PAYE, tax code and your French assets: the UK tax guide for French movers

How PAYE works

Coming from France’s prélèvement à la source, PAYE will feel familiar but stricter: your employer deducts income tax and National Insurance from every payslip, and for most employees there’s no annual return at all. HMRC tells your employer how much to deduct via your tax code.

Your tax code

A tax code like 1257L encodes your tax-free personal allowance (currently £12,570) — the part of your income taxed at 0%. The right code means the right tax. A wrong one — too little allowance, or “emergency” — means you overpay (or, rarely, underpay).

Why you overpay on arrival

This is the classic French-mover trap. Before HMRC has your full details (and your P45 if you had earlier UK work), you're often put on an emergency tax code that doesn't give your full allowance. Spot it by its shape, not just the word "emergency": a W1, M1 or X suffix after an otherwise normal-looking code (e.g. "1257L W1") means non-cumulative — each pay period is taxed as if it were your only one all year, which can make a first payslip look brutally over-taxed. You might also see BR (100% of this job's income taxed at the flat 20% rate, zero allowance) or 0T (zero allowance at all — common with no P45 handed over, or a starter checklist suggesting another main job). The result: your first months are over-taxed. It's not lost — once your correct code is issued, payroll usually refunds the overpayment automatically. But you have to notice it.

Claiming it back: the P800

If the overpayment isn't caught and corrected during the tax year itself, HMRC reconciles everyone's position at year-end and sends a P800 tax calculation letter to anyone who's over or underpaid. If it shows you're due money back, don't just wait for a cheque: sign into your Personal Tax Account on GOV.UK and choose the bank transfer option — it typically lands in about 5 working days, versus several weeks for a posted cheque.

P45, P60, P11D

• P45 — given when you leave a job: your pay and tax to date. Hand it to your new employer to set the right code.
• P60 — annual summary of pay and tax. Keep it (proof of income, refunds).
• P11D — reports taxable benefits in kind (e.g. private health), if any.

Your French assets: what the UK sees once you’re resident

Most French movers think their UK tax life starts and ends with the payslip. It doesn’t. Once you’re a UK tax resident, the starting principle is that the UK taxes your worldwide income and gains — including the flat you kept in Lyon, the interest on your Livret A and the dividends quietly reinvested inside your PEA. Two things stop that from being a catastrophe: the France-UK tax treaty (which decides who taxes what, and prevents the same income being taxed twice) and, since April 2025, the FIG regime — new arrivals who were non-UK-resident for the previous 10 years can claim up to 4 years of relief on foreign income and gains. Claiming it has trade-offs (you give up allowances), so whether it’s worth it depends on how much your French assets produce. That’s a calculation, not a guess.

Asset by asset, the honest map:

• Property you rent out in France — French rental income stays taxable in France first (non-resident rules, plus social levies), and generally must also be declared in the UK with treaty relief. Double declaration, not double taxation — if you file right on both sides.
• PEA — keepable in principle when you leave, but HMRC doesn’t recognise the wrapper: for UK purposes it’s a plain share account, so internal dividends and realised gains can become UK-taxable (FIG aside). Separate practical trap: some French brokers close accounts of UK residents — check yours before you leave, not after.
• Assurance-vie — the most complex one. The UK doesn’t recognise this wrapper either, and foreign life policies have their own (unforgiving) UK rules; a badly-timed withdrawal as a UK resident can turn patient savings into taxable income. If you hold one, this alone justifies a professional conversation before the move.
• Livret A, LDDS, PEL — tax-free is a French promise. For HMRC it’s ordinary foreign interest, taxable for a UK resident (allowances and FIG aside). And banks exchange account data automatically (CRS), so it isn’t invisible.
• Ordinary share account (CTO) — broadly: capital gains go to your country of residence (the UK), dividends keep a French withholding with a UK credit under the treaty. Workable, but it must be declared on both sides.
• Exit tax — leaving France with a large securities portfolio (roughly €800k+, or big stakes in companies) can trigger France’s exit tax on unrealised gains, usually with a payment deferral. Few people are concerned; those who are, know they should already be talking to someone.

Before you leave — the three moves: ① list every asset with its current value (your date of departure becomes a reference point) ; ② ask your French bank/broker/insurer in writing whether they keep UK-resident clients ; ③ get the FIG question — claim it or not — answered for your numbers by a France-UK professional. Some arbitrages (selling, withdrawing, restructuring) are dramatically better done on one side of the departure date than the other.

Your plan — a preview

Understand PAYE, get your code right, check your first payslips, keep your P45/P60 — and map your French assets before you fly. Veia sequences the tax-code check (with the NIN step) so you don’t quietly overpay.