Job Discussion Forums

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

my whole reasoning for going to Paris is to go to the Sorbonne to learn french (Canadian gov't work-rather Paris than Montreal) French courses only take 2-4 hours in the morning, so i would be free from about 12 or 1 on. So how much could i be reasonably expect to work, in terms of hours per week? Assuming i have the certifications, and some experience, how many euro/ hour can be expected? Is it relatively simple to get private clients, assuming heavy advertisement? Lastly, i've browsed through here and have read of people saying finding an apartment in central paris (i want 4, 5, or 6 arrondissements) is almost impossible; yet i know of a site linked right from the Sorbonne website where they seem to have dozens of apartments available. What's the truth?

[riverboat]

If you look in the FUSAC magazine (fusac.fr) you'll see that lots of experienced teachers are advertising private English lessons in Paris, charging 15 euros per hour, with the first lesson free. So that should give you an idea of the hourly rate. In terms of how much work there is to go around...I don't know.

And re: apartments, its REALLY expensive if you want to rent a studio or one-bedroom place for yourself, not so bad if you want to look for a room in a collocation.

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

[riverboat]

OK, well you'll be fine for getting an apartment then (for me, 1500 euros p/m is pretty much in the really expensive bracket). You'll be able to find a nice enough studio in central Paris for that.

By the way, I'm not sure if you were thinking of trying to find work in a language school as well as looking for private clients, but you could expect to earn around 18 euros p/h (before tax) teaching for a school. You'd probably be teaching business clientele. I've spent hte last two days here going round all the various language schools, have had some interviews and job offers, and 18 euros seems to be pretty much the standard hourly rate, though of course there is variation on either side depending on the school.

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

[riverboat]

I'm not really that clear on the tax situation yet, though I will obviously be finding out properly in the next month or so once I get my first paycheck here...I've heard different mutterings from various langauge teachers, some saying that ultimtately about 45% of what you earn gross ends up getting taxed (by a combination of social charges, social security, income tax and healthcare contributions).

RE: hours on offer, it depends on many things...all the schools are reliant on business clientele booking their services, and those bookings come and go over the course of the year, so the hours they'll offer you will pretty much be dependent on whether they've got lots of companies on their books at the time you walk through the door with your CV. I've been told by a couple of schools that February is the best time to look for full-time work here (in France thats 35 hours per week), as thats when schools are just about to enter their busiest periods.

In terms of living expenses...it depends what you want to do. A *cheap* two/three course meal in a restaurant, with drinks, will set you back about 25euros. A McDonalds meal costs about 6euros. A can of Coke will cost anything between 1euro and 2.50euros. A week-long metro ticket is 17euros. A sandwich is 3 - 4 euros. Most bars charge about 5 euros for a bottle of beer. A small coffee in a cafe is around 2 euros. I bought a week's worth of groceries (for myself, as a single person) the other day in a supermarket, and it cost me 50 euros.

If you really have 2500 euros per month to spend on living costs and an apartment, you won't have any problems at all. However, I don't know of any language teachers living here who make anywhere near that kind of disposable income every month. But maybe you have another source of income, and you were just planning on teaching here as a kind of top-up thing?

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

[Nmarie]

[riverboat]

The prices I quoted for McDonalds / can of Coke were meant to be generally exemplary of the higher cost of living for EVERYTHING (not just junk food) in Paris. I don't know what the price of groceries is like in the US/Canada, I can only compare to the UK, but certainly groceries here are more expensive than I am used to.

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

[riverboat]

I'm starting to get the impression that we are just used to very different standards of living (different budgets!) in which case we're probably talking at cross purposes!

All I can say is: I lived in London for five years before I came here to Paris, and yes, in general, most things seem more expensive here. I think that perhaps the difference is that it was quite easy to live on a modest budget in London because there were plenty of places (restaurants, shops, supermarkets) catering for people on a budget. Here in Paris, those places don't seem to exist. So yes, if you were to try to buy like-for-like, I think you'd find that nearly everything is at least slightly more expensive in Paris than in London (the forementioned can of coke for example, which is double the price or more nearly everywhere) and when you also factor in the fact that there aren't a whole load of "different" cheaper options to choose from...basically living on a budget is just really, really hard here. At least that's what I've found over the last two months!

Maybe it's just that I haven't found the right places to shop yet. That's an encouraging thought.

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

[Hot2GlobeTrot]

i keep forgetting to bring this up, you seem to be as good a person to ask as anyone.....I'll be flying into paris then heading to cannes for a month then back to paris. I want to get a cell phone before i go to cannes. I've never gotten an international cellphone before, so forgive any stupid questions, but can i just go somewhere in paris, give them a credit card and be hooked up with a phone/ plan? Or do i need a bank account in country? any idea on rates?

[riverboat]

Depends on the type of cellphone you want - a contract one, or a non-contract one.

With the former type, you get better rates but I believe that a French bank account and proof of a permanent address in France is required (I could be wrong, but this is my strong suspicion). For the latter (which I have), you can pretty much walk into a store and buy one. You do, however, need to supply your passport, which they will take a copy of. Strange, but true...this is standard practice when buying a cellphone in France apparently, not just for foreigners but for everyone.

With the no-contract phone, the standard rates are something like 50 centimes per minute (fixed rate, for calling either mobiles or fixed lines in France). Texts are about 20 centimes each. You buy a certain amount of credit each month (via vouchers available in supermarkets/post offices etc), and the credit lasts until you either spend it all on calls/texts OR the credit expires, which can happen before you spend it all. For instance, if you top up with 10 euros of credit, most of the time (depending on the network) this will expire in 15-20 days, unless you use it all up during that time. The bigger the amount of credit you buy in one go, the longer it lasts before expiry.

I'm with Virgin Mobile, because they have a special type of credit called "very long" that lasts longer, in terms of expiry dates, than any other network. You can top up with 10 euros, and it lasts a month. I don't use my mobile phone much, except for very short calls and texting, so this is ideal for me.