There is no point covering the actual forms, as the Connexion tax guide does this in detail but listing what you need may be useful preparation.
If you are using a tax professional, they may need ‘evidence’ of your income, especially if they are acting as a third party (now a requirement for professionals completing tax declarations) as they are assuming the liability for its accuracy.
This is not designed to be a definitive list but with these to hand life will be much easier.
– All bank statements from January 1 (or date of arrival in France, if you are a new resident)
– Imprimé fiscal unique (IFU), which is a statement of income from your French bank(s)
– Taxable income (revenu imposable) from any assurance vies
– Details of asset sales, such as shares / property
– Details of pension income (noting separately if civil service or military)
– Details of salary (split French from foreign)
– A list of ALL foreign bank accounts: holder’s name, a/c number, address, type (current/savings etc) and usage (personal, business etc)
– For new French residents moving from the UK, a ‘France Individual’ form from HMRC
People doing their first declaration in France need to do it on paper – the declarations become available around mid-May. You must obtain them yourself, unless you are engaging a tax professional to do the declaration. You can collect forms from your local tax office or they can be downloaded from www.impots.gouv.fr.
The main forms are:
– 2042 (the main declaration)
– 2042c (complimentary form for items not covered via the above)
– 2047 (to declare income from outside France)
– 2048 (income from property)
A search bar on the website makes these easy to find, simply type in the numbers.
If this is not your first declaration, then more of you will be obliged to complete online this year. This is no bad thing as the online declarations have improved significantly in recent years.
Use your web browser’s ‘translate’ facility to ease the French. Translations are far from ideal but good enough to understand a tax form.
I would advise you to have everything to hand before you start so the list should be useful.
Note that there are significant penalties for not declaring bank accounts abroad – €1,500 for each account, for each year missed. We strongly recommend you declare every single foreign account ever year. If you open or close an account, it must be listed with the date of opening or closing. This means it is advisable to maintain as few accounts as possible abroad.
The definition of a bank account is very wide, so anything that may potentially hold money; so betting accounts, PayPal, currency cards etc.
We see many people forget to complete the 2047 form, or not wishing to because they think they are somehow declaring the same income twice. The 2047 is essential to know how income should be assessed, whether income should be exempt, receive a credit, not have social charges applied etc. Many people who skip this form are simply paying more tax than they should.
Income is based on when you receive it, not when you earn it – so, the day the money hits your bank account (hence the year’s bank statements tend to be useful to have to hand).
If you have decided to do the declaration yourself, I would suggest downloading last year’s declaration from the website and completing it as fully as you can. Forms rarely change significantly from year to year. There is no point in waiting until May for the new forms and then realising you are out of your depth and searching for help. Many accountants will stop accepting new clients well before May.
Essentially, preparation is key to doing it right: if you have not started it is time to get going.
This column was written by Robert Kent of Kentingtons financial advisers.
See www.kentingtons.com
