A report from La Rochelle (a pilot I know personally) states that the police there require you to meet them, so de facto they are acting illegally. There is an A4 sheet of paper on the wall there giving the police phone number, so you call that and wait…
The best solution is likely to be to message your ETA to a French speaker on the ground, while you are still airborne 
Ibra wrote:
There are recent reports from Belgium, at least 3 UK pilots have recently been asked to pay 400E fines this year as “they did not go to see the police before departing” (they saw the customs & the operator), this seems like game between customs & police in Antwerp EBAW?
What actually happened? The police (politie) are in the arrivals hall of the airport, but when departing by GA you go back into the arrivals hall after airport security, and then walk out onto the apron. The police are supposed to be there 0530-2200Z (0430-2100Z in the summer), and they know you are arriving and departing because of the Gendec. Were the police not there / did not answer the call bell that is at their window? There’s enough airport staff around who I am sure could help you find the police if they weren’t answering …
As for customs (douane), I’ve never seem them actually there, but there is a separate Gendec for that. I don’t know if the police officers handle customs tasks on behalf of the customs authority.
You don’t need to see the airport operator, as they will send the invoice via email. So it seems to me more likely that the pilots that were apparently fined saw the police but not customs, and were fined for that. But that is surprising too.
