France has one the biggest civil service (related to the amount of citizen) and also the worst and most inefficient in the world. Everything that can be done by one person is done in France by 3-4 and more clerks. As a result nobody really knows what is going on, papers are being lost, communication between the different offices is lousy and the citizen get the worst possible service. People are really very nice in these offices but extremely useless.
here is a little story i have been through.