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Hundreds of Brits in France still waiting for residency card as deadline approaches

With just two weeks to go until the cut-off date when Brits living in France are legally required to hold a carte de séjour residency permit, hundreds are still waiting for their cards to arrive.

Published: 19 September 2021 09:14 CEST
Updated: 20 September 2021 10:11 CEST
Hundreds of Brits in France still waiting for residency card as deadline approaches
Photo: Thomas Coex/AFP

A survey by the citizens’ rights group Remain in France Together (RIFT) found that of those who have applied for the card, hundreds are still waiting and some have had no contact from their local issuing authority.

All Brits who were living in France before December 31st 2020 must apply for a carte de séjour – even those who are married to a French citizen or who previously held a European carte de séjour.

If you have not yet applied – here’s how to go about it.

The deadline for applications was originally June 30th, this was extended by three months to September 30th. However the deadline to be in possession of the card remains at October 1st – just two weeks away.

READ ALSO What happens to Brits who don’t have residency before the deadline?

RIFT conducted a survey of nearly 3,000 Brits living in France and found that although 75 percent had got their cards, 25 percent were still waiting.

In total of the 2,917 survey respondents who had applied for the card, 749 (25.67 percent) reported not having yet received it and 354 had not yet been contacted by their préfecture following submission of their online application.

The remaining 395 had either been sent a date for the appointment at the préfecture, or had attended the appointment but were still waiting for the card to be delivered.

The préfectures with the highest number of outstanding applications were Bouches-du-Rhône (which includes Marseille), Charente, Côtes-d’Armor, Hérault, Var and Vienne.

Although the bulk of outstanding applications were from people who had applied for the card within the last couple of months, the survey also found outstanding cases from older applications, with several dozen applicants who applied in November and December 2020 still waiting.

Previously the official advice for people still waiting has been not to contact the préfecture, as many local officials were struggling with the numbers of applications to process.

However RIFT now advises that if you have not been contacted by the préfecture to get in touch with them by email – addresses should be on the préfecture website. Queries should include your full name, the date you applied and the reference number from the automated response when you submitted the application online.

If there is no email contact, you can send a lettre recommandée (registered post letter) with the same details.

In light of the survey results, RIFT is calling on the French government to extend the October 1st deadline.

The group spokesman said: “If our survey results mirror the situation for all UK Nationals and their family members across France, many thousands will be in a precarious situation on October 1st 2021.

“The French Government has not yet officially changed the deadline and there are so few working days left.  

“We call on the French Government to please give official notification of an extension immediately and to declare the number of applications made and finalised. Clear communication is vital.”

For more information on residency, how to apply and what to do in case of problems, head to the RIFT homepage or our Dealing with Brexit section.

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BRITS IN FRANCE

Thousands of Brits still move to France despite post-Brexit paperwork

Moving to France has become a lot more complicated for Brits since Brexit, but latest French immigration data shows that thousands of them still move here.

Published: 1 August 2024 12:37 CEST
Thousands of Brits still move to France despite post-Brexit paperwork

The days of EU freedom of movement are over for UK nationals (unless they also have the passport of an EU country) and now moving to France requires first getting a visa and then requesting a carte de séjour residency card once here.

Getting a visa comes with a raft of requirements including proof of being able to be financially self-sufficient via either a job, a pension or savings.

READ MORE: EXPLAINED: How to apply for a visa to France

However it seems that these requirements are not putting off everyone – and around 9,000 Brits made the move to France in 2023.

French statistics

The French interior ministry has published its provisional immigration data for 2023, which provides the first clear post-Brexit picture of how many Brits move to France.

Although the Brexit transition period ended at the end of 2020, figures on residency cards from 2021 and 2022 include British long-term residents in France being issued with a residency card under the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement.

The figures from 2023 therefore provide the first clear indication of how many Brits move to France since Brexit.

And thousands did – 9,261 UK nationals were issued with a first-time carte de séjour residency card in 2023. Although this number may include a small number of family members of British residents who were resident before Brexit, the great majority of these are people moving to France for the first time.

READ MORE: 10 things to do before moving to France

It is not possible to compare this with pre-Brexit patterns since before the UK left the EU Brits were not required to get a visa or residency card to live in France, and there is therefore no comparable data.

How many Brits live in France now?

The interior ministry data does, however, give an idea of the total number of Brits living in France – prior to Brexit, this was difficult to estimate due to EU freedom of movement. 

In 2023, French authorities noted that there were 166,314 Brits holding residency cards in France, a 2.5 percent increase from 2022, when there were 161,194.

The real figure is probably slightly higher because it does not include Brits who have dual nationality with an EU country – eg British-Irish or British-French dual nationals – since they are not required to have a residency card. 

In 2020, a study by the French national statistics body, INSEE used pre-Brexit data and estimated that there were 148,000 Britons in France. This also found that a large number of Brits in France were in western and south-west France, particularly in départements of Charente, Dordogne and Haute-Vienne.

READ MORE: Which part of south-west France is the top ‘dream destination’ to move to?

Brits becoming French

In 2023, 1,522 Brits gained French nationality, with 767 going via décret (by residency) while another 755 gained French nationality via déclaration, the category for those who are either married to a French person or can prove family ties (eg parent of a French child).

In comparison, in 2022, 2,206 Brits became French, and in 2019, 3,557 did.

Acquiring French citizenship is a long process – the application takes an average of between 18 months and two years, while those applying through residency need to have lived in France for five years (cut to two years if they have completed higher education in France).

The post Brexit period saw a spike in Brits applying to become French – many had lived in France for many years but had never considered it necessary before since they already had the right to live in France.

What Brits do in France

Unfortunately, the data did not specify the types of residency cards given to Brits in 2023. 

However, Eurostat data from 2022 did break down first time residency permits into four categories; work, study, family reunification or ‘other’ – which includes retirees and others who don’t intend to work or study in France.

READ MORE: ‘Not all gin-swilling pensioners’ – What are Brits in France really doing?

While their data differs slightly form the interior ministry numbers, they found that a little under half (3,182 out of 7,927) of first-time residency cards for Brits were work-related.

After that, students came in second place, with 1,901 came to study in 2022.

France has been working hard to market itself as an international study destination and around 400,000 foreign students come here each year. It is the fourth most popular country for foreign students – and the top non-English speaking country.

Although Brexit has made studying in France more complicated for British students, the fact that French is still widely taught in British schools makes it a natural destination for those who want to study abroad.

READ MORE: How easy is it to move to France if you don’t speak French?

The third biggest group of Brits was the ‘other’ category which includes retirees and had 1,760 people. Meanwhile, 1,084 people came via family reunification – ie joining a spouse, partner or parents already resident in France, according to Eurostat.

How do Brits compare overall?

In comparison to general immigration data, Brits are somewhat different and are more likely to move to France to work than to study.

In 2023, the interior ministry data for all non-EU nationals moving to France showed that the largest group were students. After that, the second largest category was ‘family’ related residency cards, and the third was work-related.

Brits reverse that trend being most likely to move to France to work.

As for the number of Brits moving to France, there are fewer Britons coming here than Americans. In 2023, 12,153 Americans were issued a first-time residency card – although that number includes a significant number of students doing a study abroad programme who don’t actually intend to make France their home.

Brits come in 10th place for the largest nationality represented in new residency cards issued, behind Indians who made up 9,819 first-time cartes de séjour. Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, China and the United States were the top five (in order).

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