Some things I didn't know about Donation entre Epoux

Legal Advice
21

Yes it is something I can well do without. Thank you for all the kind words. Since I wrote the above, the daughter has sent me another message saying she can’t work out why Fran’s account should pay for the headstone seeing as it is a double plot, waiting for me.

I have explained that the 2 named accounts, Fran’s and mine, are only in individual names for tax purposes, a scheme by the French government to encourage saving, and that Fran’s account once released presumably will have to be emptied and closed. There is no way I want to close my own account by using it for the headstone.

It seems that they simply don’t understand, if only I had known that the notaire sent, or say they sent, these requests on the 4th of July instead of never querying no less than 4 emails that they never got answers from, this could have been all sorted out months ago.

I’ll have a look at that link, thanks @_Brian before I go and see the Notaire to see what my options are.

22

David, if nothing is settled soon it will pass via the Notaire to the dept that deals with Vacant Sucession who will then sit on it for the limit of ten years which is what you have if it has been refused or ignored and then the inheritors decide to re-accept. You need to make them clear on the situation and they will guide you. Whatever happens, it cannot be left in limbo and could prevent you from receiving any monies due to you from bank accounts. Your Notaire sounds very inept and I would actually go and see an Avocat who deals with inheritance issues, they will soon sort it for you and it may not cost a lot to do - my friend got a great deal of help when her ex-hussband cut their joint children from his will after he died and I also had dealings with the vacant sucession dept until we all re-accepted just before the ten year limit.

23

Thank you Shiba, I wa hoping you would appear. :smiley:
I did look at @_Brian’s link but missed the bit about changing horses mid stream. There is a helluva lot on there but will need to read again more slowly and carefully to take it all in.

One thing it mentioned was Notaire’s charges, without going into details. I paid him €50 at our first meeting but no mention has been made about further charges.

One important update from my last post is that, surprisingly, the youngest son in Ireland has answered with attachments of the 3 documents required by the Notaire. I had thought to go to the office myself today but might wait a day or so to see if Sue comes round with hers and Steven’s docs. She might be influenced by Dave’s apparent rapid change of heart but on the other hand it may be that some disagreements have arisen between the 2 in England and Dave in Ireland. I thanked him immediately by email and asked him to urge Sue to follow. So we will see.

Any delay or partial refusal by the 3 will cost me about €4,500 to pay for the headstone but as that is from an account that is frozen and will be mine eventually I am not too bothered about what they get up to. If it remains frozen I will of course lose the balance of about €1,000 as well. Annoying, as we shared everything, including our 2 savings accounts and if we had realised that a death would freeze one, which we had both jointly paid into, we would have closed them years ago. The interest lost would be less than losing it all as may well be the case now.

The advice about an Advocat is noted and kept for possible use if the problems aren’t sorted soon.

But for all married couples here this should be a warning about separate bank accounts. The money you both pay in could conceivably be tied up for years to come.

24

And another opportunity to remind people that even with joint accounts, it’s important to make sure they’re in the name of Monsieur OU Madame (instead of Monsieur ET Madame). Although I suspect all the regulars on this forum are already aware of this.

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25

If you want use a the usual saving accounts - Livret A, LEP, etc. - then those have to be individual.

…or are you suggesting keeping a large amount in one’s (correctly worded) joint account?

26

I was going to suggest a procuration bancaire, but I just read that it expires when you die.

27

Am sure David will answer for himself but am pretty certain he means by all means have separate accounts but be aware there will be a long period where you won’t have access to any accounts that are solely in the name of the deceased spouse. So make sure you have plenty of funds in joint accounts or separate accounts held in your name only.

Partly inspired by David’s experience, I finally attempted today to add my husband’s name to the carte grise. Good grief. I mugged up in advance on gouv.fr on the procedure and thought I was well prepared, with all the necessary justificatifs scanned and saved, ready to be uploaded. Signed into ANTS via FranceConnect and launched the procedure, following the instructions to the letter. Only to come completely unstuck at the supporting docs stage because they didn’t make it clear what they wanted: in one section they asked me to upload “le justificatif du retrait ou de l’ajout d’un cotitulaire” (huh? Which one? At the outset of the process, I was told I would have to supply a recent utility bill, CERFA 13750, the original carte grise, MOT certificate and my ID). But when you actually get to the justificatifs section in the online process, you are initially asked to upload just one document ( “le justificatif du retrait ou de l’ajout d’un cotitulaire”). There is no possibility of uploading more than one. And there is no indication as to WHICH of the 5 documents mentioned at the outset they want at this point.

This was followed by another section, in which I was asked me to upload “autres” supporting docs. Here at least it was possible to upload several.

I’ve submitted the application but will no doubt be contacted soon to tell me I’ve done it wrong. Have since discovered from other random websites (not the official government ones) that by “ le justificatif du retrait ou de l’ajout du cotitulaire” they probably mean a “certificat de cession” in which I effectively “sell” the car to myself and my husband. But if so, why on earth doesn’t the ANTS site explain that?
Who on earth designs these sites? Doesn’t it ever occur to them to roadtest the digital procedures on members of the public before rolling them out?

My French colleagues all said they use a professional garagiste. Fine. If the French state wants to protect jobs and force us to pay professionals. But in that case why make these digital procedures available at all?

Sorry for the rant. The smoke’s still coming out of my nostrils. I’ll have calmed down by tomorrow.

The whole thing was clear as mud.

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28

They do, and if the site is too easy to use they obfuscate it and re-test. :rofl:

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29

Or they’re in cahoots with the wig making industry. I have no hair left.

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30

Exactly. :smiley: It was explained to us by the bank that the individuality of each account was purely so that you could exceed the normal €7,700 (I think) opening deposit. They emphasised that it was just a government authorised gambit to save more money and get more annual interest, but for all intents and purposes, we both had control over both accounts. Either of us could sign without a signature by the other, no matter which account was being reduced. What they failed to say were the vital words 'until death, which then freezes the account completely ‘till the succession is completed.’ So, after Fran died and we had arranged the funeral I went along to transfer the money to pay for it, and was, for the first time, refused access. But, as the law allows for funeral expenses only to be debited direct, it made no difference in the event. It is the remaining €5,000 in there which would be handy to pay for the headstone and surround but with all this delay I might have to pay it from the joint account. I don’t even know if it still attracts interest, I doubt it, but I can’t even check that as I am blocked online from even looking at it.

However, looking at it now, it (and mine), has attracted a lot of interest over the years once we built up to the max allowed in about 2012 so we probably would not have closed them, but it would have been nice to know in order to avoid the mess there is now.

31

Hope you’re calmed! A nice cool bike ride? - prob not. I remember reading on SF that for ANTS ‘retrait’ means you are in receipt of a France pension, not retired. Perhaps earlier in the process you clicked on retrait?

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Hi there Larkswood

Yes, I’ve calmed down a bit now, thanks!
The “retrait” refers to removing a name from the carte grise. As opposed to “ajout” (adding a name).
The online procedure is the same in both cases.

Below is what the service public site says are needed for adding a name as co-titulaire (although the name to be added is my husband, the change is not “suite à un marriage” because the marriage has to have occurred very recently - and I think the fee is waived in that case). Our situation fell under “Autres situations”.

Préparer les documents

Les documents diffèrent selon que l’ajout fait suite à un mariage ou pour un autre motif :

Répondez aux questions successives et les réponses s’afficheront automatiquement

  • Autres situations

Modifier

Si vous voulez ajouter à votre certificat d’immatriculation l’une des personnes suivantes, ce sera considéré comme un changement de titulaire :

  • Enfant
  • Parent
  • Toute autre personne de votre choix (exemple : un ami)

Vous pouvez le faire à tout moment.

Seule l’adresse du titulaire principal sera mentionnée si les 2 personnes n’habitent pas à la même adresse.

Vous devez avoir une copie numérique (photo ou scan) des documents suivants :

I collected all the above documents, ready to upload.
But when you actually get into the online process, they ask for “le justificatif du retrait ou de l’ajout” (ie singular, with no indication as to which document they mean).

There’s no mention anywhere in the ANTS online procedure of “certificat de cession” yet from browsing the sites of various professional garagistes, it seems this is almost certainly what is required. Adding a spouse’s name to a carte grise if the marriage took place some time ago is, it appears, treated as a change of ownership.

I say “it appears” because ANTS never explains this.

I’ve submitted the application and am waiting for them to respond. If it’s all going to be too complicated, I won’t bother. But it would be good to have the car in both names. We live in a city and it’s parked in the street (something else that’s getting more complicated). If I were to die suddenly, my husband would not be permitted to drive it until the estate was settled. Or so I gather.

33

I don’t know, but I suspect that might not be a problem, for instance, I don’t think they turf survivors out on the street if they never got the house, in the case of a recent marriage, put into both names.

The reason I suspect that is because I was asked if our 2 cars were in both names and I said no, just mine. But then they said even so they still came in the same pot as regards the succession.

34

I’d rather not risk it, to be honest.

From what I can gather, if the carte grise is in my name only, in order to be able to continue driving it my husband would need to transfer it into his name before he can drive it.

If it were in both names, he could just continue driving it, with a requirement to remove my name within a certain period.

None of this would be a real problem if we had offroad parking and he had decent French and was good at dealing with paperwork.
Unfortunately none of that is true in our case.
I am seriously coming to the conclusion that we will have to return to the UK at some point because there’s no way he could cope here on his own.

35

I had this problem as the family car CG was in OH name as the dealer dealt with him on the car loan and used his name only. After his death, I went to the prefecture with three attestations (the children who were heirs and our notaire confirming this) and death certificate and at a small cost they issued me a new CG on the spot in my name only. It is obligatory with a vehicle if it is in deceased name on the CG plus autorisation to do so.

36

Apologies for my wrong guess. I hope you get this sorted - did John Scully have thread on doing something similar with a car?The good advice takeaway I’m getting is always have things in both names…

37

Hi Shiba
If only one could still toddle along to the Prefecture and talk to a human. They don’t deal with carte grise stuff any more.

38

Definitely best to have things in both names.
I will know for next time, when we come to buy a vehicle.

39

No, it was in 2012 and so much easier to drive 45mins in to Brest and do it in person. I hate with a vengeance all these online registration sites for everything now, they are more trouble than they are worth and do not save time nor jobs for that matter.

40

I don’t mind if they work. But so often, as in this case, they don’t.
Am hoping this is just a transition phase and that, in a couple of years, all the clunkiness will have been ironed out and we’ll have nice, user-friendly processes.

Am going to be so embarrassed now if ANTS turns round in a couple of days and issues me with a new, duly updated carte grise…

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