CAF

I received some VERY exciting news this week. My CAF has finally arrived!

For those of you who don't know, CAF (Caisse d'Allocations Familiales), is money allocated by the French government to people living in France who earn under a minimum threshold to contribute towards rent. The amount differs depending on income and price of accommodation and it very generously covers foreign students living abroad, meaning if you're on your Year Abroad in France you should be entitled to it!

However, as I've discovered with lots of admin in France, CAF is an absolute nightmare to organise. To start with, you have to fill out a long form listing all your finances and information about your accommodation, as well as submit a copy of your passport, birth certificate, bank details and tenancy agreement. Once this is all sent off, you should receive log in details in the post so you can access your account online and track your status.

Having spoken to other friends who also applied, it seems the process is slightly different for everyone - some friends never received their online details, others were sent their CAF money immediately and others were asked for more documents (and photocopies) of their forms of ID, payslips, utility bills, the secret recipe for CocaCola, the script to the new Harry Potter book... ok I'm joking about the last bits but you get the idea.

I was in the unfortunate position of having to provide a payslip for a month I never actually received due to issues with my pay at the start of my placement. Woohoo, slight issue. Having gone into the office a couple of times and made many attempts to drop off my bank statement for the following month with little success I'd pretty much given up hope on ever receiving CAF altogether.

Fortunately, my friend Kate said she was going along again and motivated me to give it one more try. So at the start of this month, a whole 6 months after I first made my application, I went into the CAF office and explained my situation to an extremely helpful woman who added some notes to my form and arranged a phone call for Monday morning. Despite being on a ski trip in the Alps, I kept my phone on loud and fortunately managed to take the call while coming off a chairlift, trying my best to understand the French being spoken to me over the gale-force mountain winds!

This week the magic finally happened and I have a very happy little French bank account. My monthly allowance for the past few months has been deposited in a tidy lump sum, the perfect cherry on the cake to have in the final weeks of my time abroad in France.

My top tips for applying for CAF:

• If you can, go in person to the office. It is 100 times quicker and easier to speak to someone and they are always really helpful and sympathetic of your situation so can help you through the process.
• Be persistent. I had almost given up but I'm so glad I went in that one last time - it's worth it in the end!
• Try and do your application early. Although it can be daunting when you move to another country for the first time, especially with the language barrier, these things take a long time and a lot of patience so the sooner the better really!