Immigration consultant's notes. Changes in the legislation of France since January 2020.
From January 1, the minimum wage of French workers (employees) was increased to € 10.15 per hour or € 1,539.42 per month.
As a result, the basis for calculating the salaries of applicants for a talent passport has changed, since the minimum wage of applicants for a talent passport is counted on the base of foregoing minimum wage.
At the same time, the Ministry of the Interior outlined a number of steps that local authorities can take, ranging from expediting the processing of applications for a talent passport to issuing temporary residence permits that will expand the applicants' ability to receive ICT (intra-company transfer permits).
Initiatives were set out in a memorandum of the Ministry of the Interior of December 2019 for local immigration authorities (prefectures).
The ministry called on local authorities to:
- reduce the time for considering applications for a talent passport to 15 days,
- schedule an appointment for applicants within two weeks of applying,
- ease the requirements for application documentation, in particular, to exclude birth certificates from the list of documents for applications for a talent passport (both for new applications and for renewals), although birth certificates will still be necessary for other document processing procedures,
- issue a six-month temporary residence permit to applicants for ICT, while applicants are awaiting a final decision on their applications. This option is currently only available to talent passport applicants,
- allow ICT cardholders to change their immigration status without leaving France.
It is difficult to assess what impact the initiatives will have on local processes, but the changes are nonetheless a welcome sign of France’s efforts to ease immigration requirements for highly skilled workers.
