Where is “home” when you’ve moved to live in France?
October 22nd, 2006 | 
Author: This is far from a simple question to answer.For instance, many of the British that move here to live still maintain a considerable degree of contact with the UK. Quite a number maintain their UK number plates on their car by travelling to Dover each year for their MOT and often seem to keep their UK car insurance, though I imagine that if they tried claiming whilst the car was here they’d find that it wasn’t actually valid. Others move here and keep paying their taxes in the UK to avoid the hassles of French taxation. And, of course, there are the trips “back home” to see friends and family.
On the other hand, there are many like us who have a French car, pay UK tax, etc. but who would still probably consider home as being somewhere in the UK.
Even the authorities seem a little confused by the question. Almost three years after moving here, the French have continued to send tax bills to our former home in the UK whilst the same office simultaneously sends other tax bills to us here. The UK tax people are even worse if that’s possible with Inland Revenue regularly sending mail to here, our old house in the UK, my former employers in the UK and even my parents house sometimes! Where they consider is home for me is anyones guess.
My driving license is expiring shortly and I thought that perhaps I’d have to swap it for a French one because the UK form states quite clearly on the front page that you can’t get a UK driving license unless you are resident in the UK. However, they go on to define in detail what they mean by someone being resident in the UK and I meet all their requirements!
In fact in most cases it is still much easier for me to prove that I live in the UK than to prove that I live in France, to the extent that not only have we been able to get credit cards but even a mortgage! Interestingly, despite telling everyone official that we live in France, we have yet to receive any request to pay the Taxe d’Habitation so it would seem that officially we don’t really live in France after all.
So it would appear that, officially at least, “home” for us is actually still the UK.
PS We’re off to Spain for a short break this afternoon so no more FPs ’til at least Wednesday.
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