Health Cover - Progress?

Yesterday we thought that we would have another go at getting our Carte Vitale reinstated. Armed with all our paper work, passports, birth and marriage certificates, and “impôt sur les revenus”, we headed back to CPAM in Carcassonne. Realising that one of the ladies at the accueil was the same that we had seen last time, we were expecting the worst. When it was our turn, she couldn’t have been more different. She smiled, even tried a little English and as the queue was so long, arranged an appointment for us today. We shall see what the rendezvous brings.

***

We have had our rendezvous with CPAM. They accepted all our paperwork and taken our completed form. All we have to do is to wait for our new attestations confirming that we now back in the system. How long that will be, I don’t know, but the process has started!

Health Cover Encore!

OK, I thought it was too good to be true. It was announced last month that “inactive, early retirees” like Richard and I could join the French Health Service, rather than having to take out very expensive private insurance cover. We waited a few weeks to allow the information to be passed down to the staff and, armed with all our documentation (even a copy of the French Minister of Health’s letter) went to the CPAM in Carcassonne. We weren’t expected to be welcomed with open arms but we did hope that they may help us. The lady we spoke to was less than helpful and wouldn’t even acknowledge that there going to be changes. I am sure that it will all be sorted out in the end, but it is very frustrating in the meantime. I suppose that is French bureaucracy for you!

Health Cover

After coming home from shopping, I put the computer on checking for e-mails, checked the next Scrabulous challenge that my daughter, Sally, might have set me and checked the latest forum updates. There it was on the Anglophone-direct forum. Someone had written that there had been an update on the latest health issues for Ex-pats. As "early-retired inactives", we knew that our health cover would run out this month, so since the news was announced last year that our health cover would cease, we have been looking for a good assurance policy. We finally made our decision and received our acceptance from the company last week. Fortunately we were given a 14 day cooling off period which runs out tomorrow, so we quickly sent the appropriate paper work, cancelling the policy.

I guess we will have to wait at least another couple of weeks for the message about the new rules to get to our local CPAM. It is then going to be a matter of filling in CMU application forms and getting our Cartes Vitale re-issued. Remembering how long it took to get them first time round I am not going to be holding my breath. After that, we will have to re-start our Complementary Insurance. In the meantime, I assume, we will just have to pay for any medical treatment and keep all our receipts.

Our route home from the post office took us past the local bergerie. The herd somehow had got out and were blocking the road. They decided that they would return home, slowly, in front of our car. Thirty minutes later, they arrived at their field. It was amazing that we didn't see any cars during this time. As it was at 12:30, I suspect most of the usual people using the road were probably sitting down for lunch.