One thing to note is that not all French banks operate nation-wide. We opened our account with Credit Mutuelle because you see their banks wherever you go in France. Our account is in Cusset (near Vichy) but when we were living near Boulogne we went to conduct some business at the Boulogne branch. Only it's not a branch, it's a different bank. Our Credit Mutuelle is part of Credit Mutuelle Massif Centrale, not Credit Mutuelle Nord pas de Calais! Very confusing, so check it out first so your bank is where you need it to be, especially if you want to bank online. I had no end of confusions until I got it clear in my mind. Credit Mutuelle has a different website for each autonomous area and if you log on to the wrong one it gets very muddled, that is if you can log on at all. Although they try hard on the help lines, most French people do not speak good English and if your telephone French is limited it can be a slow process.
http://www.allbanks.org/main/France
You will pay some bank charges. We each have a debit card and so we pay 3.50 euros each per month, plus other charges. Once a year we seem to pay for someone to 'look over' our account. I think this is why many French folk still use cheques for their shopping. If you do pay by cheque be prepared to show 1 or 2 proofs of identity at the till.
We also have a livret bleu, which is a savings account. We keep money in this because if the current account is empty then they take money from the livret to pay bills. They charge for this of course.
The other thing you must take into consideration is that you are not allowed to go into the red. Getting credit is difficult and may not be possible anyway if you are based in UK.
It is illegal to write a cheque or use a debit card if you know you have insufficient funds in the account. We have banked in France for 7 years and have never been offered a credit card. You need to make sure you transfer funds from the UK in good time for bills to be paid.
We have a cheque account, with standing orders to pay regular bills. We find this essential since we are still based here in UK and it's embarrassing to forget when bills are due. Some bills, such as local taxes, can't be paid monthly until you have paid the bill for at least 1 year so you need to check. You don't want to find your water has been disconnected so you need to know when that bill is due...in our area we can't pay for water monthly, though that could just be communication difficulties!
Thinking about local taxes, there are no reductions for holiday homes, so if you are like us you will have a house you may only use 3 or 4 times a year but you will still have to pay all the taxes. There are 2 local taxes........ taxe d'habitation and tax fonctionairre. One of these is payable by whoever is resident on January 1st so if you are renting try to move in after January 1st and your landlord will have to pay that tax for the whole year. Likewise, if you are moving out of a rental property do it before January 1st or you may be liable for the whole year's tax. Sometimes tenants will negotiate a proportional payment of local taxes when tenancies change.
http://www.french-property.com/finance-taxation
Income tax is not deducted at source so it is really important to keep all your payslips for the year for when the tax form arrives. You have a deadline to return it and you MUST get it back on time. The tax offices have outside postboxes so on the night of the deadline folk can be seen dashing up at all hours to post their tax returns before midnight. If you're lucky the tax form will arrive largely filled in because your employer has sent in your earnings figures otherwise you'll have to fill it in yourself. Once you get your tax demand you must pay it within a certain time so make sure you have saved the money so you can pay. We only worked in France for just over a year so it may be possible to pay tax monthly if you are working long-term.
Further, more detailed information from:
http://www.livingfrance.com/
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