How To Move To France: A Guide-Blog

This is a short post all about home insurance (or assurance habitation ), and why you have to get it. In France, unlike in the UK, you must have home insurance by law . No one told me this, so I am telling you now. Getting home insurance is something you should make a priority, unless you want Emmanuel Macron to come knocking. (No one wants that.) A running theme: this is something that took me ages to get around to, partly because I didn't know I had to, partly because it is yet another daunting task on the never-ending list of daunting tasks. (But don't worry, I'm here to explain so it's not daunting for you.) In fact, when I did do it, it was very simple. The best way is to just take out home insurance when you set up a bank account - most banks tend to offer un compte bancaire and assurances . When I finally managed to get a meeting at the bank to create (yet another) French bank account, sorting out insurance, which I had been anxious about for ages, turned ...

France gets a bad rap when it comes to paperwork and bureaucracy, and all for very good reason, as you are about to discover. It took me about five or six separate meetings with various people sorting out various things before I once went to one where I had all the right documents. Here I will list exactly what those are, so hopefully you can skip the infuriating trial-and-error period that many have to go through. Obviously, having a French bank account is very important. A French bank account comes with a 'RIB' - a long code which is absolutely essential for you to function in France, not least because your employer requires it to pay you. (It also comes with a 'BIC/Swift' code, an IBAN number and the code of the bank you are with.) 'RIB' might not mean very much to you now, but by the time you get one you may well weep with joy. Choosing your bank . A bit of background on the way French banks (and France in general) works: everything has to be done the pa...