Last week I received rather unexpectedly a convocation for the Police for my 10 year residency card (I finally qualify this year). I didn't realize I would have a Police interview for the card since it's based on 3 years of marriage and "normally" "automatic". The appointment was for Wednesday, which while a good thing that it was during my week of vacation so I didn't have to take time off work, it ruined our plans to spend a week with B's family. Luckily the letter had the number of the commissariat and a note "If the appointment time does not suit you, you may call to change it." I was able to get an appointment Friday morning, which at least left us most of the week to be with family in the Gard.
I tried to look up online what the interview would be like since I wasn't really expecting it. Back when I had my first working carte de séjour as an Assistante in Foix I had a Police interview that lasted about 3 minutes while the guy wrote down that I was working for the Inspection Academique. The forums I found this time around only mentioned French-North-African couples, and while on paper the nationality of the foreigner shouldn't make any difference, we all know these things are political and I probably wouldn't have the same experience as the Moroccan housewife who wears a head scarf.
So Friday morning we took the metro to the south side of Toulouse to a neighborhood we've never visited, and got to the commissariat about 5 minutes before 10am. We waited about 10 minutes, at which time the inspector/officer doing the interview called me into his office without B. The convocation listed a bunch of documents to bring (including a "carte adhérent association culturelle ou sportive") so I had a briefcase full of papers.
To start, he asked me to present my passport, carte de séjour + recipisée, French drivers license, and livret de famille.
Then for about 20 minutes he asked me the following questions (which I tried to remember in the approximate order he asked them) (randomly in English and French, sometimes as he asked them, so with vous, sometimes reported so with je)
vous êtes américaine? j'ai vu que vous êtes née en allemagne alors je pensais que vous étiez allemende! (yeah right, like a European citizen is going to be getting a carte 10 ans....)
quel âge avez vous?
votre date de naissance?
vos études/diploma?
emploi?
emploi de mon mari?
avez vous fait une service militaire?
décorations civiles ou militaires? (okay, I admit, my first thought was "décorations civiles"= French flag, then I realized he was asking about having received a medal)
connu des services de police/gendarmerie?
quand est-ce que j'ai rencontré mon mari?
married?
children?
does husband have children?
first marriage for both?
who proposed to whom?
est-ce que nous avons eu une période de séparation depuis le mariage?
est-ce que le mariage se passe bien?
confirmation des noms des parents
age des parents
aux états-unis?
frères ou soeurs?
fratrie de mon mari
est-ce que je connais mes beaux-parents?
est-ce qu'ils m'ont bien accueilli?
est-ce que j'ai des loisirs en commun avec mon mari?
quel était le dernier film que nous avons vu au cinéma?
est-ce que nous partageons les frais du foyer?
After these questions he asked to see our bail, bank account statement with both names, and feuille d'imposition. He didn't ask to see my fiche de paie, or the attestation from the community band I play in, or any of the other documents I'd brought (telephone, electricity, B's income, etc).
Then he said I was finished and I should ask my husband to step in. Seeing how long I had spent answering the questions, I sat down on the benches in the waiting area, and decided to surf the net on the my phone. I wondered if B would correctly name the last movie we had seen in the theater, since we watch a lot at home but only go to the theater occasionally.
I had barely loaded the Facebook application when B came out. Instead of asking him all the same questions and seeing if he had the same answers he had the following questions:
first marriage?
connu des forces de l'ordre?
names of his in-laws
what is his diploma?
current job?
did he oppose my request for the residency card?
For that last question, I feel like the guy clearly has no idea what the whole "live as a non-European in France" thing is like. If my husband was opposed to me having residency paperwork 1) why are we married? but more importantly 2) all he would have to do is not accompany me to the Préfecture or the Police for all these convocations and I wouldn't be getting my card... It's not like my husband is going to get up early, take the metro far away from our house and where we have anything we need to do, wait for 20 minutes with a screaming kid in the waiting room so say "Yeah, actually, don't give it to her".
My current récipisée is valid until the end of April, and I would bet money I won't have anything before then. But, I do think that when I go to get it renewed they will be able to tell me that the system says my card is in process (last time they had nothing). In October when I renewed my cds they said the carte 10 ans could take 9 months to be ready. In some respects, it would be easier if it's ready after June 30th because my job will be over and I won't have to miss work to pick it up.
Any other similar experiences? Or something completely different? Things differ so much from one Préfecture to another that I'm sure someone else has gotten the 10 year card through a completely different procedure.
7 comments:
I'm shocked to read this. I obtained my carte de séjour of 10 years without effort a few years ago. I have renewed my annual carte de séjour, for the third time and when I showed up at the préfecture they told me I was entitled automatically to the 10 yrs card. My husband was with me, but no personal questions were asked. I must say, I was lucky I had it easy when Sarko was not influenced by Guéant and all of the far right wing people of UMP.
That's crazy! I never once had any sort of police interview for my 10 year card that I got about a year ago. It was suprisingly easy, with little to no paperwork (other than the standard stuff). The only thing I can think of is that because Max is a cop, maybe they did feel the need to check me out (because I had already given some info to the police when we got married to make sure I'm not a terrorist lol).
I wonder if the process has changed that much in the past year or so? Or is it because you are American and I'm Canadian? But I don't recall anyone else I know having to do a police interview like that, regardless of their nationality....
Good lord, "is your marriage going well?" what do they expect people to answer?? "Right now we're having trouble conceiving a child but I expect we'll get through it?" "No, he hits me?" That's the only question that I find really shocking. Anyway, courage.
Woah, that is crazy! I've never had a police interview, though they did request the mayor of our teeny village in Seine et Marne 'interview' me but it was basically, according to him, to check that I spoke French...
I think that this just confirms that I'll be applying for French citizenship in September (once I've been in France 10 years so I don't need to send my fingerprints to the FBI for checking, that gives me the heebie jeebies)... The 10 year card is sooo nice, no more renewing. And they are teeny now, credit card sized!!
They might have asked Bart if he was opposed in case it was an abusive relationship at all. I imagine it's probably more likely if it's a man wanting a residency card based on his wife's citizenship. But just to make sure you're not "coercing" Bart into getting you the card. It might also be more common when people are coming from countries with less gender equality.
Anyways, glad you made it through, especially since it sounds like it's a more involved process than it used to be!
I had to do that too. Exactly how you describe, same questions, piece of cake. the first time we showed up for the appointment the guy who was supposed to take us was gone. where is he? out. family something. when's he coming back? we don't know. isn't there someone else who can do the interview? nope. what do we do then?? he'll call you back when he gets back into the office.
then there was about 3 weeks where we didn't hear anything, I called back and apparently he was back ("family problem") and he had tried to call my cell to reschedule the appointment, and never left message, (the repondeur was in english and 'I didn't know what it said so I wasn't going to leave a message')
good thing I called to check up on things!
«The convocation listed a bunch of documents to bring so I had a briefcase full of papers.»
The more paper, the better! You've done incredibly well learning the ways of French bureaucracy!
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