u/former_taswegian

Hello,

I recently received my first carte de sejour and thought I'd share my timeline, in case it is of interest to others who may be in a similar situation. I am based in the Annecy area (74). My wife is an EU citizen, I am not (anymore, Brexit 😢)

• 15th January: Arrived France
• 10th April: Applied CdS
• 30th June: Received follow up questions on evidence provided and responded
• 9th July: Received invitation for fingerprinting
• 21st July: Attended finger printing
• 23rd July: Received attestation de decision favorable
• 13th September: Received notification titre de sejour available
• 16th September: Booked appointment
• 9th October: Picked it up

One thing that threw me off a little bit at the picking up appointment was the woman behind the desk asking for my récépissé - which, since I applied online, I did not have. The convocation of the picking up appointment asks for:

• passeport
• dernier titre de séjour et récépissé
• un timbre fiscal à acheter sur le site https://timbres.impots.gouv.fr, le montant du timbre estindiqué sur le SMS que vous avez reçu.

When I looked through this list, I thought, "passport, yep, last TdS and récépissé, well it's my first so I don't need this, timbre fiscale, i'm EU pathway so this is zero. Great, I just need my passport.". But she was very insistent that I provide her with my numero etrangere / attestation de decision favorable.

So, if you're on an EU-family member path, I would suggest bringing a copy of your attestation de decision favorable in lieu of a previous TdS/récépissé when going to pick up your CdS even though it isn't explicitly mentioned in their communications. Hope this helps someone!

Hi there,

I'm an Australian software engineer with many years of experience (> 20) and I've been living in France with my wife since mid-January. My wife is an EU citizen, working as an auto-entrepreneur, and I applied for my carte de sejour on the basis of marriage to an EU citizen in early April. I'm in 74, and my understanding is that Annecy is one of the slowest prefectures to process these applications :-/

I'd like to start looking for work, and I believe that legally I can work, but my understanding is that no French employer will take me on without the correct paperwork. But that could take a very long time...

My most recent experience was 7 years at the Staff level at a FAANG in Bay Area + Seattle, so based on https://www.reddit.com/r/Expats_In_France/comments/1py7ycb/advice_regarding_tech_employment/ I'm relatively confident I'll be able to find a role. Of course nothing is certain in life.

My questions are:

• Has anyone been able to start work while waiting for a CdS as an EU-family member?
• Would swapping to a passeport talent/'french tech visa' be possible, and a faster route to employment, if I found something? Would a company support this? (e.g. my US employer engaged an immigration law firm to handle our E3 visas).
• Is there another route that I'm missing?

Financially I can afford to take the time, but I'd really like to start exploring possibilities now. In the meantime, I'm working on improving my A2 level (from high school 30 years ago) French.