Your father retired to the Dordogne, your sister lived in Lyon for a decade, or your husband died on holiday in Nice. In the middle of grief you face a foreign system: a French death certificate to obtain within days, a decision about repatriation to Britain or a local funeral, a French bank account that is suddenly frozen, and a notaire (the French public officer who settles successions) asking for documents you have never heard of. This guide walks British families through the whole sequence after a death in France since Brexit: how the death is registered at the French mairie (town hall) and which certificates work in the United Kingdom, how a body or ashes can be brought home and what permission each step needs, which court and which law govern the succession when the deceased split their life between Britain and France, and how heirs prove their status, meet French tax deadlines and protect children against a will written under English law. Every decisive statement is linked to its official text so you can verify it yourself, and every French legal term is explained the first time it appears. Part I covers the first days: registration and the body. Part II covers the months that follow: the succession itself.

I. Registering the Death and Deciding What Happens to the Body

A. How Do You Register a British Death at the French Mairie and Get Certificates That Work in Britain?

French law puts the registration duty on the place of death, not on nationality. Article 78 of the Civil Code provides that “L’acte de décès sera dressé par l’officier de l’état civil de la commune où le décès a eu lieu, sur la déclaration d’un parent du défunt ou sur celle d’une personne possédant sur son état civil les renseignements les plus exacts et les plus complets qu’il sera possible.” In practice this means a relative, or the funeral director (opérateur funéraire) acting for the family, declares the death at the mairie of the commune where the person died, armed with the medical death certificate (certificat de décès) drawn up by the doctor and the deceased’s identity documents and family record book (livret de famille) if there is one. The official service-public.fr guide confirms the sequence: two documents must be established, the death certificate by a health professional and the declaration of death by the officier d’état civil of the commune of death, and the certificate is now usually produced electronically and transmitted directly when the death occurs in a hospital or care home (service-public.fr, Déclaration de décès).

The resulting acte de décès (death certificate) is a precise document. Article 79 of the Civil Code requires that “L’acte de décès énoncera : 1° Le jour, l’heure et le lieu de décès ; 2° Les prénoms, nom, date et lieu de naissance, profession et domicile de la personne décédée ; 3° Les prénoms, noms, professions et domiciles de ses père et mère ; 4° Les prénoms et nom de l’autre époux, si la personne décédée était mariée, veuve ou divorcée”, with equivalent details for a civil-partnership partner and for the person making the declaration. Check every line before you leave the counter: British first names and places of birth are frequently misspelled, and an error on the death certificate propagates into the succession papers, the bank file and the British probate application. If the death was violent, sudden or unexplained, the procureur de la République (public prosecutor) is informed and a post-mortem (autopsie médico-légale) may be ordered at a medico-legal institute; the British government’s guide for deaths in France warns that post-mortems are carried out by court-appointed forensic doctors, that cultural or religious sensitivities may not be taken into account, and that the British authorities cannot stop or interfere with the process (gov.uk, What to do after a British person dies in France).

Ask the mairie for several full copies (copies intégrales) of the death certificate at once, and ask whether a multilingual extract is available. The gov.uk guide states the position clearly: deaths must be registered in the country where the person died, so a death in France is registered at the local mairie, normally by the next of kin or by a local funeral director; French death certificates do not show the cause of death; and you do not need to register the death in the United Kingdom, because the local death certificate can usually be used in the UK for most purposes, including probate. If you want a British-style document as well, you may separately register the death with the Overseas Registration Unit and buy a Consular Death Registration certificate, a record of which is sent to the General Register Office within twelve months. Order more copies than you think you need: banks, insurers, pension funds, the French notaire and the British probate registry will each want an original or a certified copy, and relatives who live far away cannot easily return to the mairie counter.

Two practical warnings complete this first stage. First, tell the French authorities if the deceased suffered from an infectious condition, so that precautions can be taken by everyone handling the body. Second, start a list on day one of every organisation that must be notified: the French bank, the landlord or managing agent, the insurer, the pension providers in both countries, and the British passport office to cancel the passport. The gov.uk checklist covers cancelling the passport, retrieving belongings and finding a translator or a lawyer from its published lists. Keep every receipt and every reference number: the succession will need proof of the expenses the heirs advance, and funeral costs paid by one child are recoverable from the estate.

B. Can You Bring the Body or the Ashes Home to Britain, or Bury Your Loved One in France?

The family must choose quickly between three paths: repatriation of the body to the United Kingdom, cremation in France followed by transfer of the ashes, or a local burial or cremation in France. Each path has its own paperwork, and the funeral director coordinates it, but the heirs sign and pay, so you need to understand what is being requested in your name. Where the body must first be moved before the coffin is closed, for example from the place of death to the family home or to a funeral chamber (chambre funéraire), article R. 2213-7 of the General Code of Local Authorities requires a prior written declaration to the mayor of the place where the body lies, and the transport must use specially fitted vehicles reserved for funeral transport. This is the rule for movements inside France before the coffin is sealed; the international journey obeys a stricter rule.

For repatriation outside metropolitan France, article R. 2213-22 of the same Code provides that “Lorsque le corps est transporté en dehors du territoire métropolitain ou d’un département d’outre-mer, l’autorisation est donnée par le préfet du département où a lieu la fermeture du cercueil.” In practice the funeral director applies to the préfecture (the State’s local authority) for the exit authorisation (autorisation de transport de corps), presenting the death certificate, the medical certificate confirming that the deceased carried no infectious risk or that precautions were taken, the hermetic coffin certificate (certificat d’herméticité) and the embalming certificate where required. The gov.uk guide explains the British side of the same journey: a relative or formally appointed representative must appoint a United Kingdom-based international funeral director, who works with the French funeral director so that all requirements are met at both ends, including the local civil-registry death certificate, the embalming certificate and the permit to transfer the remains to the United Kingdom. If the deceased held travel or other insurance, contact the insurer immediately, because the policy may cover repatriation and appoint funeral directors on both sides; without insurance, the family bears the full cost and should ask for itemised quotes from at least two international funeral directors before signing.

Cremation in France followed by transfer of the ashes is often simpler and cheaper. Cremation itself requires the mayor’s authorisation and, where the deceased left written wishes, those wishes govern. Ashes travel under lighter formalities than a body, but airlines and the receiving crematorium or cemetery in Britain each impose their own documentary conditions, so confirm them before the urn leaves France. Families sometimes divide the ashes between the two countries; check that each recipient site accepts the portion it receives, particularly where a French cemetery concession (concession funéraire, the time-limited right to occupy a plot) is involved.

A local burial or the scattering of ashes in France raises a question British families rarely anticipate: French funerals follow French rules even for a British deceased. Burial must occur in a cemetery, in a concession purchased from the commune or in a family vault; private land burial is in principle forbidden. The commune of death is not necessarily the commune of burial, and transporting the coffin to another commune needs the mayor’s authorisation for closure of the coffin and transport. Scattering ashes in nature is allowed but must be declared to the mairie of the commune where the scattering takes place, and affixing a plaque or marker requires permission. Where the deceased owned a French house with a garden they loved, relatives sometimes ask for burial there: refuse this idea gently but firmly, because it is unlawful and it would blight the future sale of the property. Record the deceased’s funeral wishes in the succession file as well, because the heir who pays for the funeral recovers the cost from the estate, and disputes between siblings about an expensive repatriation are a classic source of litigation.

II. Settling the French Succession: Court, Law and Heirs’ Rights

A. Which Court and Which Law Govern the Estate of a Briton Who Dies in France?

Once the funeral is over, the succession (succession, the estate) opens. Article 720 of the Civil Code states the starting point in one sentence: “Les successions s’ouvrent par la mort, au dernier domicile du défunt.” But the last home address is only the beginning of the analysis for a British family, because European private international law decides which country’s courts hear the case and which country’s substantive law distributes the assets. The instrument is Regulation (EU) No 650/2012 on jurisdiction, applicable law and the European Certificate of Succession (Regulation (EU) No 650/2012). It still binds France, it still covers British nationals as foreign elements, and Brexit changed nothing about its application by French courts and notaires: the United Kingdom never opted into the Regulation, so the United Kingdom was always a third State for its purposes, and it remains one.

The general rule is habitual residence. Article 4 of the Regulation gives jurisdiction over the whole succession to the courts of the Member State where the deceased had their habitual residence at death, and Article 21 makes that same law the law applicable to the succession as a whole. The Cour de cassation (France’s highest civil court) has explained how habitual residence is found when a wealthy person divided their life between two countries. In its judgment of 29 May 2019, No 18-13.383, it recalled that “sont compétentes pour statuer sur l’ensemble d’une succession les juridictions de l’État membre dans lequel le défunt avait sa résidence habituelle au moment de son décès”, and that “afin de déterminer la résidence habituelle, l’autorité chargée de la succession doit procéder à une évaluation d’ensemble des circonstances de la vie du défunt au cours des années précédant son décès et au moment de son décès, prenant en compte tous les éléments de fait pertinents, notamment la durée et la régularité de la présence du défunt dans l’État concerné ainsi que les conditions et les raisons de cette présence, la résidence habituelle ainsi déterminée devant révéler un lien étroit et stable avec l’État concerné” (Cass. 1re civ., 29 May 2019, No 18-13.383). For British readers who winter in France and summer in England, or who retired to France but kept a London flat, a British bank account and British doctors, the lesson is direct: habitual residence is a factual assessment, not a stamp in a passport, and the family’s evidence about where the deceased actually lived, voted, paid tax and received healthcare will decide which country’s courts and law govern everything.

Where the deceased lived outside the European Union, for example a Briton domiciled in London who kept a holiday house in France, French courts are not necessarily powerless. Article 10 of the Regulation creates a subsidiary jurisdiction: where habitual residence at death was not in a Member State, the courts of the Member State where estate assets are situated may still hear the whole succession if the deceased held that State’s nationality. In its judgment of 21 September 2022, No 19-15.438, a case in which the widow lived in the United Kingdom, the Cour de cassation restated the rule: “lorsque la résidence habituelle du défunt au moment du décès n’est pas située dans un État membre, les juridictions de l’État membre dans lequel sont situés des biens successoraux sont néanmoins compétentes pour statuer sur l’ensemble de la succession dans la mesure où le défunt possédait la nationalité de cet État membre au moment du décès.” It added, following the Court of Justice of the European Union’s judgment of 7 April 2022, that the provision “doit être interprété en ce sens qu’une juridiction d’un État membre doit relever d’office sa compétence au titre de la règle de compétence subsidiaire prévue à cette disposition lorsque, ayant été saisie sur le fondement de la règle de compétence générale établie à l’article 4 de ce règlement, elle constate qu’elle n’est pas compétente au titre de cette dernière disposition” (Cass. 1re civ., 21 Sept. 2022, No 19-15.438). The court must therefore check this fallback jurisdiction on its own motion. A French house owned by a person who died in England does not escape the French courts simply because the deceased lived in England.

Within the applicable law, one choice matters above all for British families: the professio juris (choice of law clause). Article 22 of the Regulation allows anyone to choose the law of their nationality to govern their whole succession, and British nationals habitually resident in France use it to elect English law in a will, often hoping to preserve full testamentary freedom. That choice is valid in France and the French notaire will apply it. But it does not wipe out French protections entirely, as the next section explains, and it never governs French inheritance tax, which follows its own territorial rules. Readers who want the full analysis of English-law wills, the forced share of children and tax should read our companion guide on British wills and French houses after Brexit, which this article completes with the procedure that follows the death itself.

B. How Do British Heirs Prove Their Status, Meet French Deadlines and Protect Children Against an English-Law Will?

The first practical step is proof of heir status. Article 730 of the Civil Code provides that “La preuve de la qualité d’héritier s’établit par tous moyens.” In France the standard proof is the acte de notoriété (notarial certificate of heirship), drawn up by the notaire on the basis of the death certificate, the family record book, the marriage certificate and any will. British heirs should arrive with every civil-status document they hold: full birth certificates, marriage and divorce certificates, and, where the family history includes a foreign adoption or a foreign judgment, the judgment itself with a certified translation. The Cour de cassation recalled in a succession dispute that where recognition of a foreign judgment arises incidentally, the court “avait seulement à vérifier si se trouvaient remplies les conditions requises pour que ce jugement soit reconnu en France, ainsi que, le cas échéant, les effets qu’il produisait” (Cass. 1re civ., 6 Nov. 2019, No 18-17.111). A British grant of probate, an English adoption order or a foreign divorce decree can therefore be recognised for what they are worth in the succession, provided their authenticity and the conditions for recognition are established. Where heirs disagree about who inherits, for example where a second family contests the status of children from a first marriage, the acte de notoriété records the dispute and the matter goes to the tribunal judiciaire (the ordinary civil court). Banks release funds only against the acte de notoriété or, for cross-border estates, the European Certificate of Succession (certificat successoral européen), which the Regulation created precisely so that an heir proved in one Member State can demonstrate their rights in another without a second procedure.

The second step is the tax return, and the deadlines are short. Article 800 of the General Tax Code requires that “Les héritiers, légataires ou donataires, leurs tuteurs ou curateurs, sont tenus de souscrire une déclaration détaillée”, subject only to small-estate exemptions, and article 641 of the same Code fixes the filing periods: “De six mois, à compter du jour du décès, lorsque celui dont on recueille la succession est décédé en France métropolitaine; D’une année, dans tous les autres cas.” A Briton who dies in France therefore leaves their heirs six months to file the déclaration de succession, even if the heirs live in England and the estate includes English assets taxable in France. Late filing triggers interest and penalties that accrue monthly, and the notaire cannot close the file while the tax position is open. Our detailed guide on succession tax for British heirs of a French house sets out the allowances, the rate scale and how to challenge a reassessment; read it alongside this article, because procedure and tax run on parallel clocks.

The third step is the protection of children, which is where English testamentary freedom meets its French limit. Under French domestic law, article 913 of the Civil Code caps gifts and will provisions: “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.” The balance is the réserve héréditaire (the forced share reserved to children). Since the Act of 24 August 2021, this protection follows French children across borders: where the deceased or at least one of their children is, at the death, a national of a European Union Member State or habitually resident there, and the foreign law governing the succession offers children no reserved-share mechanism, “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” (C. civ., art. 913). Concretely, a British father habitually resident in France who elects English law and leaves everything to his second wife can still see each child take a compensatory levy on the French assets up to their French forced share. Children who suspect they were disinherited should therefore instruct the notaire in writing to freeze any distribution until the applicable law and the compensatory levy have been analysed, and surviving spouses in the opposite position should take advice before assuming an English-law will disposes of the French house freely.

Two final safeguards close the file. First, inventory everything early: French bank balances, assurance-vie policies (assurance-vie, the French life-insurance savings contract with its own succession regime), the contents of the French house, and any debts including the last medical bills and the funeral invoice. Heirs accept the succession purely and simply, with limited liability up to the net assets (acceptation à concurrence de l’actif net), or renounce before the court registry (greffe) within the statutory periods; never sign a bank’s blanket discharge or sell estate assets before choosing, because conduct implying acceptance (acceptation tacite) can bind you to the debts. Second, where the family is divided across the Channel, consider a single coordinating lawyer alongside the notaire: the English executor (executor, the person appointed by the will to administer the estate) and the French heirs often work from different documents, and a mistranslated will or a missing apostille (apostille, the Hague Convention stamp authenticating a foreign public document) can stall the file for months. The service-public.fr bereavement guide walks through the standard French steps after a relative’s death, from notifying the bank to settling the estate (service-public.fr, Un proche est décédé).

Conclusion

A death in France sets three clocks running for a British family: the immediate clock of registration at the mairie and the choice between repatriation and a French funeral, the six-month clock of the French inheritance tax return, and the longer clock of the succession itself, governed by habitual residence or by the law the deceased chose, and corrected where necessary by the compensatory levy that protects children. Each stage has its own proof, its own authority and its own deadline, and a mistake at one stage, a misspelled death certificate, an unauthorised transfer of the body, a missed filing date, an English-law will taken at face value, compounds at the next. Gather the civil-status papers early, order extra death certificates, put the funeral decision and the applicable-law question to the notaire in the first meeting, and keep every receipt. Grief leaves little energy for administration; a file opened methodically in the first fortnight is the surest way to protect both the memory of the deceased and the rights of those who remain.