Since Brexit, a British citizen who wants to spend more than three months a year in France lives under a completely different legal regime from the one that applied before 1 January 2021. The 90-days-in-any-180-day visa-free allowance covers short stays only. As the British government itself warns its nationals, you can travel without a visa to the Schengen area, which includes France, for up to 90 days in any 180-day period, and if you overstay the 90-day visa-free limit, you may be banned from entering Schengen countries for up to 3 years. To stay longer than 90 days, you must meet the French government’s entry requirements. For the retired Briton settling in the Dordogne, the second-home owner who wants to spend the whole winter in Provence, or the Briton living on rental income, dividends or a private pension who has no French employer to sponsor a work permit, the standard answer is the long-stay visitor route: the visa de long séjour valant titre de séjour (VLS-TS, the long-stay visa that counts as a residence permit) endorsed visiteur (visitor), renewable in France as a carte de séjour temporaire mention visiteur (one-year temporary residence card as a visitor). This guide explains, in plain English and with every French term defined at first use, who qualifies, what papers prove it, how the online validation works after arrival, and what to do when the consulate or the appeals commission says no. Every decisive point is tied to the exact article or court decision that proves it.
I. How does a British citizen obtain a French long-stay visitor visa after Brexit?
A. Who is the visitor route for, and what three promises must your file prove?
French law starts from a blunt rule. Under Article L312-2 of the CESEDA (the Code de l’entrée et du séjour des étrangers et du droit d’asile, the code governing entry and residence of foreign nationals), “Tout étranger souhaitant entrer en France en vue d’y séjourner pour une durée supérieure à trois mois doit solliciter auprès des autorités diplomatiques et consulaires françaises un visa de long séjour dont la durée de validité ne peut être supérieure à un an. Ce visa peut autoriser un séjour de plus de trois mois à caractère familial, en qualité de visiteur, d’étudiant, de stagiaire ou au titre d’une activité professionnelle, et plus généralement tout type de séjour d’une durée supérieure à trois mois conférant à son titulaire les droits attachés à une carte de séjour temporaire ou à la carte de séjour pluriannuelle prévue aux articles L. 421-9, L. 421-11 et L. 421-13-1 à L. 421-24.” In short: any stay beyond three months needs a long-stay visa obtained before leaving the United Kingdom, from the French diplomatic or consular authorities, and the visitor flavour of that visa exists precisely for people who will live in France on their own means. The visitor route is the natural home of British retirees drawing a UK State Pension topped up by private pensions, second-home owners who want six or nine months in their French house, and Britons living on investment or rental income. It is not a work route, not a study route and not a family route: each of those has its own visa, and applying under the wrong heading is one of the commonest reasons files fail.
Once the principle is clear, the file must prove three things, and the statute states them in one sentence. Under Article L426-20 of the CESEDA, “L’étranger qui apporte la preuve qu’il peut vivre de ses seules ressources, dont le montant doit être au moins égal au salaire minimum de croissance net annuel, indépendamment de l’allocation aux adultes handicapés mentionnée à l’article L. 821-1 du code de la sécurité sociale et de l’allocation supplémentaire mentionnée à l’article L. 815-24 du même code, se voit délivrer une carte de séjour temporaire portant la mention ” visiteur ” d’une durée d’un an. Il doit en outre justifier de la possession d’une assurance maladie couvrant la durée de son séjour et prendre l’engagement de n’exercer en France aucune activité professionnelle. Par dérogation à l’article L. 414-10, cette carte n’autorise pas l’exercice d’une activité professionnelle. Les conditions d’application du présent article sont précisées par décret en Conseil d’Etat.” Three conditions, then: own resources at least equal to the annual net SMIC (the salaire minimum de croissance, the French statutory minimum wage), comprehensive health insurance covering the whole stay, and a signed undertaking not to work in France. The administration’s own guidance puts flesh on the resources figure: the official service-public.fr page for the visitor card states that the minimum amount of resources required for a single person is €1,477.93 net monthly, over one year, alongside health insurance covering the duration of the stay and a bar on any work in France whether as an employee, trader, self-employed person, craft worker or member of a liberal profession. Treat that monthly figure as the floor for a single applicant, not the target: consulates look at the stability and regularity of the income, and a file showing twelve months of pension slips, bank statements and tax notices beats a file showing a single healthy balance.
The resources test deserves a closer look, because British files fail it in predictable ways. The regulations allow the applicant to prove means of subsistence in several forms. Article R313-2 of the CESEDA provides that “Afin de justifier qu’il possède les moyens d’existence lui permettant de faire face à ses frais de séjour, l’étranger qui sollicite son admission en France peut notamment présenter des espèces, des chèques de voyage, des chèques certifiés, des cartes de paiement à usage international ou des lettres de crédit. La validité des justificatifs énumérés au premier alinéa est appréciée compte tenu des déclarations de l’intéressé relatives à la durée et à l’objet de son séjour ainsi que des pièces produites à l’appui de ces déclarations et, le cas échéant, de la durée de validité du visa.” Cash, traveller’s cheques, certified cheques, international payment cards, letters of credit: all are admissible, but each is weighed against the declared length and purpose of the stay. For a British retiree, the strongest file layers UK State Pension and private pension award letters, twelve months of bank statements showing the money actually landing, the latest UK tax calculation, and, where the pension alone looks thin, savings presented as a supplement rather than the whole story. For a second-home owner relying on rental income from a UK property, add the tenancy agreement and rental accounts. What never works is the informal top-up: money paid in cash by family members, undeclared transfers, or a child’s offer to “cover anything missing” will not count as the applicant’s own resources, and, as the case law below shows, insisting on family support can push the file into the wrong visa category altogether.
Health insurance is the second pillar, and British applicants misunderstand it more than any other requirement. The statute demands insurance “couvrant la durée de son séjour”, covering the whole stay, and the appeals commission routinely refuses files where the policy covers only emergency care, excludes repatriation, or expires mid-stay. Since Brexit, the European Health Insurance Card issued in the UK (and its successor, the Global Health Insurance Card) does not satisfy a long-stay visitor application: those cards cover medically necessary care during temporary stays, not a year of residence. Buy a dedicated long-stay policy with explicit medical, hospitalisation and repatriation cover for France, for the full visa period, and keep the certificate showing the dates and ceilings. Note the related entry rule that frames the whole file: as recalled in recent case law from Article L311-1 of the CESEDA, a foreign national must hold not only the visa but the supporting documents on the purpose and conditions of the stay, on means of subsistence where relevant, on cover by an approved insurer for medical and hospital costs including social assistance, and on guarantees of repatriation. The visa interview is the moment to lay all of that on the table, not the border crossing months later.
The third pillar, the undertaking not to work, is absolute and catches out more Britons than any other condition. The visitor card does not authorise any professional activity “par dérogation”, by exception to the normal rule that residence cards allow work. Remote work for a UK employer from a French farmhouse, freelance consultancy invoiced to London clients, running a gîte (a furnished holiday let) as a business rather than letting one property passively: all of these breach the undertaking. If you intend to work in any form, apply for the right route (employee, self-employed, entrepreneur) instead. A visitor file that smells of disguised work ends in refusal, and the refusal stamp then poisons the next application. Accommodation evidence completes the picture: title deeds (titre de propriété) for owners, a twelve-month lease for tenants, or a duly validated hosting certificate (attestation d’accueil) for guests, plus evidence the address is real and habitable. Owners should add the latest taxe foncière (property ownership tax) bill: it proves ownership, occupation and seriousness in a single page.
B. How do you apply in London, validate after arrival, and renew the card in France?
The application starts online and ends at an appointment in the United Kingdom. British residents apply through the France-Visas portal and then attend a TLScontact centre in London, Manchester or Edinburgh, where biometrics are taken and the file is lodged. From the moment the file is lodged, the administration owes you a paper trail. Article R312-2 of the CESEDA states that “La demande d’un visa pour un séjour d’une durée supérieure à trois mois donne lieu à la délivrance par les autorités diplomatiques et consulaires d’une attestation de demande indiquant la date du dépôt de la demande.” Keep that receipt (récépissé or attestation de demande): the filing date it records is the starting point for every later deadline, including the two-month period after which silence on the mandatory administrative appeal counts as rejection. Expect the standard supporting bundle: passport valid well beyond the stay, the long-stay application form, photographs to the French standard, proof of the three pillars above (resources, insurance, no-work undertaking), proof of accommodation, and the visa fee. Answer every question on the form exactly as the bank statements show: declared length, declared address and declared resources must match the documents, because the regulations instruct the officer to assess each proof against the applicant’s own declarations.
Two different visas can come back, and confusing them causes real damage. The standard grant is the VLS-TS visiteur: a visa valid four to twelve months that counts as a residence permit from the day you validate it online, with no trip to the préfecture (the state authority in each département that handles immigration files) needed during its first year. The alternative bears the endorsement carte de séjour à solliciter dans les deux mois suivant l’arrivée (residence card to be applied for within two months of arrival) and obliges you to attend the préfecture promptly for a separate card. Read the sticker the day the passport comes back: the endorsement printed on it decides your first steps in France. For VLS-TS holders, the decisive deadline runs from entry. Article R431-17 of the CESEDA provides that “Les visas mentionnés aux 6° à 18° de l’article R. 431-16 permettent à leur titulaire de séjourner en France au-delà d’une période de trois mois et dans les limites de durée mentionnées au même article, à la condition que l’intéressé, dans un délai de trois mois à compter de la date de son entrée en France, déclare notamment la date de cette entrée et le domicile qui y est le sien, au moyen d’un téléservice, dans les conditions prévues par arrêté du ministre chargé de l’immigration.” Within three months of arrival, declare your entry date and home address on the official online service and pay the validation fee that is added to the visa fee: the administration’s own guidance confirms that within three months of arrival you must validate the VLS-TS and pay that fee, and that completing the online step keeps the stay lawful and preserves the right to cross Schengen borders. Miss the three-month window and the visa’s residence effect lapses: you become unlawfully present even though the sticker in the passport has not expired, which is exactly the trap that filled the dockets of the validation litigation of recent years.
The VLS-TS year is only the first chapter. The system is built around two complementary categories that applicants should understand together. Article R431-16 of the CESEDA organises the exemptions from applying for a residence card, including, at its item 3, “Les étrangers séjournant en France sous couvert d’un visa d’une durée supérieure à trois mois et inférieure ou égale à douze mois comportant la mention ” dispense temporaire de carte de séjour “, pendant la durée de validité de ce visa”, foreign nationals staying under a visa of more than three and up to twelve months endorsed temporary exemption from a residence card. The VLS-TS visiteur works on the mirror principle: no card is needed while the validated visa runs, but anyone who wishes to stay on must apply before it expires. Article R431-18 of the CESEDA then sets the renewal path: “Les étrangers mentionnés aux 6° à 11° et 13° à 18° de l’article R. 431-16 qui souhaitent se maintenir en France au-delà des limites de durée mentionnées au même article sollicitent une carte de séjour temporaire ou une carte de séjour pluriannuelle dans les conditions fixées au 1° de l’article R. 431-5. Ils doivent en outre justifier avoir accompli les formalités prévues à l’article R. 431-17 et remplir les conditions sanitaires pour être admis à séjourner en France par la production d’un certificat médical délivré dans les conditions fixées par arrêté conjoint du ministère chargé de la santé et du ministre chargé de l’immigration.” In practice the British visitor applies at the préfecture of the home address, two to four months before the VLS-TS expires, for the one-year carte de séjour visiteur, reproving the three pillars with fresh documents: updated resources, renewed insurance, and the medical certificate issued by the OFII (the Office français de l’immigration et de l’intégration, the state office handling reception and medical checks). Keep every validation confirmation, every OFII summons and every receipt: renewal files are refused far more often for missing proof that the first year’s formalities were completed than for any change in the applicant’s means.
A final practical warning before refusals are discussed: never try to fix a weak file by entering visa-free and applying from inside France. The long-stay visa must be sought from the consulate before departure, and a préfecture will not regularise a British visitor who arrived as a tourist and then decided to stay, outside narrow humanitarian exceptions that do not cover convenience. Overstaying the 90-day allowance while “waiting to sort the papers” combines unlawful presence with the Schengen ban risk described above, and it hands the administration a public-order ground that will follow every later application. The lawful sequence is rigid and must be respected in order: consulate first, entry, online validation within three months, then préfecture renewal before expiry. Each step proved by its receipt, each receipt kept.
II. What happens when France refuses the visitor visa, and how do you challenge the refusal?
A. Why do visitor files fail, and what does the mandatory appeal to the visa commission change?
Visitor refusals cluster around the same three findings, and understanding them is the key to both avoiding and challenging them. The leading recent illustration is a decision of the administrative court of appeal of Nantes concerning a long-stay visitor application refused first by the consulate and then by the appeals commission. In CAA Nantes, 6th chamber, 24 June 2025, No 24NT01732, the court restated the governing principle in terms every British applicant should memorise: “L’étranger désirant se rendre en France et qui sollicite un visa de long séjour en qualité de visiteur doit justifier de la nécessité dans laquelle il se trouve de résider en France pour un séjour de plus de trois mois.” The applicant must show a genuine need to reside in France for more than three months. The court continued: “les autorités françaises, saisies d’une telle demande, disposent, sous le contrôle du juge de l’excès de pouvoir, d’un large pouvoir d’appréciation et peuvent se fonder non seulement sur des motifs tenant à l’ordre public, tel que le détournement de l’objet du visa, mais aussi sur toute considération d’intérêt général.” A wide discretion, reviewed only for manifest error: the consulate may rely not only on public-order grounds such as misuse of the visa’s purpose, but on any general-interest consideration. And crucially: “La commission de recours contre les décisions de refus de visa d’entrée en France peut légalement fonder sa décision de refus sur les motifs tirés de ce que le demandeur ne justifie pas disposer des moyens d’existence suffisants pour faire face aux dépenses liées à son séjour en France ou posséder une assurance maladie couvrant la durée de son séjour.” Insufficient means of subsistence and missing health insurance are lawful refusal grounds in themselves. In that case the applicant, a Moroccan pensioner invoking support from his French-national daughter, was refused because his own regular resources were insufficient and his insurance did not cover the whole stay; the court upheld the refusal, adding that family support arguments belong to a different visa category and that short-stay visas previously enjoyed do not create any right to a long-stay one. Replace Morocco with the United Kingdom and the lesson is identical: the visitor visa tests the applicant’s own autonomous resources and insurance, and a British retiree whose pension is topped up informally by children, or whose insurance covers only emergencies, will fail on exactly these two findings.
When the refusal arrives, the first remedy is not the court but a mandatory administrative appeal, and skipping it kills the case. Article D312-3 of the CESEDA establishes that “Une commission placée auprès du ministre des affaires étrangères et du ministre de l’intérieur est chargée d’examiner les recours administratifs contre les décisions de refus de visa de long séjour prises par les autorités diplomatiques ou consulaires. Le sous-directeur des visas, au sein de la direction générale des étrangers en France du ministère de l’intérieur, est chargé d’examiner les recours administratifs contre les décisions de refus de visa de court séjour prises par les autorités diplomatiques ou consulaires. La saisine de l’une ou l’autre de ces autorités, selon la nature du visa sollicité, est un préalable obligatoire à l’exercice d’un recours contentieux, à peine d’irrecevabilité de ce dernier.” For a long-stay visitor refusal, the appeal goes to the CRRV (the commission de recours contre les décisions de refus de visa d’entrée en France, the commission for appeals against visa-refusal decisions), and going to the administrative court without it means the claim is thrown out as inadmissible. File the CRRV appeal by registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt within two months of the consulate’s refusal, attach everything the consulate said was missing plus a short letter answering each ground, and keep the acknowledgement: it proves the date from which the commission’s two-month silence counts.
Silence has a precise legal meaning here, clarified at the highest level. Article D312-8-1 of the CESEDA provides that “En l’absence de décision explicite prise dans le délai de deux mois, le recours administratif exercé devant les autorités mentionnées aux articles D. 312-3 et D. 312-7 est réputé rejeté pour les mêmes motifs que ceux de la décision contestée. L’administration en informe le demandeur dans l’accusé de réception de son recours.” No express answer within two months means an implied rejection that adopts the consulate’s reasons, and the administration must warn you of that mechanism in the acknowledgement of receipt. The Council of State confirmed the consequences in a published opinion of 21 April 2023. In CE, opinion, 21 April 2023, No 468836, published in the Lebon reports, the court held that “Les décisions des autorités consulaires portant refus d’une demande de visa doivent être motivées en vertu des dispositions de l’article L. 211-2 du code des relations entre le public et l’administration. Il en va de même pour les décisions de rejet des recours administratifs préalables obligatoires formés contre ces décisions.” Both the consular refusal and the rejection of the mandatory prior appeal must state their legal and factual reasons in writing. Where the commission rejects implicitly, “cette décision implicite, qui se substitue à la décision initiale, doit être regardée comme s’étant appropriée les motifs de la décision initiale”: the implied decision takes over the initial decision’s reasons, provided the applicant was warned of that appropriation. And the opinion adds a weapon for the administration that applicants must anticipate: “Le mécanisme d’appropriation des motifs ne fait pas obstacle à ce que l’administration puisse faire valoir devant le juge un ou plusieurs autres motifs et que le juge fasse droit, dans les conditions de droit commun, à cette demande de substitution de motifs dès lors que celle-ci ne prive pas le requérant d’une garantie procédurale liée au motif substitué.” The minister may ask the judge to substitute a fresh ground, and the judge will allow it unless it deprives the applicant of a procedural safeguard attached to that ground. Concretely: if the consulate refused for missing insurance and the file still shows irregular income, expect the ministry’s defence to add the resources ground before the court, and build the CRRV appeal to cure every weakness, not just the one printed on the refusal.
B. How do you take the refusal to court, and what mistakes destroy an otherwise winnable case?
The court stage belongs to a single courthouse. All challenges to CRRV decisions go to the administrative tribunal of Nantes (the tribunal administratif de Nantes), whether the applicant lives in Kent or in Cannes, and the claim must arrive within the standard public-law time limit. Article R421-1 of the Code of Administrative Justice states that “La juridiction ne peut être saisie que par voie de recours formé contre une décision, et ce, dans les deux mois à partir de la notification ou de la publication de la décision attaquée.” Two months from notification of the commission’s express rejection, or from the implied rejection born of its two-month silence. Where the commission never answered, first ask for the reasons of the implied decision and remember the opinion’s guidance: an applicant who never requested those reasons cannot usefully complain about defective reasoning, while an applicant facing a reasoned consular decision may attack its inadequacy directly before the judge. The claim asks for annulment (annulation) of the refusal and, joined to it, an injunction (injonction) ordering the minister to issue the visa or at least to re-examine the file within a stated time, if necessary under a daily penalty (astreinte). Judges grant re-examination far more readily than they order issuance: the wide discretion recalled by the Nantes court means the judge censures manifest errors and legal mistakes but does not step into the consulate’s shoes.
Three arguments carry real weight, and three illusions waste money. The strong arguments are, first, defective reasoning: a refusal that cites no article and no fact, or a commission decision that adds new grounds without any examination, falls under the motivation rule confirmed by the Council of State. Second, factual error on resources or insurance: twelve months of pension credits, a tax notice and a full-year policy with stated ceilings can turn an “insufficient means” finding into a manifest error of assessment (erreur manifeste d’appréciation), the standard the Nantes court applied before upholding the refusal in the case above. Third, genuine procedural breach: a file examined under the wrong heading (visitor instead of family member, or the reverse), or a decision taken on a ground the applicant was never given a chance to answer. The illusions are the mirror image. Previous short-stay visas create no entitlement to a long stay, as the Nantes judgment shows. Family presence in France helps only within the matching category: a British parent supported by French-resident children should examine the ascendant route rather than dressing dependency as visitor autonomy, because the visitor test measures the applicant’s own means. And Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the right to private and family life) protects an established family life, not the wish to spend longer in a holiday home: the Nantes court rejected the Article 8 plea precisely because the applicant had visited France on short stays, could receive visits at home, and showed no obstacle to family life continuing at a distance.
Two traps specific to British files deserve emphasis. The first is the renewal refusal at the préfecture. A validated VLS-TS does not guarantee the one-year visitor card: the préfecture re-tests resources and insurance with fresh documents, verifies that the online validation was completed within the three-month window, and checks the medical certificate. A retiree whose pound-denominated pension dipped below the SMIC threshold after a bad exchange year, or who let the insurance lapse in month eleven, can be refused renewal and face an order to leave. Keep the file evergreen: renew the policy before it expires, keep statements flowing into the same account, and file the renewal two to four months before expiry so that the receipt (récépissé) covers any processing delay. The second trap is working “a little” on a visitor status. A British owner who starts managing gîtes full-time, takes on French clients, or draws a salary from a French company while holding a visitor card risks not only refusal at renewal but withdrawal of the card and an obligation to leave French territory (OQTF, obligation de quitter le territoire français). If the life project changes, change the status first through the proper work or business route rather than stretching the visitor undertaking until it snaps.
For British readers based in Paris and Île-de-France, one organisational note matters: renewals and status questions for the capital region run through the Paris préfecture de police and the surrounding département préfectures, whose visitor counters work strictly by appointment with local processing times that lengthen each autumn. Book the renewal slot the day the two-to-four-month window opens, bring originals plus one full copy set, and arrive with the validation confirmation printed: Paris counters check the three-month validation systematically, and a missing confirmation means a second appointment months later. Wherever in France the file sits, the discipline is the same: every step proved by its receipt, every receipt kept, every deadline counted from the paper, never from memory.
Conclusion
The long-stay visitor route is France’s standing offer to Britons who can support themselves: no employer, no family sponsor and no investment threshold, only three proven facts — autonomous resources at least equal to the annual net minimum wage, health insurance covering the whole stay, and a genuine undertaking not to work. The consulate grants it, the online validation within three months of arrival activates it, and the préfecture renews it year after year for files that stay clean. Refusals obey the same logic in reverse: insufficient means, missing insurance, or a file examined under the wrong heading, reviewed by the CRRV within two months and then, if needed, by the administrative tribunal of Nantes within a further two months, with the Council of State’s reasoning rules guarding the procedure. British applicants win these cases the same way they win the visa itself: with bank statements that match the declarations, a policy that covers the full period, an address that is real, and a paper trail for every step. Build that file before the consulate appointment, not after the refusal, and the year in France stops being a gamble and becomes an administrative routine.
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