Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About The French Working Holiday Visa

France offers working holiday visas to Australians aged 18-35. The eligibility criteria is fairly straightforward, but as many Australians have found out, the process of actually getting a French working holiday visa is not.

You need to get an appointment with VFS Global – sometimes easier said than done – and there’s a fair bit of paperwork involved. The fact that the information provided by the French embassy is sometimes contradictory doesn’t exactly help.

This is where the Working Holidays for Aussies community comes in! There are now hundreds of helpful comments on our French working holiday visa guide, including lots of questions and answers. Many Australians who’ve successfully applied for a French working holiday visa have also commented with their real-world experiences, tips and feedback for other Aussies who want to do the same.

Thinking about applying for a French working holiday visa? In this article, we’ve summarised the most important comments on that guide, and provided a helpful FAQs section at the end.

Please note that visa requirements are subject to change at any time, so you should still check our full guide for the most up-to-date info.

When to apply for your visa and travel to France

One of the most common questions in the comments is about the visa start date. Some people want to apply well in advance, and some people are unsure about when they can enter France and/or the Schengen Area.

The main things to remember are:

• You can only apply up to 3 months before you plan to arrive in France
• The 12-month visa validity starts when you enter France
• It can take a while to get an appointment with VFS Global and the average visa processing time is 15 days
• One person commented that VFS Global staff would not process a visa application where the person was planning to arrive in France in less than 3 weeks from the application date – so plan ahead

Where you can apply for this visa

In theory, you must apply for your visa from your country of residence. Some Australians have commented that they were able to apply from outside Australia, e.g. in Berlin, but the French government could theoretically refuse to process your application if you’re not a resident (i.e. living at least six months) in the country where you’re applying.

This could mean that you might need to return to Australia to apply if you’re currently travelling.

VFS Global appointments are a big frustration

Many people have found it difficult to secure an appointment with VFS Global, the third-party company that accepts French visa applications in Australia on behalf of the French government. Slots are limited and book out quickly.

For this reason, you should plan ahead and try to book an appointment well in advance. Many people also suggest checking daily for appointments to become available as people cancel theirs.

If you’re having trouble booking an appointment on the VFS website, try using incognito mode on your browser.

Confusion about the required documents

The list of required documents to apply for a French working holiday visa is sometimes unclear. In general, Australian citizens have found that:

• Medical checks and police checks were not required
• If you need proof of accommodation, a hotel/hostel booking for your initial arrival in France or a letter from a friend you’ll stay with in France should suffice
• Your travel insurance needs to cover your entire stay in France, but can also cover other countries and/or dates beyond your intended stay in France – as long as you’re covered while in France (see our guide to working holiday travel insurance for more tips on this)

How the French working holiday visa interacts with Schengen travel rules

There’s a bit of discussion about whether you can travel in other parts of Europe while on a French working holiday visa.

The general consensus is that you can spend up to 90 out of every 180 days as a tourist in other Schengen countries while on this visa, with your time in France not counting towards this as long as your visa remains valid. However, you may only live and work in France.

Once your visa expires, we understand that you would need to leave the Schengen

Do you need to validate your visa upon arrival in France?

You don’t usually need to validate a working holiday visa as an Australian citizen in France, as long as it’s a “vacances travail” visa.

Links to particularly helpful comments

Here are some links to some of the most helpful comments on the French WHV guide:

• A complete summary of applying for this visa in March 2025, by Blair
• Another summary of an Australian’s experience applying for this visa in September 2024, by Hec

Have another question or want to leave a comment about this topic? Please do so on our French working holiday visa guide. 🙂

While best efforts are made to keep this information updated, we do not guarantee its accuracy.

If you spot an error, would like to suggest new information to be added or simply have a question, please let us know in the comments and we’ll endeavour to respond or update the article as quickly as possible!

Matt Graham

Matt is the founder of Working Holidays for Aussies. Passionate about travel and always looking for great deals, he believes that a gap year is the perfect opportunity to immerse yourself in another culture and learn all the things they didn’t teach you in school!

Originally from Australia, Matt has travelled to over 100 countries, lived in 7 countries, and has extensive real-world experience with working holiday visas.