Your father lived in London all his life, helped your brother with the deposit on a Manchester flat nine years ago, gave you nothing comparable, and has now died leaving an English will that leaves almost everything to his second wife plus a holiday flat near Antibes. At the first meeting the French notaire, the regulated legal officer who settles successions in France, tells you three things you did not expect: the Manchester deposit will be added back to the French tax computation because it is less than fifteen years old, you must equalise it with your brother in the partition unless the gift was expressly made as an extra, and the English will cannot, as to assets governed by French law, give the children less than their reserved portion. This guide explains, on the texts in force on 2 October 2026, how lifetime gifts made in Britain re-enter a French succession, how equality between siblings is restored, what the reserved portion guarantees children against an English will, which court hears each claim when the deceased died in England, and how to challenge the tax bill that results. It is written entirely for a British reader, every French term is explained at first use, and every decisive proposition is tied to the official text it comes from. Where the dispute is instead about the notaire’s own invoice, the regulated fee and how to have it taxed down are treated in the companion analysis of the succession bill (French notaire succession bill: how the regulated fee is calculated and challenged). No two families are identical, and only the court hearing your case decides that case.

The starting point is the reach of French succession duty when the deceased was domiciled outside France. The French embassy in London summarises the domestic scope on its official pages: French succession duty reaches immovable property and tangible movable property situated in France, business assets operated in France, and shares and similar rights issued by French companies with their seat in France, even where the deceased never lived in France. The same official summary adds that bonds issued by French companies and French State securities bear no such duty, and that where both the deceased and the beneficiary were domiciled abroad, foreign securities generally escape the French charge. Alongside this domestic scope sits the convention between France and the United Kingdom for the avoidance of double taxation on death, whose official text is published by the French tax administration (official text of the France United Kingdom succession convention on impots.gouv.fr). That convention, whose stated purpose is the avoidance of double taxation on death between the two States, does not remove the French charge on the French flat; it organises relief so the same value is not fully taxed twice. Gifts made in Britain enter this picture through two different doors, the tax door and the family door, and confusing them is the most expensive mistake British heirs make. The paragraphs below take each door in turn, then the shield that protects children against a will written under English assumptions, including the points that matter specifically in Paris and the Ile-de-France region.

I. London gifts and the French succession: the fifteen-year adding back and equality between siblings

A. Which British gifts the French tax return brings back within fifteen years

French tax law looks backwards as well as sideways. When the notaire draws up the déclaration de succession, the detailed return of everything taxable in France, every lifetime gift by the deceased to the heirs within the last fifteen years is added back to the computation. Article 784 of the Code général des impôts, the French tax code, requires the parties to disclose earlier gifts in every deed and every succession return, and provides that assessment adds the value of property given away earlier to the property in the return, with the exact words “à l’exception de celles passées depuis plus de quinze ans” (official text of Article 784 of the Code général des impôts). Rappel fiscal is the French name for this adding back. A cash gift wired from London to a child eight years before death is therefore added to the French-taxable share for computing the progressive bands and for using up allowances, even though the money sits in a British account and even though no French notaire handled the gift. Gifts older than fifteen years drop out entirely. The practical consequence is a paper hunt covering a decade and a half: list every gift, advance, school-fee payment, and deposit contribution by the deceased, with dates, amounts in sterling converted at the rate of the day, and bank proof, because an undisclosed gift discovered later costs the allowance, the correct band, and penalties, while a disclosed old gift costs nothing.

The filing that carries these figures obeys its own clock. Article 641 of the same code provides: “Les délais pour l’enregistrement des déclarations que les héritiers, donataires ou légataires ont à souscrire des biens à eux échus ou transmis par décès sont :” (official text of Article 641 of the Code général des impôts). It then sets two limbs: “De six mois, à compter du jour du décès, lorsque celui dont on recueille la succession est décédé en France métropolitaine;” and “D’une année, dans tous les autres cas.” In every other case, including a death in London, Manchester, or Edinburgh, the heirs have one year from the day of death to file and pay, and interest for late payment runs automatically once the year expires. The return itself is mandatory in almost every British case. Article 800 states: “Les héritiers, légataires ou donataires, leurs tuteurs ou curateurs, sont tenus de souscrire une déclaration détaillée.” (official text of Article 800 of the Code général des impôts). The same article dispenses direct-line heirs, the surviving spouse, and the partner in a pacte civil de solidarité, the French registered partnership known as a PACS, only where the gross estate is below 50,000 euros and no undeclared lifetime gift was received, and other beneficiaries only below 3,000 euros. A French flat on its own almost always exceeds these thresholds, so a British heir to French property always files, and always within the year. The official service-public.fr guidance confirms the filing logic and the proof-of-status rules in English (service-public.fr page on inheritance tax exemption, verified 13 May 2026).

The added-back gifts then meet the rate tables and the allowances. Article 777 opens the tables with this sentence: “Les droits de mutation à titre gratuit sont fixés aux taux indiqués dans les tableaux ci-après, pour la part nette revenant à chaque ayant droit :” (official text of Article 777 of the Code général des impôts). Droits de mutation à titre gratuit means transfer duties on gifts and deaths; part nette means the net share after allowances and debts. In the direct line the rate climbs from 5 per cent on the first slice up to 45 per cent beyond 1,805,677 euros, applied slice by slice rather than as a single rate on the whole share. Between brothers and sisters the same article applies 35 per cent up to 24,430 euros and 45 per cent above, then 55 per cent for relatives up to the fourth degree and 60 per cent beyond that and between non-relatives. Before the rates bite, allowances called abattements reduce each share. Article 779 provides: “il est effectué un abattement de 100 000 € sur la part de chacun des ascendants et sur la part de chacun des enfants vivants ou représentés par suite de prédécès ou de renonciation.” (official text of Article 779 of the Code général des impôts). Each child therefore takes the first 100,000 euros of their French-taxable share free of duty, but earlier gifts within fifteen years have already used up part of that shelter, which is why the Manchester deposit pushes the French flat into higher bands. The same article grants 159,325 euros to any disabled heir, 15,932 euros to each brother or sister, and 7,967 euros to each nephew or niece. The surviving spouse stands apart: the official service-public.fr guidance states, under the heading for the spouse of the deceased, “You are exempt from inheritance tax.” (service-public.fr page on inheritance tax exemption, verified 13 May 2026). Three computations should therefore be checked on every bill: were all sub-fifteen-year British gifts included, was each allowance applied once and only once, and was each progressive slice recomputed after the adding back.

B. How siblings restore equality when the notaire divides the estate

The tax adding back has a civil twin that operates between the heirs themselves. Where one child received a London deposit and another received nothing, French law treats the first child as already advanced part of their inheritance. Article 843 of the Code civil, the French civil code, states: “Tout héritier, même ayant accepté à concurrence de l’actif, venant à une succession, doit rapporter à ses cohéritiers tout ce qu’il a reçu du défunt, par donations entre vifs, directement ou indirectement ; il ne peut retenir les dons à lui faits par le défunt, à moins qu’ils ne lui aient été faits expressément hors part successorale.” (official text of Article 843 of the Code civil). Rapport means this bringing back into the common mass; hors part successorale means expressly outside the heir’s share, as an extra. English families rarely document the distinction, because English law has no equivalent default rule, so the French partition reopens what everyone thought was settled: silence in the paperwork means the gift counts inside the share, and the favoured sibling takes less of the French assets to compensate the others. If such gifts exist, gather the transfer records now and check whether any deed or letter states the gift was made expressly outside the share; without those words, equality is restored by figures, not by memories.

The mechanism only works if the heirs are properly identified and the mass correctly composed. Article 724 of the Code civil states: “Les héritiers désignés par la loi sont saisis de plein droit des biens, droits et actions du défunt.” (official text of Article 724 of the Code civil). Saisine means the heirs step automatically into the property, rights, and claims of the deceased, with the rents and the risks from the day of death, which is why the Antibes flat must be insured immediately even while the family argues. Acceptance can be pure and simple, acceptance up to the net assets, known as acceptation à concurrence de l’actif net, or renunciation, and a sibling worried about unknown French debts should choose the limited route before signing anything unconditional. Proof of status passes through the acte de notoriété, the deed by which the notaire certifies who the heirs are. Article 730-1 provides: “La preuve de la qualité d’héritier peut résulter d’un acte de notoriété dressé par un notaire, à la demande d’un ou plusieurs ayants droit.” (official text of Article 730-1 of the Code civil). The same article requires the deed to cite the death certificate, to mention the supporting documents, and to contain the signed statement of the claimants. For a British family this is where the English paperwork enters: the UK death certificate, the English grant of probate or letters of administration, and any English will arrive with a sworn translation and, in most cases, an apostille, the international authentication stamp. The British government explains the legalisation route on its official pages (GOV.UK guidance on getting a document legalised). French banks holding the deceased’s French accounts will in practice refuse to release funds without the acte de notoriété, so pressing the bank directly while the file is incomplete wastes the months the one-year deadline does not give you.

Where siblings cannot agree on what was given, the argument is won with documents, not with testimony about family intentions. The fifteen-year bank history of the deceased, the completion statement of the Manchester purchase showing the source of the deposit, the deceased’s English tax returns, and any letter accompanying the gift form the core bundle. A gift routed through a joint account, a mortgage paid off directly, or school fees settled from the deceased’s account all count as indirect gifts within the article quoted above. Conversely, ordinary maintenance and small customary presents do not enter the mass, but the line between a customary present and an advance on inheritance is drawn by amount and context, and a house deposit never falls on the customary side. In Paris and the Ile-de-France region, where the French asset is often a high-value flat and the British gifts are also large, the equalisation arithmetic decides who keeps the flat and who receives compensation, known as a soulte, so commissioning an independent valuation of the French property at the date of death, with comparable sales, is part of the sibling file as much as of the tax file. Set out the full gift history at the first notaire meeting rather than waiting for the draft partition: figures disclosed early are negotiated, figures discovered late are litigated.

II. When the English will cuts out the children: the reserved portion and the right court

A. What the reserved portion guarantees children against an English will

An English will that leaves everything to a second spouse and nothing to the children of a first marriage collides, as to assets governed by French law, with a protection English law does not know. Article 912 of the Code civil defines it: “La réserve héréditaire est la part des biens et droits successoraux dont la loi assure la dévolution libre de charges à certains héritiers dits réservataires, s’ils sont appelés à la succession et s’ils l’acceptent.” (official text of Article 912 of the Code civil). Réserve héréditaire means the reserved portion; héritiers réservataires means the protected heirs, in practice the children and, failing children, the surviving spouse in certain configurations. It adds: “La quotité disponible est la part des biens et droits successoraux qui n’est pas réservée par la loi et dont le défunt a pu disposer librement par des libéralités.” Quotité disponible means the freely disposable portion; libéralités means gifts and legacies. Article 913 then fixes the fractions: “Les libéralités, soit par actes entre vifs, soit par testament, ne pourront excéder la moitié des biens du disposant, s’il ne laisse à son décès qu’un enfant ; le tiers, s’il laisse deux enfants ; le quart, s’il en laisse trois ou un plus grand nombre.” (official text of Article 913 of the Code civil). With two children, only one third of the French-governed assets may go to the second wife; the rest is theirs by law, whatever the English will says.

The excess is corrected through the action en réduction, the claim that reduces excessive gifts to the disposable portion. Article 924 states its effect: “Lorsque la libéralité excède la quotité disponible, le gratifié, successible ou non successible, doit indemniser les héritiers réservataires à concurrence de la portion excessive de la libéralité, quel que soit cet excédent.” (official text of Article 924 of the Code civil). British readers should note the remedy carefully: it is compensation in money, an indemnité de réduction, not recovery of the Antibes flat itself. The donee keeps the property and pays the children the excess value, which often leads to a sale or a compensation arrangement rather than a transfer. Readers who made, or inherited under, an English will choosing English law for the whole succession should read the companion analysis of that choice and of the reserved-portion dispute it can still provoke (British will and French house: choosing English law and challenging a blocked succession). Lifetime gifts and legacies are combined when measuring the excess: the Manchester deposit, the legacies to the spouse, and any other liberality are totalled against the disposable fraction, so the gift history assembled for the tax file serves the réserve file too.

One cross-border refinement matters specifically after Brexit. Where the deceased chose English law, or English law applies, and that law offers children no reserved-portion mechanism, French law gives children a compensating deduction from assets situated in France, but only where the deceased or at least one child was, at death, a national of a European Union Member State or habitually resident there. Article 913 provides: “Lorsque le défunt ou au moins l’un de ses enfants est, au moment du décès, ressortissant d’un Etat membre de l’Union européenne ou y réside habituellement et lorsque la loi étrangère applicable à la succession ne permet aucun mécanisme réservataire protecteur des enfants, chaque enfant ou ses héritiers ou ses ayants cause peuvent effectuer un prélèvement compensatoire sur les biens existants situés en France au jour du décès, de façon à être rétablis dans les droits réservataires que leur octroie la loi française, dans la limite de ceux-ci.” (official text of Article 913 of the Code civil). Prélèvement compensatoire means a compensating deduction taken from the French assets. A family where everyone was exclusively British and habitually resident in England may fall outside this safety net, which makes the drafting of the will and the choice of applicable law decisive rather than decorative. Conversely, a child living in France, even with a British passport, can anchor the mechanism. Check passports and habitual residences at death before concluding the English will has the last word.

B. Which court hears the claim when the deceased died in England, and how to challenge each bill

Forum follows the nature of the claim, and the Cour de cassation, the supreme court for civil matters, has fixed the rule for the most common British case. Where a lifetime gift of a French property is attacked as excessive, the claim for compensation does not follow the property. The Court held on 14 April 2021, appeal number 19-24.773: “Il résulte de la combinaison des principes régissant les successions internationales et de l’article 924 du code civil que l’action en réduction exercée par les héritiers réservataires contre le donataire d’un immeuble, qui ne tend pas à la restitution en nature de l’immeuble mais au paiement d’une indemnité de réduction et présente, dès lors, un caractère mobilier, relève de la compétence des tribunaux du pays où le défunt avait son dernier domicile.” (Court of Cassation, First Civil Chamber, 14 April 2021, no. 19-24.773). Where the deceased’s last domicile was in England, that compensation claim belongs before the courts of England, not before the French court of the property’s location. Raise the point at the outset, before costs accumulate in the wrong forum: suing in France for the reduction indemnity where the last domicile was English ends in referral, delay, and a costs order, as the 2021 judgment itself shows with its order sending the parties to pursue the matter elsewhere.

Challenges otherwise divide into three tracks with three different judges, and the most common failure is taking the right complaint to the wrong one. Track one is the tax: overpaid droits de succession are recovered from the administration through a réclamation, a formal tax claim, and then the administrative court. Plead in this order: the scope error, showing an item was not taxable in France at all, for example foreign securities where both deceased and beneficiary were domiciled abroad; the allowance error, showing the 100,000 euro allowance per child or the spouse exemption was missed; the band error, recomputing each slice after a corrected adding back; and the double-tax error, crediting United Kingdom inheritance tax paid on the same value under the convention with receipts and probate valuations attached. The one-year filing deadline does not govern claims, which follow their own limitation rules running from collection, so a return filed on time can still be corrected afterwards. Interest follows the principal in both directions, which is why paying the demanded duty under express protest while litigating the balance often costs less than refusing to pay, provided the protest letter states that every head remains contested.

Track two is the family dispute underneath the figures: a sibling denies the London gift, refuses the rapport, or contests the valuation of the French flat. These belong before the civil court, and the partition should be sequenced accordingly rather than signed under pressure. Obtain the fifteen-year paper trail first, commission the independent valuation of the French property with comparables at the date of death, and have the notaire record each gift’s date, amount, and character in the draft partition before anyone signs. For Paris flats, spell out floor, lift, light, and noise adjustments with dated evidence, since both the tax office and a co-heir will argue these points line by line. Track three is the notaire’s own invoice, which follows the tariff and the taxation-of-costs procedure before the president of the judicial court, on appeal the first president of the court of appeal: that route is set out step by step in the companion fee analysis linked at the opening of this guide, and its case law should not be mixed into the tax or family tracks. In Paris and the Ile-de-France region, estates often combine a valuable flat, British accounts, and children on both sides of the Channel, so ask the notaire at the first meeting for a written roadmap with three columns, civil steps, tax steps, and fee steps, each with its forum and its deadline. A file that merges them into one conversation is how families pay twice: once in duty computed on gifts wrongly omitted or wrongly included, and once in equality lost for want of a single sentence recording that a gift was expressly outside the share.

Conclusion

A French succession with a British connection is decided by three questions asked in the right order. First, what was given in the last fifteen years, because the tax return adds it back and the partition equalises it: undisclosed London gifts cost allowances, bands, and equality at once. Second, what the children are guaranteed regardless of the English will, because the reserved portion caps the disposable share at one half, one third, or one quarter, corrects the excess in money rather than in kind, and may require proceedings in England where the deceased was last domiciled there. Third, which judge takes which complaint, because duty is reclaimed from the administration, equality is settled before the civil court, and the invoice is taxed before the costs judge. The official texts reward preparation: the gift history with dates and proof, the English papers with translations and legalisation, the French valuation with comparables, and the will with its choice of law examined before positions harden. Assemble that file in the first months of the one-year deadline, and the letter from the notaire becomes what it should be: an account to be checked line by line, corrected where wrong, and then paid, rather than a figure to be feared.