenuptial agreement or handling one’s estate, are ways of limiting people’s freedom and the promise of ever gaining or maintaining a worry-free state.

These are tiny illustrations, coming when both France and the USA are pretty much in a presidential electoral campaign, with an ongoing debate on how much right of surveillance the state should have to protect its people.

It is all about finding the cost of freedom.

MORE DETAILS ON NEW REGULATIONS FOR INTERNATIONAL ESTATES
In the September 2015 issue, I mentioned that as of August 17th 2015, the handling of estates would now be governed, by default, by the laws of the country of residence of the testator, including real estate owned in other countries.

Another aspect of this new regulation is just about as striking, from my point of view, as many of my readers have said in the past that this issue is even more important to them. The fact that one chooses, by writing a will, which law should apply to one’s estate – the law of nationality or that of residence – is indeed a major change. I believe it will be an especially radical change for French notaires, who will have to deal with estates located abroad if a French citizen living in the USA makes this choice. One last comment: it is often assumed that Britons and Americans always resent the Napoleonic rule that children cannot be disinherited and come first as legatees, but many of my clients, including Americans, are fine with this, especially when they realize the surviving spouse can easily get a life interest in the entire estate.

I will continue this topic in future issues, as some illustration is needed to show the consequences of those two changes.

THE RIGOROUS JOB DESCRIPTION OF THE NOTAIRE
The position of notaire is an odd French institution, which grants a lot of security in, among other things, real estate transactions. The notaire in France has three roles:

Here are some notable examples of the types of leave of absence granted in France:

Official supervisor. This is linked to the special status of real estate in France. Sales must be handled by a person representing France. The duty of the notaire is to guarantee that the sale is in the best interest of all the parties involved, including the state. The buyer should receive all necessary documents, including a guaranteed title, and acquire a property free of financial liability (libéré de toute hypothèque).

Tax collector. The so-called frais de notaire are for the most part taxes that the notaire collects and pays on behalf of the buyer.

• Private adviser. As a professional, the notaire establishes a personal relationship with his client and can be a normal legal adviser, either paid by a standard fee or according to a fee schedule. This, however, is the least important of the notaire’s roles.

A decision of the French Supreme Court (Cour de Cassation) on February 4th illustrates the extent of the first role: securing the buyer’s rights to a perfect title.

In the case in question, renovations had been done in an apartment, and the notairechecked that all necessary authorizations had been requested and obtained. But a document from the management company or syndic raised questions as to whether the work completely complied with the authorizations. The court decided that the duty of the notaireis to leave no stone unturned, and to guarantee, as much as possible, a perfect title. In this case, the work had affected a common area, damaging it.

More recently, I witnessed another illustration of the extent of this role of the notaire. An American bought a Parisian apartment where the gardienne, a type of concierge for the building, is suing the condominium association over a labor regulation and is seeking a sizable amount of money. The notairecalculated how much it would cost the new owner should the court rule in favor of the gardienne.

The parties agreed at the time of the signing of the initial pre-sale contract (promesse de vente) that the chances of the woman winning the case were very slim. Nevertheless, the notaire’s duty was to inform the buyer of this financial risk before any engagement was made, and obtain the buyer’s approval of this situation that did not affect the decision to buy.

In such situations, I find, French notaires are very reassuring when they do their job at its best. They must dig up whatever information they can regarding any potential liability linked to the property.

http://sosconso.blog.lemonde.fr/2015/05/19/quand-le-notaire-permet-la-vente-dune-terrasse-illegale/ La Cour de cassation, qui statue le 4 février, 2015.

PUBLIC TRANSPORT NOW COSTS THE SAME EVERYWHERE IN THE ILE DE FRANCE REGION
I would like to review a few aspects of the history of public transport in the greater Paris metropolitan area to explain why the change that took effect on September 1st 2015 was so radical in the way it affected pricing and the way the public transport is used.

The transport system introduced the Carte Orange (orange card) in 1975 to simplify usage, mainly of suburban trains. The price of the weekly, monthly or yearly pass depended on how many of the five zones existent at that time were traveled through, (from 1991 to 2007, there were 8 zones.) The Paris Métro system is almost completely within zones 1 and 2, which correspond to how far one can go with a normal metro ticket.

Keep in mind that French employees receive a reimbursement from the employer for half the cost of this pass, since it is considered to be the cost of going to work. Many employers pay the full cost of the pass and deduct half of it on the pay slip.

The card stayed pretty much the same until the Navigo pass was introduced in 2005. The new pass was read electronically instead of requiring a ticket to be inserted in a turnstyle.

The prices of both Navigo passes and individual tickets increased regularly, but the logic of the pricing system was not changed until this year. There has been political debate on the issue for a long time. Conservatives want the amount paid by the user to be as close as possible to the actual cost – within limits, since that also increases employers- costs. The left wants to maintain the system or improve it to help users. The idea of uniform pricing had come up regularly. An initial step was taken in September 2012, when holders of monthly and yearly passes got the right to travel to any zone in the system on weekends and during school vacations.

Many reasons have been put forward for the latest modification. In my opinion, making public transport more attractive is one way to fight car traffic in a very densely populated region (the 12 million people of the Ile de France make up 18.2% of the French population). It is also a popular change, as those who travel the farthest are paying less for their commute.

It is now mostly zone 1 and 2 travelers who pay more. The uniform price is currently 70 euros a month for the annual pass.

In my view the true issue is that the infrastructure is badly aging and the volume of people traveling makes it extremely difficult to carry out major repairs and maintenance. It is only recently that I have seen sections of the metro lines inside Paris closed for weeks for repairs. I am astounded by the frequency of failures in the system -problems with individual metro cars, signaling and so on – compared to what I remember from my youth. While in the bigger picture such incidents are small  one loses time, but there are hardly ever any significant accidents  they can make it very difficult to get to work on time if one uses, for example, the RER. And it is expected that the 2016 budget will be reduced by 485 million euros.

I know that this position is not popular but I would have preferred an increase in the budget so more repairs and renovation could be done. For now, though, I admit that I do enjoy the new set-up.

www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2015/09/01/ile-de-france-les-gagnants-et-les-perdants-du-passe-navigo-a-tarif-unique_4741939_4355770.html#igzZb0hS01JUw3O4.99

EVEN MORE RESTRICTIONS ON CASH PAYMENTS IN FRANCE
Paying in cash, depositing cash or even cashing a check is between suspicious and illegal in France. This is quite a contrast with the USA, where retail business relies a lot more on cash transactions. In addition, the acquisition of debt is discouraged. It was a political decision in France to push the use of debit cards; France has hardly any credit card companies as defined in the USA. Debit cards in France are issued by banks, and are linked to a bank account. Non-bank lenders such as COFINOGA and CETELEM do issue cards that allow access to a line of credit, but even there the latest regulations limit how much a client can charge on these cards, as well as the amount a client can borrow money when taking out a loan.

Thus it is now a lot more difficult to multiply the use of credit cards and to take out loans. Furthermore, most payments must be made into a bank account: that is the only way to receive one’s salary, subsidies from the Caisse d’Allocations Familiales, health care reimbursements, tax reimbursements and so on. Increasingly, payments out must also be wired directly from a bank account, including notably almost all utilities (electricity, gas, Internet, phone).

The latest development is that since September 1st it has been illegal to pay cash for purchases exceeding 1,000 euros; the previous limit was 3,000 euros. This includes transactions between professionals. For non-residents, notably tourists, the limit went down from 15,000 euros to 10,000 euros. Thus the new regulation promotes paying by check or debit card. Already, half of all transactions in France were with debit cards (49.5%, to be precise). Today the average amount of cash transactions is 24.30 euros, which illustrates how widespread the other means of payments are.

Starting on January 1st 2016, one must show ID to change more than 1,000 euros to a foreign currency. Also from that day, French banks will have to report to Tracfin (the French finance and budget ministries anti-money laundering unit) any account with cash deposits or withdrawals exceeding 10,000 euros. This should trigger an investigation of the client by Tracfin inspectors and most likely after that the tax inspector.

One last thing: foreigners, especially Americans, tend to be surprised at how common paying with a check is in France, including in grocery stores, restaurants and shops, even though the merchants are often lukewarm about accepting them since there is no assurance that they will not bounce. This form of payment is a lot more common in France than in the USA.

www.lemonde.fr/argent/article/2015/08/31/paiement-en-liquide-les-regles-changent_4741375_1657007.html#z2Mb1djUsRHrvjLH.99

FAKE MARRIAGE AND BEING MARRIED UNDER FALSE PRETENSES
I have always been interested in the dynamic of couples where the spouses are of different nationalities. Sometimes there is an age difference, often exceeding twenty years  in some cases it is an aging husband, in others the wife is older. One spouse may have significant means and the other be a penniless refugee without any legal immigration status. We could list other examples as well, although I know that such things do not just happen with international couples but can characterize couples who live in the same country or even the same city.

What interests me particularly is the sincerity of the love an undocumented alien has for a national when they get married.

The definition of a fake marriage (in French, a mariage blanc) is that both spouses knowingly get married for the sole purpose of obtaining immigration status for one of them, often with a financial payment to the national spouse. This is criminal in France and the USA.

About five years ago, some far right French politicians wanted to criminalize what they call grey marriage(mariage gris) in which one spouse was getting married for the sole purpose of obtaining immigration status while the other was sincerely in love and absolutely certain that this love was shared by the other. This attempt was short lived, as it appeared virtually impossible to prove criminal intent at the time of the wedding in most instances.

My observation, after working so many years with undocumented aliens, is that for many of them, obtaining legal status appears for years to be an unattainable goal. So when someone is kind and attentive to their situation and shows love and care for them, they are often totally overwhelmed with gratitude and have an outburst of love. From that, it does not take much to turn this into a love affair and then a stable romantic relationship, which in turn leads them to get married.

After a few months or a few years, when the couple has settled down and the immigration issue is fully solved, the foreign spouse may start to see the marriage and the other spouse very differently. Or other issues can come up, such as an age difference, difficulty in having children, and so on. As with all couples, when caught in such a dynamic of disillusion, the relationship may end in divorce.

The question I have always wrestled with is where to draw the line between foreigners who genuinely fall in love, even if influenced by the effects of a long quest for legal status, and those who all along are fooling the other person (and sometimes themselves) into showing love and getting married?

I assume that very few of them plan the entire thing and act as predators catching their prey. The article I give the link to clearly describes that. From my position as an outsider, the ones I have met and helped seemed to have genuine feelings for each other (although keep in mind what I describe above).

French law states that if the foreigner obtains immigration status exclusively through marriage and the couple does not stay together at least three years, this foreigner automatically loses the right to stay in France. As the article notes, this law takes care of at least the most blatant cases.

It leaves unanswered this question: what is the chemistry of love made of? This question has existed since the origin of humankind!

http://leplus.nouvelobs.com/contribution/1398345-j-ai-ete-victime-d-un-mariage-gris-il-voulait-juste-des-papiers-moi-je-l-aime-encore.html

Best regards,

QUESTION

CARTE DE RESIDENT HOLDER MARRIES A NON-FRENCH RESIDENT

I am an American expat in France who has been living and working in Paris for over fourteen years and I hold a carte de résident de long durée. I have also been a fan of your newsletter for many years and read it religiously although I have never had cause to contact you until now. My situation is complex. Last month I married a Czech woman who is a legal resident of Austria. We divide our time between Vienna and Paris and I maintain my legal residence in France. We are also expecting a baby girl later this year. The baby will be born in Austria and for the first year or so she will live there, although we do plan to move back to Paris in 2017. I will maintain my resident status in France as well as my apartment in Paris, which I own. My question is: Who in the French administration am I obliged to inform about my marriage and the birth of my child? Being a long-term resident here I know that there must be someone I have to inform of my changed status, but I have no idea who that would be.

QUESTION

WORKING IN FRANCE AS AN ENGLISH TEACHER

I am an American living in the USA and I would like to teach English at a French university. I currently teach English at the university level for foreign students who study business. I have been told that it is close to impossible to do this, but can you please help me?

I would like to wish all of you a great summer and a very nice vacation.

“Hit Me with Your Best Shot” is a song written by Canadian singer/songwriter Eddie Schwartz, and recorded by American singer Pat Benatar in 1980 on her second album Crimes of Passion. In view of the recent tragedies, I look at the message and lyrics of this song and I see many violent images. Poetic images are used all the time and they often give a better explanation, a better illustration of a situation than words do. This song is all about a woman in love and there is not an ounce of real brutality in it. All the same, the title and the lyrics use a language that, if taken out of context, would be seen as rather savage.

HATRED – VIOLENCE & INTOLENCE
During my twelve-day vacation in the USA, I visited a longtime friend in Waterbury CT. She invited my wife and me to the 28th Annual Lobsterfest of the Sandy Hook Volunteer Fire & Rescue in Connecticut. While we were there, she introduced us to many former students of Sandy Hook Elementary School, where she had been a student herself. At the end of the dinner, I asked where the school was in which the December 2012 shooting had taken place, and she answered: “Right behind you ” they tore it down to rebuild a new one!

Too often people are blas about this kind of news until they are personally affected in some way. Being a French person living in France, I stay away from the debate regarding mass shootings, which happen all too often in the USA. But because of the personal connection, the Sandy Hook one hit me hard twice. Learning that I was having a great time a few yards away from that school cast a pall on the rest of my evening, to say the least.

On June 17th in Charleston, a white man attacked an African-American church, killing nine people. The incident brought back memories of the Civil Rights movement, of African-American churches burning and people being killed. This is another tragedy, an expression of pure hate.

When my family visited Charleston in 2006, the four of us spent several hours at the Confederate Museum. It is a small space but there was so much I wanted to learn, to understand, as the story is almost always told from the other side. Clearly, this period is still alive for part of the population.

Are all expressions of hatred the same? Absolutely not! At the same time, such intolerance, hatred, discrimination and racism is unacceptable. At roughly the same time as the Charleston shooting, an elementary school on the French island of Corsica was forced to cancel the year-end school party because the teachers received death threats after deciding to have the children sing John Lennon’s song “Imagine” in five languages, including Arabic.

RETENUE  LA SOURCE  INCOME TAX WITHHELD BY THE EMPLOYER
France is one of the last Western countries where income tax is paid by the individual directly and not withheld by the employer. There are many cultural and historical reasons why the French people are reluctant to change this set-up, but all of them combined are not enough to explain why it has not yet been done.

There is only one technical reason that withholding tax would be very difficult to set up. It is called thequotient familial. I believe France is the only country that taxes the family as a group rather than individuals. This means the amount of tax you owe changes if:

• – You get married,
• – You get divorced,
• – You have a child,
• – The child leaves the home,
• – A family member dies, and/or
• – A family member becomes disabled.

These events occur frequently enough in the course of a lifetime that if France had withholding taxes, such happenings could significantly change the amount withheld. A withholding system works well only if there is just a small discrepancy at the end of the year. This is why the French system prefers to have taxes paid in three installments. The first two, in February and in May, are calculated on the amount owed the year before, and the last one on the amount of taxes owed for the year.

Now, however, the government is determined to have a new withholding system go into effect on January 1st 2018. Neither employers nor employees are very happy with this. Employers do not want an extra task to complicate the French pay slip even more. Employees do not want the change, as it will mean the employer will know much more about their private lives. Employees will be required to inform employers right away of any of the abovementioned changes in their life. The employers will then be obligated to inform the tax office to calculate the new amount owed. Considering the level of distrust that French employees have toward their employers, this could create major difficulties.

It is going to be interesting to see if this measure actually goes through. Most likely it will, but I can see a lot of problems arising from it, and there will be a lot of unhappy people in France before everything settles down.

OFFICE STAYS OPEN DURING THE SUMMER!
I have not scheduled trips this summer, but expect some absences between Friday July 17th and Monday August 17th. I will take a few extended week-end trips.

I would like to remind everyone that there is no August issue.

Best regards,

QUESTION

THE FRENCH WEALTH TAX

I am a recent subscriber to your newsletter, which I find very interesting, informative, and frequently helpful. My wife and I own property in Paris, where we live about six months per year  three months in the spring and three months in the autumn. We are mindful of, and studiously comply with, the 90-day tourist visa waiver program limits. Our question concerns the French wealth tax. Could you explain 1) generally, how it works, 2) who is subject to it, when, and to what extent, and 3) whether staying in France more than six months per year increases the risk of exposure to the tax. Thanks for any information you can provide on a subject that everyone seems to have a different, and conflicting, opinion about.

QUESTION

ABOUT THE FRENCH SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER

I would like to make a comment about your explanation of the French social security number in the April 2015 issue.

I received mine long before my wife got hers. The delay was caused, according to what I was told, by the failure of the local town hall in the town where she was born in the USA to provide the sequential line number in the registry book. INSEE sent the letter requesting this vital number and nothing happened until they heard back. To fix the situation I sent two registered letters, one to CPAM asking them to try again and another to the town hall in the USA imploring them to respond to the request when they got it. This Wikipedia article explains that the last three digits correspond to the applicant’s birth order in a given place:

fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Num%C3%A9ro_de_s%C3%A9curit%C3%A9_sociale_en_France

QUESTION

LOSING FRENCH RESIDENCY WHILE BEING MARRIED TO A FRENCH

I’m leaving France to move to Australia in six weeks, but my one-year family carte de séjour is still valid until October. I might want to return to France in a year or two. Do I need to do anything regarding my carte de séjour to make it easier for when I return? Or do I just let it expire? I’m Australian and I am married to a Frenchman.

fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Num%C3%A9ro_de_s%C3%A9curit%C3%A9_sociale_en_France

QUESTION

COMING TO FRANCE AS AN UNMARRIED COUPLE

I am Polish but currently I am living in Australia. In July/August I am planning to move to Paris where I would have a contract job and I will be staying there for a few years. I am thinking of moving to France with my Thai girlfriend but we do not have any official documents for our relationship, as it is fairly new.

I know that I do not need a visa since Poland is a full member of EU now, but I would like to know about her rights. Is there any chance that she could get a long-stay visa in France with the option to work and that this visa could be granted because she is in a relationship with me?

Do I need to legalize this relationship somehow? Our friendship is not long enough to think about marriage but I would think about it if there were no other way.

I have already used the title BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER from the title song of Simon & Garfunkel’s final studio album, and I did not want to use it again.

A bridge is a good symbol for the need to reach out, sometimes pretty far, when one lives in a foreign country. It can be seen as a link from the unfairness wherein the foreigner needs to do more, and therefore feels discriminated against, to the help that can come from someone who unexpectedly reaches out from nowhere and keeps the foreigner out of trouble.

The month of May in France is often called « le mois des ponts ».

LES PONTS DU MOIS DE MAI – THE « BRIDGES » OF MAY
Americans who come to France to work are warned about the special phenomenon that happens in May. It is referred as les ponts du mois de mai, which can be translated as « the bridges of May, » although that means nothing in English because the concept is peculiar to France.

May 1st (Labor Day) and May 8th (VE Day, the end of World War II) are national holidays. So is the Feast of the Ascension, which is celebrated 40 days after Easter and therefore is almost always a Thursday in May. Many French employees take advantage of these paid holidays and ask to have one or two days of paid vacation in conjunction with them to take a long weekend. For example, if the holiday is a Thursday, you take Friday as a vacation day and end up with a four-day break while using just one day of your paid vacation. Some years it is possible to have a total of twelve days off work but only use up three days of vacation. Of course, the immediate impact of this is that French business at the national level crawls for about a month because not enough people are working.

The pont (bridge) is the vacation day you use to link the bank holiday and the weekend. Faire le pont (doing or making the bridge) is an expression commonly used at this time of year.

APPLYING FOR FRENCH CITIZENSHIP VIA MARRIAGE: THE INTERVIEW
On the 3rd of April, my wife, Paula, had her interview with the préfecture as part of the procedure to obtain French nationality by virtue of her marriage to me. The very first part of the procedure took place nearly 20 years ago, in 1995, when I was initially told that I was not French enough for her to have this done because my mother was Danish and my father’s mother was Spanish. I had thought that being born in France of at least one French-born parent would create enough of a French nationality paper trail to allow me to pass on my French nationality to my spouse. In those days, according to the civil servant, it was not. The man told me I needed to produce my grandfather’s birth certificate and marriage license, as well as one of these documents for his parents, my great-grandparents. Rather than try to find these old documents, I petitioned the Tribunal d’Instance, or Small Claims Court, to rule on my French nationality. Some time later, I received the court’s decision: I was French from birth and being married to an American did not make me lose my nationality. But we had both lost interest in pursuing the project by the time this ruling was issued. About a year ago, however, my wife asked me to start the process again, and this time the regulation was more lenient (and, of course my French nationality was a matter of record). The file was composed of American documents certified in accordance with the Hague Apostille Convention and officially translated, plus other documents proving the fact that we have always lived together, our respective work history, and so on.

She received a letter setting up a meeting for a Thursday morning, and it said my presence was mandatory. We arrived a little early and the civil servant met us almost on time, less than five minutes late, which by préfecture standards is incredible. The first part of the meeting was devoted to making sure we had brought the originals of the copies we sent. The second part was what felt like a chat about our life, our centers of interests, hobbies, the children’s education – the kind of things one would talk about at a party. The reality, from the civil servant’s side, was a series of questions to verify how much each spouse knows about the other, and how integrated they are in each other’s family. Paula enjoyed this discussion, adding details and anecdotes, while I was more interested in making sure that her French credentials had been recorded and the documentation secured in the file. As can sometime happen at the prefecture, what is supposed to be an interview, which the foreigner often expects to be questioned or a French quiz, feels more like an informal chat.

In some situations, the foreigner thinks the file is complete because it has all the documents on the official list, and then finds the civil servant short and rude, in a one-way conversation that does not take the applicant’s excellent level of French into consideration. The situation depends on many variables, but here are some guidelines.
* A French list almost always indicates the information needed and needs to be tailored to a specific situation. This can considerably increase the number of documents to bring.

* In France, the file always talks louder than you can. So make sure you see it as a two-step process. The interview is not the time to fix what you did wrong with the file.

* The civil servants at the préfecture are more like members of the police than paper pushers. They rule, you comply. There is next to no chance of having an equal relationship with equal time for each party to speak. In short, you can ask for information and maybe some advice, but you cannot demand things, and you certainly won’t get anywhere waving an American passport and saying, I am an American citizen, I have rights!

I feel this is the most important advice I can give on how to handle such situations. Yes, there are rules that the French administration complies with, and yes, foreigners residing in France obtain certain rights and protection.

FRENCH INTERNET PROVIDER SAGA
I received the following message from a reader:

Thank you so much Jean for the piece on Internet providers. As we spend 90 to 120 days (of which we try to spend 30 out of the Schengen countries) in France every summer, we have that continued issue with home Internet providers (including phone internet with rules that are guaranteed to change annually). In addition to proving we are moving back to the USA (worked once) you have to add the complication that you have to return the equipment before you leave AND acquire new equipment when you get back. The wasted time and energy of all 3 operations encouraged us to bite the bullet and just leave the Internet all year around. To your point Orange won simply by wearing us out. They made canceling so hard that it was not worth the effort and the colossal waste of time waiting in line to return the equipment. Add to that re-establishing the service when you come back which may be a Saturday so you may be without service for as long as week by the time you lease the equipment again, get it working, get help on-line if needed, etc.

DISCRIMINATION IN FRANCE: NOT ALWAYS WHAT YOU THINK
60 millions de consommateurs, the magazine of a French consumer advocate group, recently published the results of a study about people’s access to good housing. The results were appalling.

Many foreigners whom I help to find a bare-walls, three-year-lease rental feel they have been severely discriminated against because of the insane level of guarantees that landlords and management companies ask for. I strongly believe this has nothing to do with discrimination and everything to do with the level of security needed to get a lease in France, especially in Paris. These are French people who have the same profile as the foreigners mentioned earlier, and who moved back to France without an employer and with no family members left in France, to face the same demands described in my February 2014 issue.

On the other hand, what the magazine describes is real discrimination based on race, foreign origin and personal situation, even against people who are French citizens with a stable employment track record and relatives in France.

In the study, people presenting themselves as belonging to one of five different groups telephoned in response to 150 ads for rental properties in Paris and elsewhere in France. All the candidates supposedly had identical salaries and professional positions, but otherwise the profiles were quite different: average single childless French person, elderly person, single mother, person with African-sounding name and accent, etc.

The « average French person » never had any trouble getting an appointment to visit the property. The « African » caller only succeeded two-thirds of the time.

In Paris, would-be renters are usually asked to have a salary equal to three times the rent. Agents handling the properties checked this only nine times for the « French » caller but 43 times for the « African » one.

Interestingly enough, the « French single mother with one child » got as bad results as the « African » caller, and when people of these two profiles did get an appointment to visit, they were asked to submit a much thicker file, giving a lot more detailed information.

It does not make anyone feel any better to see how difficult it is to find a long-term rental in Paris. A new law called A.L.U.R. (pour l’Accès au Logement et à l’Urbanisme Rénové), sponsored by the former minister for housing, Cecile Duflot, is supposed to counter this type of discrimination, creating regional commissions called « les commission de contrôle des professions immobilières » to fight it.

The truth is that such discrimination is very difficult to document in a way that holds up in a French court. What is more, in the Parisian market landlords get so many applications that they have an ample choice of candidates and therefore can choose on subjective criteria.

My opinion is that as long as the law increases protection of the tenant, the market will react by being more and more selective because of the risk involved in choosing a tenant. A sudden huge increase in the number of apartments for rent in Paris would force landlords to change their tune, but the chance of that happening is about as great as the chance of the market being opened to all profiles overnight.

FRENCH INCOME TAX: TIME TO DECLARE AND PAY
Regarding the more mundane topic of income tax, I would remind everybody that the paper version of the 2013 income declaration must be filed in France by May 20th and the second partial income tax payment (deuxieme tiers) is to be paid by May 15th (midnight, in both cases). The forms have been available since April 9th and people could start declaring online on April 16th at the website www.impots.gouv.fr. Everything is much earlier than usual this year. You can file your declaration on the website as long as this is not your first time filing, since you need your tax ID number and some access codes.

If you do file online, you benefit from a later deadline. The schedule depends on your postal code: départements 01 to 19 must file by Tuesday May 27th, 20 to 49 by Tuesday June 3rd and 50 or higher by Tuesday June 10th.

An important reminder: if you are a French fiscal resident, you must declare your worldwide income to the French authorities even if you do not earn any income in France, do not have the right to work in France or truly do not work in France. Just because there is no penalty to pay does not mean it is legal to neglect to file. To put it simply, if you hold a carte de séjour or an immigration visa validated with an OFII stamp, chances are you are a French fiscal resident.

Best regards,

QUESTION

OBTAINING AN EU CARTE DE SEJOUR

I have both American and British nationalities, and I am married to an American; I have been living in France for a while. I had an expat status for three years based on my American citizenship, and I was laid off a few months ago. I chose to stay in France with my wife so I asked for a carte de séjour, this time as an EU citizen. The préfecture refuses to give it to me because I have no job, and I receive no unemployment subsidy. The préfecture says that I do not belong here. This is outrageous; I am an EU citizen and I know I have the right to live in France. Can you explain what is going on?

QUESTION

VARIOUS TYPES OF FISCAL STATUS OF MONEY EARNED IN FRANCE

Several years ago, I hired an undocumented alien to be my cleaning lady. She first did my home and then over the years, she did the apartments I own and rent and now other landlords use her services. She does a wonderful job, and manages the tasks in a very autonomous way. I pay her with CESU as much as I can manage it, so the majority of her income comes from the other owners who mostly do not reside in France. How can she manage her income declaration to the tax office while she is an undocumented alien and once she obtains a legal immigration status?

QUESTION

CARTE DE SEJOUR COMMERCANT & K-BIS

I work for a small multinational and I have been appointed the Senior Manager of the French branch located in Paris. I asked for a long-stay visa at the French consulate in Chicago, and after several trips there, waiting a long while and giving an impressive amount of documents, I finally got it. Upon my arrival in France, I had to redo exactly the same thing, giving the same documents but this time to the préfecture. The French staff helped some. I thought the last meeting would be the final one but the préfecture stated that I needed to come once again with an updated K-Bis. I do not get it  the current one has my name on it and the address of the company’s headquarters in France where my office is. What more do they want?