Carte de séjour renewal: the documents checklist, in English
What every titre de séjour renewal on ANEF asks for, the extras per status (salarié, étudiant, vie privée), and the formatting rules that cause silent rejections.
Renewals fail for boring reasons: a missing quittance, a scan the portal can't read, a passport page nobody photographed. This is the checklist to assemble BEFORE you start the ANEF renewal form. The form times out, and hunting for a document mid-submission is how errors happen.
The core set: every status needs these
- Passport: identity page + visa page + every stamped page. One PDF or clear photos.
- Your current titre de séjour, both sides.
- Proof of address less than 6 months old: EDF/Engie bill, internet bill, or quittance de loyer. Phone bills are often refused.
- If you're hosted by someone: attestation d'hébergement + their ID + their proof of address.
- e-photo code from an approved photo booth or photographer (the 22-digit code, not a scan of prints).
- Justificatif of your resources. Each status asks for something different here; see below.
Per-status extras
The formatting rules nobody states
- Every upload must be under the portal's per-file size cap. Compress scans, and don't photograph documents against dark backgrounds.
- Multi-page documents go in as ONE file, not five photos.
- French translations by a traducteur assermenté for any foreign-language civil document (birth certificate, marriage certificate). Regular translations get silently rejected.
- Names must match across every document. If your passport hyphenates and your payslips don't, add a note explaining it, because agents flag mismatches rather than resolving them.
When to start
ANEF opens renewals from 4 months (occasionally 2, depending on the titre) before expiry. Submit as early as the portal allows: an early dossier that stalls still leaves you time to get an attestation de prolongation before the expiry date; a late dossier doesn't.
Keep the paper trail
Every attestation, quittance, and payslip you gather for this renewal will be asked for again, by CAF, by your bank, and by the next renewal. Store the scans somewhere you can find them. Mes Papiers keeps them in a dossier, reads each new letter the préfecture sends back, and reminds you before the deadlines it finds.