joey123

Hi everyone,

ill be relocating to France shortly. I am a qualified beauty therapist and i also carry out semi permanent make up. Does anyone have experience of moving from uk to france and still working? Is there anywhere i can check my certs are sufficient? I have ran a successful business here for 18 years..... i love my job and wish to continue in france....
Any info appreciated xxx

christmasoompa

Hi, welcome to BE.

I'll move your thread to the France forum, where the good folks there will be able to help. Have you got the visa side of things sorted?

Good luck with the move.

EuroTrash

Hi joey123, welcome to the forum
You don't mention visas which is normally the first thing Brits ask about these days. Are you one of the lucky Brits with an Irish or other EU passport?
Regarding your qualifications, it will depend very much exactly what treatments you plan to offer. Unfortunately getting UK qualifications recognised in France is potentially more complicated since Brexit so you may have a bit of homework to do on this. It might be a good idea to make contact with eg the Chambre of Trade and Commerce near where you will be living and see if they can help guide you through it.
If you do need to apply for a visa allowing you to set up a business in France, you'll need to sort this out before you apply, as you will have to include a full business plan with your application and obviously you would need to demonstrate that you are actually legally qualified to do all the things you.mentioned in your business plan.
Exciting times, good luck with the planning!

joey123

Hi!

Thanks for the reply.
I havent started the visa process yet, I was just trying to figure out my qualifications so i can work... ive been on a site but as you say its asking me about my business first and i just wanted to clarify my qualifications before i began. I think ill hire a company that will hold my hand!
thanks for the feedback!
jo x

EuroTrash

Sounds like a plan.
While you're waiting to see whether your qualis will be accepted it wouldn't be a bad idea to look into the various options for setting up a business in France. It tends to be more complex than e.g. a UK ltd co, and it's important to make the right choice for your situation. Social charges (=NICs) in particular are significantly higher in France (on average you can expect your bill for social charges to be around 35-40 per cent of profit or alternatively around 20% of turnover, depending which business structure you choose). Again this will need factoring in to your business plan, they will want to see that you've done your research and found out how businesses operate in France, and costed things out realistically.

Pulaski

If you would be willing to share a little more about your plans you should be able to get more useful and specific information. .... Are you planning on moving to France [1] primarily to support yourself with your own business and your own business visa [2] moving with, or to join, a domestic partner who is French citizen (or other EU country citizen), [3] moving with a domestic partner who has their own employment based visa, or [4] something else?

joey123

Hi!
Thank you for replying!
I am moving with my husband who will be still employed in the UK but offshore. I still want to work when we re locate to France but im finding it so difficult to find out about my qualifications.
I have ran a business in the UK for years and i wish to carry on in France too. We havent applied for visas yet, I was just trying to do some research.
thanks
jo

Pulaski

Does he know that if he is living and working in France, albeit for a British employer, he won't be able to stay on the payroll in the UK and will need to register in France to pay French income tax and social charges?

cyrian

There were special rules for EU off-shore workers when we were part of the EU but I do not know what the rules are post-Brexit.
I suspect that what Pulaski is saying could be correct.

joey123

Hi,

ah, we thought that he would be out of the country enough to not be classed as resident.... due to his shift pattern... guess ill check this too!!
thanks for the heads up!

Pulaski

You said "off-shore worker", which I assumed you meant "working while offshore" i.e. working from home, in France. But now you mention "shifts", so do you mean he will be returning to the UK to work, or working "offshore" such as merchant mariner or oil rig worker, then taking time off, when not working, in France? If that is the case, for example if he is doing say month-on-month-off, then the question is a whole lot murkier, but I suspect that the French taxing authorities aren't going to tolerate someone working "somewhere outside of France" for half the year, and living in France for almost all the time they're not working without paying income tax in France.

That said, although I know next to nothing about French social charges, I suspect that the French will not allow someone from outside the EU, to settle and live in France without paying the social charges, and income tax at very least, on their non-employment income.

Chatter Static

Are you Clarins or Phytomer trained? obviously having additional certification from bigger known names on top of your fundamental beauty therapy training will go a long way here as will where you trained in the UK. Are you looking to go it alone or work for a company like Beauty Success or Yves Rocher which are franchised beauty stores here. You obviously have larger city places like Galeries Lafayette or Prinrtemp’s in cities Which will be busier more income etc but high living costs. Running costs ie paying tax etc is costly here, it tends as a noob to be an employee for someone else.

Listen Very Carefully

Pulaski has raised some important points about your husbands work.What exact work will he do and how will he do it? For example if he is an employee of a UK company who send him to France to work on a project for a limited period eg construction then special rules will apply.If however he is going to be working in France doing the same work for the same people that he did in the UK then the "rule of bum" applies.ie you are taxed where you are working This means that either the company will have to set up a French business entity or your husband will need to set up one of his own and this will really need to be done before you apply for visas.
If however your husband physically does the work in the UK and returns on a regular basis to do it AND does no work at all in France then all the taxation etc is paid in the UK.I did this for a while pre covid and all that needed to be done was to declare the income on my French tax return.Likewise I know of police officers who lived in the Calais area who would return to the UK to do week of shifts so all their work was done in the UK.. Or if he is involved in maritime or oil rig activities different rules apply so you need to understand the differences so as to stay "en regle" and avoid any problems

EuroTrash

I was assuming "offshore worker" in the usual sense of, on the oil rigs or suchlike.
There did indeed used to be special rules for offshore workers as regards tax, social security etc but I am hazy on what they were and I don't know whether Brexit has had any impact.
I am struggling to get my head round what visa you would apply for if you work offshore for a UK employer, because what actual connection do you have to France, how are you going to mesh with the French system, but then that is why there have to be special rules because offshore workers tend not to be a good fit with the usual rules..