Moving to France

1. Advice after having lived here for almost three years
2. Advice after having lived in France for a year
3. Read my article about living and working in France, on Transitions Abroad
4. Useful resources
5. Finding work
6. Learning the language
7. Making friends

Advice after having lived in France for almost three years (November 2007)

I get an average of 5 e-mails a week from people hoping to move to France and wondering how they can do it. If you're reading this page you're probably getting ready to send off an e-mail to me too. Well, before you do, please read this:

1. I provide this page purely to help others who are about to do what I've already done. If you want in-depth advice, you should consider hiring a professional relocation consultant.
2. I am happy to answer specific questions if you keep your e-mail short and it is obvious that you have done your research before contacting me.
3. I am not an embassy and I can't help you choose a visa.
4. I am not an employment agency and I can't help you find a job.
5. I am not a real estate agency and I can't help you find an appartment.
6. If you can't speak French, have no idea what sort of job you'll do when you get here and don't have the right to work in France, please don't ask me for advice. You won't like my answer.
7. Finding work in France is tough enough for the French. Finding work as an unqualified expat who can barely speak the language, is near impossible.
8. I meet an average of 30 people a week, most of them expats. Everyone who is here from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the US etc and is here under their own steam, is either here on a tourist visa or a student visa. As for working holiday visas, I know they exist for Australians under 30/31 (?) and last for a year but as for other nationalities I couldn't tell you.
9. Expats living permanently in France who have the right to stay here typically fall under one of four categories: 1. they are British or some other nationality which is part of the European union; 2. they are married to a French person and eligible to apply for a temporary visa every year for four years, after which time they can get a 10-year visa (as is my case); 3. their job sent them here and they're only here for a couple of years; 4. they have dual nationality.
10. Teaching work is very easy to get (seriously, you just need to turn up and say you're a native English speaker, they give you the keys to your classroom and you start that day) but you won't be paid until you've worked 6 months to a year. I am currently battling with Mirail University because eight months after having worked there, they still haven't paid me and miraculously seem to have lost all of my paperwork and evidence that I even worked there.
11. In my current job teaching at ICAM (a private engineering school), although I am salaried and no longer need to be registered as self employed, I won't be paid until this time next year. As if the pay situation is not bad enough, the organisation of the school is appaling and 6 weeks into the first semester I still don't have a coursebook, let alone a list of my actual students (the students I get change every week yet I am supposed to prepare them for the Cambridge FCE and CAE exams which will be in May).
12. You can't rely on teaching to support yourself in France. If you're going to teach, make sure someone is supporting you and consider the money you earn as a bonus at the end of the year -- if you manage to get them to pay you at all. Meanwhile, you'll need to pay a bunch of administrative bodies every two to three months -- amounts ranging from 60 to 360 euros each time, and then there's tax to be paid. All of this must be paid whether you earn a cent or not and whether you've been paid or not. There are penalties for not paying on time, as well.

My research notes on the move from Edinburgh to Toulouse in 2005 (with some updates)

My French is only intermediate, but I should pick things up quickly once I get over there. I started two groups in Toulouse: a French/English Exchange Group (French Fridays) and an English Conversation Group (English in Toulouse). If you're reading this and want to join, please see the English in Toulouse Web site for more information.

Useful resources

• Teaching English in Paris - The Easy Way
• Dave's ESL Cafe
• An Aussie who met her Frenchman online.
• Good news about becoming a language assistant
• Excerp from Dave's ESL site: If you don't have any experience or qualifications, I suggest the French assistant program run by the Ministère de l'Education Nationale: they hire americans, canadians, aussies, and new zealanders to work 12 hours a week in French public schools.
• Great advice from an American who went to Paris.
• What makes the French so Unmistakably French: by Jennifer Yee.
• Americans in Toulouse: A helpful organisation for English-speaking Expats mostly from America, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand. They offer advice on everything including how to recognise and overcome culture shock, hairdressing terminology and how the important boring stuff works (like taxes and legal, postal system, utilities and television, etc.)

Picking a visa

Option 1: Apply for a work visa

French Embassy says: I can stay in France (without working) for up to 3 months on a tourist visa. If I want to stay longer than that I need to apply for a work visa. The catch is, I must have secured a job before I can apply for a work visa.

Note: Will any French organisation take me on without already having a visa? If not, how do I get a job so that I can get a work visa?

Follow-up note: No they won't, and it's not just me that found that out.

Option 2: Apply for a Working Holiday Visa

Excerp from French Consulate Web site: "As from 23 February 2004 Australian citizens, aged between 18 and 29 years (inclusive) at the date of lodgement of an application for a Working Holiday Visa, may combine tourism and work in France. The Working Holiday Visa is a multiple entry visa valid for one year from the date of arrival in France. [...] Australians outside Australia, but not already in France, may apply by mail to the Sydney Consulate on the condition that an Australian address be provided. [...] Once employment in France is found, Working Holiday Visa holders must apply for a Temporary Work Permit (autorisation provisoire de travail) at the nearest French Labour Department (Direction départementale du Travail, de l'Emploi et de la Formation professionnelle). A work permit shall be granted for the duration of the position. Working Holiday Visa holders may also study or attend a training course."

Option 3: Apply for a student visa

Interesting loophole mentioned by someone on Dave's ESL forum: If you are a student at an official university (and not a language school), you are eligible to work up to 19.5 hours per week on a student visa. Quite a few foreigners actually enroll in a university program (around 300 euros a year) just to get the right to work in France. Once they're in and they have their official papers to work, they never actually go back to classes.

Follow-up note: This is getting harder to pull off. You're now actually monitored and if you miss more than three classes, immigration is called.

Option 4: Get married and get a carte de sejour for family reasons

We went with this option. I came over on a tourist visa, we took a couple of trips to London to get a newer stamp on my passport and started the immigration process the week after we got married. Nearly three years on (Nov 2007), I'm still having to apply every 6 months for my temporary one year carte de sejour (it takes them 3 months to get you a receipt and then when that one expires you have to apply for another receipt and eventually you get your carte de sejour. It's a lot of trips to the Mairie and costs around 60 euros every year), but hopefully this time next year I'll be eligible for a 10-year visa.

Finding work

What I can do:

Option 1: Teach English

• Native speaker of English (I'm an Aussie)
• Be self employed (That was an expensive mistake!)
• Be able to support yourself for a year until you get paid (or longer...!)

• A degree in anything (I have a BA in Journalism)
• TEFL certificate of some sort (I did the Cambridge ESOL CELTA but it cost a fortune and was hard work. Also, it scared head teachers more than impressed them.)

• Cambridge ESOL: This Web site lists all official Cambridge-approved TEFL and CELTA courses.
• Transfer: I took the Cambridge ESOL CELTA in Paris at Transfer where I did 4 weeks of intensive teacher training.
• Avoid working for language schools as they are reputed to under-pay and over-work.
• Don't under sell yourself, especially if you register as self employed! Many places will offer to pay you 17€ per hour as an independent (you'll have to invoice them to be paid). I cannot emphasise this strongly enough: do not accept to be paid this low! Why? Because: 1. You will end up earning less than minimum wage, 2. you won't receive any benefits such as restaurant tickets, a steady income or partial travel reimbursements (you get all of that on minumum wage if you are salaried and work for a company) — don't forget to factor in preparation time for your classes, especially if you are a new teacher!, and 4. you hurt your fellow teachers when you accept work under these conditions. For details on how much teachers should earn in France, see my article below.

Option 2: Teacher's assistant ?

• Assistantsinfrance.com "is the unofficial web site for all past, present, and future language assistants in France."
• British Council for Language Assistants: Not relevant for me, as I don't hold an EU passport and I completed my education in Australia, but still has useful advice.

Learning the language...

• I listened to the Pimsleur French course on my laptop, which didn't do much for me and I gave it up pretty quickly. When I got to France I did a one month intensive course, and met people off the 'net several times a week for language exchanges. The language exchanges helped the most, but it helped that I already had an intermediate level when I started doing that.

Making friends and getting a life...

• English in Toulouse — through organising my group I've met hundreds of interesting people and have made a few very good friends.
• Toulouse Tourist Office
• How To Live, Work & Lounge In France

Advice after having lived in France for a year — April 2006

Well, I've now been living in France for a year. In that time, I've done my teacher training course (CELTA) which was, by the way, the most difficult and intensive four weeks of my life! I've also grappled with the language from the point of not understanding a thing to being able to hold a conversation, ask for directions, successfully handle job interviews and tell people off when they do something I disagree with (very important!) and got myself married to Yves, the very reason I'm in France.

I've also learnt a lot about how it works here in France regarding being able to teach/get work, so here comes an information overload... I hope it helps anyone who is considering the move to France!

Teaching English at a university

Universities in France only hire language teachers as 'vacataires' (substitute teachers) which means you need to be a 'travailleur independant' (self-employed) and they can't be your main employer -- the majority of English teachers in French universities work at at least two universities, as well as at language schools and teaching English at companies.

With this in mind, you shouldn't rely on teaching to get your work visa, unless you apply for a 'salarié' (salaried employee) position at a language school. Most schools prefer you to already have a work visa.

A word about pay if you manage to find work, the minimum rates of pay before tax are:
Salaried: 18 euros/hour
Vacataire: 40 euros/hour
Travailleur independant: 60 euros/hour

The reason it's so well paid as a 'vacataire' and 'travailleur independant' is because the work is unstable and you must pay around 1700 euros to URSSAF (www.urssaf.fr) -- that's healthcare and pension, per year plus taxes or a minimum of about 800 euros if you don't make anything at all. You'll need to register with URSSAF as soon as possible if you go down this road, and get yourself a 'siret number'.

Also, you only get paid every 6 months (in arrears) and at some universities, at the end of the year.

If you are salaried, all of this (except for tax) is done for you and there's no financial risk involved. Plus, you are paid monthly.

Teaching English at a language school

Language schools might be very keen to hire you, but be careful, as some of these places really exploit people as they only pay 12€/hour before tax. (Avoid the language schools 'Ready International,' 'Acadomia' and 'Keepschool' in Toulouse which are notorious for exploiting their teachers.)

If getting official work is too much bother...

You didn't hear this from me, but if just want to hang around France for 3 months as a tourist, many people work 'au noir' (cash in hand) and advertise for 'English lessons'. Those who mention they are native speakers seem to get a lot of enquiries! Places to advertise are: community web sites, university noticeboards and at English bookshops.