What about your employees - partial operation

To address the issues associated with the consequences of coronavirus (decline or shutdown of business, lock-down obligation, etc.), please file an application for partial operation as soon as possible. Contracts are then suspended and consent by employees is not required.

 

A press release from the Ministry of Employment states that a decree should be published promptly that would allow companies a 30-day period to file their application, with retrospective effect.

Below you will find information on the implementation of partial operation (=partial unemployment).

Above all, the priority is to create a company space via the link below.

https://activitepartielle.emploi.gouv.fr/aparts/.

The log-in codes will be sent to you after a period of 24 to 48 hours. We therefore advise that you create the space as soon as possible.

 

As a result, an application for authorised partial operation must be made via the website.

When making your preliminary application, the main information to be provided via the dedicated portal will be as follows: 

• Company name and SIRET;
• The number of company employees; 
• The employees affected by the partial operation and the predicted number of hours applied for for the period;
• Bank details specifying the first 8 characters of the BIC;
• The opinion of the Social and Economic Committee (“CSE”), where applicable.

 

In principle, all applications must be filed via the dedicated portal https://activitepartielle.emploi.gouv.fr/ before employees are actually placed in partial operation. If it is not possible to file applications for partial operation before placing employees in partial operation, employers may file their applications for partial operation within a reasonable time frame after the start of the period applied for.

In the case of applications related to coronavirus, the time frame for reviewing the file has been reduced to 48 hours (instead of 15 days previously).

With regard to the reason specified for the claim, Covid is an adequate reason. Simply state "Covid19" or "Coronavirus". It is not necessary to provide any further justification before applying for authorisation.

The reduced operations or the shutdown of operations must be temporary and collective. It must therefore affect the entire establishment or part thereof: production unit, workshop, service, team. All employees of the company are intended to benefit from compensation for partial operation, including part-time employees and home workers.

In summary: partial operation is a collective measure, which must therefore not affect one employee in particular but it can affect an objective category of employees who are part of the same service for example.

The principle is that the employer must pay compensation to the employee.

• The employee currently receives 70% of their previous gross salary (i.e. approximately 84% of their net salary), calculated on the basis of a 35-hour week for a full-time employee, for hours not worked (or 100% of the net remuneration if the employee trains during hours not worked).
• Hours paid but not worked are not subject to the flat-rate payment on wages or to social security contributions.
• The employer receives a flat-rate allowance from the State, exceptionally fixed at 8.04 euros per hour not worked in the case of COVID-19 (for companies with -250 employees, for others, the amount is fixed at 7.23 euros).A press release dated 16/03 states that a decree should be published shortly to fix the payment at 100% within the limit of 4.5 times the minimum wage. We will keep you informed as soon as it is published.

Thereafter, at the start of each month, compensation for partial operation must be applied for via the website https://activitepartielle.emploi.gouv.fr/aparts/, using the codes provided at the time of consent to the original application.

• On that application, the number of hours worked and hours not worked must be entered for each employee concerned.
• That application will activate the compensation of the business by the State and UNÉDIC. Otherwise, the employer shall not receive any compensation.

For information purposes, there is a compensation simulator: http://www.simulateurap.emploi.gouv.fr/

 

All our teams of employment and HR experts are playing an active role and remain at your disposal by phone or by email to support you in your partial operation application and to answer any questions you may have.

Please read our subsequent article "Your employees must keep their children under the age of 16 at home: they are automatically placed on sick leave"  

 

“Our experts are constantly monitoring regulatory changes providing support to businesses. Our articles are updated by midday on the basis of press releases and the publication of decrees by official bodies, which are deciphered by our experts. There may sometimes be a couple of hours delay between the official texts and our publication, the purpose of which is to provide you with preliminary answers to your questions."