Meet the Team Behind representatives-compare.com and See How We Work

Who we are

representatives-compare.com is an independent editorial project focused on a narrow question: when a non-resident sells a French property or operates a foreign company with French VAT exposure, does that person need a French accredited fiscal representative, and if so, which firm is actually a sensible pick. The project is run by a small editorial team with a background in French non-resident tax, cross-border conveyancing, and product comparison sites. We are not a law firm, we are not a fiscal representative ourselves, and we do not provide tax or legal advice. What we do is read the source law, talk to the firms that actually hold the accreditation, and publish the result in plain English.

The site was launched to solve a specific frustration. The rules are public, the list of accredited firms is public, and yet every non-resident seller we spoke to had been quoted a different fee, offered a different scope, and given a different answer on whether a representative was even needed. That pattern is not an accident: it is what happens when a specialist market is small, language barriers are real, and most buyers encounter the rule once in their life. An editorial layer was missing, so we built one.

Editorial principles

Three rules bind every page on this site. First, subject first, partners second. A page about selling a Paris apartment from New York must talk about selling a Paris apartment from New York; the paid placement block is a sidebar, never a headline. Second, no page is published unless the writer can point to the primary source, whether that is Article 244 bis A of the Code général des impôts, a bulletin of the BOFiP (Bulletin officiel des finances publiques), an EU reciprocity list, or a specific passage of a tax treaty. Third, we do not publish a recommendation we would not give to a friend. If a fee model looks designed to trap the seller, we say so, even when a paying partner uses it.

How we research a page

A typical guide starts with the underlying text of law and the current BOFiP commentary, which is the doctrine the French tax authority actually enforces. We then check how the rule is applied in practice by reading a sample of recent notarial deeds that pass through our network, and by asking two or three accredited firms how they would price, scope and document the same transaction. We look for disagreement between firms, because disagreement usually flags the point where the reader is most likely to be misled. Finally, we run the numbers. Every worked example on the site uses real French base rates, real social charges (the 7.5 percent prélèvement de solidarité versus the 17.2 percent prélèvements sociaux), and the two real taper schedules on income tax (22 years) and social charges (30 years).

When the law changes, we update the page and re-run the example. Year references on the site are dynamic through current_year(); a page that says "updated for 2026" genuinely was.

Independence and funding

We earn money when an accredited firm purchases a paid placement slot. There are exactly three such slots, they are clearly labelled "paid placement" in every aside and in the partner cards, and they feed into our ranking methodology page. No other funding source is accepted: no affiliate commissions on property sales, no referral fees from notaires, no kickbacks from translators or escrow agents. A partner that tries to steer editorial coverage is removed from the programme, not promoted. The directory lists every accredited firm we have verified, paying or not, with the same one-line positioning, the same regional coverage, and the same language information.

Corrections, updates, and takedowns

If you see something wrong, write to us through the contact form with the source. Substantive corrections are made within five working days; editorial nuance (a sentence rephrased for clarity without a factual shift) can take longer. When a correction affects a featured partner card, we flag the change inside the card for thirty days so a reader following the same path twice can see what moved. Takedown requests from accredited firms are honoured only where a factual error is documented; opinion-based takedowns are declined and logged.

What we do not cover

We do not cover French residency tax returns for expatriates, we do not cover inheritance planning beyond the narrow question of whether a representative is required, and we do not cover corporate income tax beyond the VAT representative question. Those fields have their own specialist publications and their own specialist firms. The scope of this site is narrow on purpose: the accredited fiscal representative regime is one of the few areas in French tax where a reader genuinely cannot proceed without an officially licensed firm, and where the choice of firm materially affects the outcome.

The editorial firewall in practice

The writer of a critical guide (red flags, hidden costs, escrow retentions, how to verify accreditation) is not shown partner fee agreements before publication, and partners are not shown those pages before they ship. The partner card copy (the one-line positioning inside the Top 3 block) is the only piece of content a partner sees in advance, and even that copy is written by us, not by the firm. If a firm insists on controlling its own positioning copy, the slot is not sold.

Contacting us

The best route is the contact form, which routes by subject: editorial correction, accreditation verification, or partner enquiry. Editorial emails are read and answered by a human within two working days. Partner enquiries go into a separate queue and are handled on a first in, first out basis as slots become available. We do not publish a phone line because the volume would drown the editorial team and push us toward a call-centre model that we want to avoid.