Permis de conduire
One of the hardest things as an expat, living in a country where we are not fluent in the language, is having to deal with lots of unfamiliar systems, and obtain all the relevant paperwork and permits you need to live in a country. Add to that the small matter of Brexit, which still seems to bring changes every week, and the complexity levels double. It can be quite challenging, and involves us in some interesting tasks. It can be difficult to continually ensure we are legal in every aspect. Somehow though, with the help of various very useful websites and forums, I think we manage it.
One such issue is our driving licenses. Brian’s license expires later this year, so under the Brexit agreement we now need to exchange his license for a french one. I cannot do mine as it is still valid, and the rules state only to exchange it on expiry.
To start the application he needed to sign into the ANTS (l’Agence nationale des titres sécurisés) website. To do this he had to have a sign-in from a recognised administrative body. He tried to use his government online identity, but as we are still waiting for our carte vitales (health registration cards), it seems, for some reason, that we’re not able to use that route, because something isn’t completed yet. And that’s one of the complications, it’s not always clear why things won’t work, or what’s needed to complete them. The best option then was to find another, easier way in. We decided the best way was to get our La Poste online presence registered, and use that. Those of you who follow my blog would have seen that we completed that the other day, which included another visit to Bar-sur-Seine to prove who we were by a trip to the post office in person. Our La Poste registration got us into the ANTS website, Hoorah!
Following the instructions we had read from the French Entrée website, we gathered all the materials it said we needed (including taking a rather good digital photo) and started our application. This all came to an abrupt halt at the photo stage, when we were informed we needed to get a ‘certified digital passport photo’ of Brian, not the photo we had taken. So we had to then research where we could get one. Fortunately, after 15 minutes searching, we found that there is a registered studio in Bar-sur-Seine.
Next day, we made a visit to the studio, based at the Intermarché, who very efficiently took the photo, certified it, then provided us a code. We entered the code into the ANTS website, and automatically Brian’s photo was uploaded for his license. It was all rather snazzy actually.
Having used our code, I must say the rest was simple. It is now all complete and we are waiting to be updated on what happens next.
To navigate all these little jobs we use a number of useful online resources. The ones we use, which provide good, useful information, are:
This is the digital magazine I wrote an article for in the first year we arrived in France, the link is here if you are interested to read it. My French entrée article
The UK.Gov website, living in France
Facebook also has a number of useful groups: strictly legal France, expats living in France and strictly santé France