Every May full-time residents of France are required to file la Déclaration des Revenus (Declaration of Earnings), the annual tax declaration equivalent to filing your 1040 tax form in the US.  Since France is our principal residence and we have lived here longer than a year, we are required to file a Déclaration des Revenus for the first time since moving to France.

So, how did we — with our rudimentary skills in speaking French — figure out how to file our Déclaration des Revenus?

In this case the Internet, Google Translate, expat discussion forums, and numerous professional websites were all major tools.  I’m often thankful that we have so much information available from the Internet. Neither of us can imagine the struggle of expats living abroad before such tools were readily available.  One key source for collecting information was the online English language newspaper, “The Local, France’s News in English” that reminded readers in April that a Déclaration des Revenus would be due in May.  The article listed the forms required, had advice from an expat tax expert, and listed links to La Direction Générale des Finances Publiques, the French version of the US Treasury’s Internal Revenue Service.  The Finances Publiques’ web site allows you to download forms and even file your Déclaration des Revenus online.  (There are also expat tax preparation services in France, but ours was pretty straight forward.)

Due to my lack of confidence with online filing the Déclaration des Revenus in French, I elected to visit the local Centre de Finances Publiques (tax office) to pick up the needed forms.  Between my “shopping list” of forms, my very basic French, the helpful Finances Publiques’ representative’s basic English, I managed to pick-up the required forms.  Like our US Tax Return, the Déclaration des Revenus consists of several forms.  For us, we needed:

Formulaire 2042
The main tax form (like the US tax form 1040) listing our name, address, and global income.

Formulaire 2047
This form is for listing any income earned outside of France.  Our pensions are considered foreign income that must be declared on this form, as well as the total noted on the Formulaire 2042.

Formulaire 3916
On this form we list all bank accounts that are located outside of France.

Filling out these three forms was actually simpler than completing many of my past US Tax Returns; but, of course, these forms and directions are written in French and I had to struggle with the language barrier.  Yes, French tax forms share with US tax forms the ability to create stress and give the preparer a total feeling of confusion and inadequacy.

Using an English-French dictionary, Google Translate, and a tax help guide from “The Connexion:  France’s English-Language Newspaper” written for British expats, it took about two days to (hopefully) correctly complete the documents.  Tracy double-checked the translations, Dollar-to-Euro conversions, directions, math, documents, and finally concurred that we had now had all the forms ready to submit.

The next big question was:  to whom or where do we submit Déclaration des Revenus?  Unlike US tax forms, there was no mailing address on any on the forms, nor directions for how to file.  So we gathered up all the completed forms and visited the local tax office again.  Tracy spotted a large mail box outside the office door with a sign marked for Déclaration des Revenus.  But first I visited with the Finances Publiques’ representative again and asked her to double-check that our Déclaration was complete.  (Thankfully the representative spoke some English, which was extremely helpful to me.) She asked me to include a copy of our 2013 rental contract with our Déclaration des Revenus and then the package would be complete.

We had a quick round trip back to the apartment, made a copy of our lease, and returned to speak with the same Finances Publiques’ representative for one last final review. The representative believed the package was complete now and officially accepted the Déclaration des Revenus. Yet another milestone first with living in France.

So what happens next?

Unlike the US, no payment is ever sent with the Déclaration des Revenus.  The Finances Publiques reviews the financial situation on the forms and later sends an Avis d’Imposition (a tax bill) or an Avis de Non-imposition (certificate of non-taxable income) usually around mid to late August for the amount of taxes due. Since it is our first filing, we are told that we could receive a response from the Finances Publique as late as November or December 

Now for the complexity.  The United States is one of the few countries that taxes on the basis of citizenship rather than residence.  The United States requires that US citizens file a yearly tax return with the US Internal Revenue Service as long as their income (earned in the US or earned abroad) is over $9,000. Americans working abroad are generally exempt from paying tax on their first $97,600 in foreign earned income, but they are still required to file a return. 

Tracy and I do not earn income in France and we previously filed our US tax return in April.  

To avoid double taxation for citizens living abroad, there is a tax treaty between the US and France, the “Convention Between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the French Republic for the Avoidance of Double Taxation and the Prevention of Fiscal Evasion with Respect to Taxes on Income and Capital (1994).”  The biggest issue for us addressed in the treaty is that pensions from a US source is taxed only by the United States and not by France.  So, in theory, we are only required to pay our US taxes, however, in actually application we may still receive a tax bill.  

This is our first time filing a Déclaration des Revenus with France, so we are interested to see exactly how this will work out for us.  Every expat’s tax situation is unique unto itself.  So we may have no French Impôts sur le Revenu (income tax) liability, a small French income tax bill (for non-pension interest or dividends), or no income tax liability but a bill for social service fees (if you call it a “fee” it doesn’t fall under the “tax” exemption.)

We will tell you about the outcome sometime between August and November when we hear from La Direction Générale des Finances Publiques.  Keep your fingers crossed that we only get a Avis de Non-imposition (certificate of non-taxable income).

Following the Prefect Office’s instructions that we received after we submitted our applications to renew our Titres de Séjour (residency permits) [First Renewal of Our Residency Permit (Titre de Séjour)], we e-mailed the prefecture after 30 days to inquire whether our application has been approved and Cartes de Séjour (residency cards) issued.

So after an anxious 30 days (we expected the approval to be pro forma with the initial request in the US for a long-term visa being the most challenging, but it’s never good to make such a broad assumption of an automatic approval when immigration law and bureaucracy are involved) I translated an inquiry into French and e-mailed the Préfecture de l’Aude here in Carcassonne.  I immediately received an auto-response advising me that the message was received by the Prefecture and to expect an answer within 5 working days.  I put my “Type A” personality back in retirement mode and told myself, five more days to wait was not unreasonable.

However, I received back within two hours an e-mail response from an actual person telling me our request was in the hands of a real person and requested our 10 digit identification number from our Récépissés de Demande de Carte de Séjour (receipts of application for residency permit.)  I referred to our  Récépissés, located the ID numbers in the upper right corners where the e-mail said the numbers would be found, and e-mailed the information back to the Prefecture.

The following morning before 9:30 a.m. there was an e-mail from the Prefecture telling me that our application is approved, our new Cartes de Séjour are at the Prefecture, and to come and pick the cards up April 1. We were asked to bring with us our Récépissés de Demande de Carte de Séjour and current Titres de Séjour (residency permits) which are “sticker” documents affixed inside our US passports.

So April 1, Tracy and I were up early to be at the Prefecture at 9 a.m. when the doors open to the residency permit office. After a little bit confusion and language difficulties at the reception area we received a yellow “Post-It” note with the number “4” written on it and sent to the waiting area outside the residency permit office.  This was unusual because on previous visits at the prefecture, like at the DMV back in the States, we received a printed number tab to match the electronic number display next to the office door.  After waiting a couple of minutes the electronic display turned on and showed “500.”  That didn’t look right.  Having a number “4” in our hands we decided we misunderstood something in the French.  After checking back at the reception desk, the receptionist took us into the Estranger Passeport (foreign passport) office and created an informal line with us and other visitors also holding “Post-It” note numbers. We quickly moved up in the line short line and met with the friendly Prefect representative who accepted our Récépissés de Demande de Carte de Séjour and passports. The representative very efficiently had us sign a form accepting our new Cartes de Séjour and handed us our cards and a receipt for our records. We were in and out of the Prefecture in 20 minutes.

The Carte de Séjour is rather “High-Tech” with security features like a microchip with biometric information, a “watermark photo” that matches the subject’s photo, hologram, shifting colors, micro-printing, République Française watermarks on the laminate, the subject’s signature, and check digits.  It’s a very professional looking document, although a rather unattractive pastel pink and blue in color.  The card lists our French ID number, expiration date, nationality, place and date of birth, gender, and current address in France.

So we are starting our second year in France feeling fairly accomplished with successfully navigating French bureaucracy and obtaining our Cartes de Séjour without any snags. For our renewal next year we are planning the same strategy of starting early and being well prepared with all the documents required.