One of the surprising aspects of starting a business in France is, for many people, the compulsory registration with a ‘chamber’ such as a Chambre de Commerce et d’Industrie (CCI) or de Métiers et de l’Artisanat (CMA).
Broadly speaking, registration is needed at the CCI for businesses which sell things, the CMA for those who make things or offer trades and certain services and the Chambre d’Agriculture for anyone who grows things to sell. Registration is with Urssaf for those in the professions libérales.
Anyone who tries to set up a stall at a French town market, will find that an inscription number from the CCI is required.
In terms of business set-up, these chambers are called the centre de formalités des entreprises (see this link for more: tinyurl.com/which-CFE).
Each has its specifics but it is the CCI which probably plays the largest role in French political life, with the notables, usually from large businesses who sit on the departmental CCI boards, often being the same people who are prominent in local political parties.
Officially the CCI is now a ‘one stop shop’ for those thinking of setting up a ‘selling’ business, and promises to help with all the steps of dealing with the other government departments.
As with many French institutions variations happen both at regional and departmental level so the experience with one CCI might be very different to the experience at another.
Signing up is usually accompanied by fees to register the business with the registre du commerces et des sociétés, a register of business information held by the local tribunal de commerce (see here for more: tinyurl.com/registercost). This is now compulsory even for those on the micro-entreprise status, formerly known as auto-entreprise, though they are dispensed from the registration fee.
The level of fees varies with the status of your business, and many CCIs offer at this point a paid for service, usually around €70, to help you through the administrative formalities.
The chamber will also liaise with the bodies collecting for compulsory health insurance and Urssaf, which oversees the collection of social security charges and some taxes such as Contribution Sociale Généralisée and Contribution au Remboursement de la Dette Sociale.
With most businesses these social cotisations, established by complicated calculations based on percentages of your business activity are fixed and involve certain minimums, whether the business is making money or not (in theory only micro-entreprise companies escape this rule). The health bodies and Urssaf are quick to launch recovery procedures if payments are not made on time.
So one of the benefits of joining a chamber is that it puts you in the French social security system and you get officially registered and allocated a Kbis registration certificate, including your Siren number identifying the firm.
Another big function of the chambers is training. For example, CCIs almost all offer a training course for new businesses, typically five days for around €450, covering the basics of French company law, administration and taxation, as well as business basics such as how to calculate a profitable margin (for those starting artisan businesses, whose chamber is the CMA, a €260 set-up course of at least 30 hours is obligatory).
One big advantage is that on completion you obtain a certificate of competence, which opens the door to business loans from local banks. Links between local banks, often co-operatives with strong local links, and CCIs are, usually strong and friendly.
The CCIs can also help with exports – in spite of attempts at rationalisation there are still numerous official export promotion bodies in France and the CCIs are among them. Through their links export guarantees, foreign banking, and other services are available.
Apart from set-up training for new businesses, in theory chambers offer other training opportunities covering such topics as accounting, buying, selling, basic and advanced computer training, telecoms and administration and language courses, including sometimes French as a foreign language.
Having said which it is often difficult for the self-employed to access such training, with work-related opportunities being on the whole more accessible to salaried employees (see more below).
Training for the self-employed
For years it has been difficult for self-employed people to access training in spite of them having to pay into a training fund.
Contributions towards training are added to the social cotisations every year but trying to get training in return is difficult.
In fact Connexion could not find any self-employed workers who had obtained training using their contributions. A request to the Work Ministry for contacts also drew a blank.
Having said which the government appears to be making efforts to help the self-employed have access to similar training schemes as salaried workers – but it will be 2019 before these are effective.
This revolves around a new website moncompteactivite.gouv.fr which is meant to provide a place where workers, salaried and independent, can access their rights.
For the self-employed, their 2018 contributions to the training fund will only be registered in 2019 so, if all goes to plan, it is from then that they can benefit.
The first step using the site would be to find a course which meets your needs. They may be offered by public bodies associated with the chambers as well as by private firms. The site will include the chance to search for courses open to the self-employed but at present if you click to find one (Je recherche une formation) the Travailleur Indépendant choice is not yet working. Once a course is found, you will have to create a dossier giving details of the training, why it is needed and its cost and send it to a funding body.
Under the existing system of work skills training the Fonds d’Assurance Formation are the main ones. The Work Ministry has not yet clarified who the funding bodies will be under the new system. If the dossier is accepted, the worker can do a course, possibly having to pay for it upfront themselves then be reimbursed by the funding body.
A spokeswoman for the Work Ministry confirmed that independent workers will be able to access their training rights through the website from spring 2019 if they paid training fund contributions in 2018.
She said self-employed people who pay income tax are also entitled to a tax credit for training (crédit d’impôt pour la formation des dirigeants d’entreprise) equal to the hours of training (up to a maximum of 40 a year) multiplied by the Smic minimum wage hourly gross rate, eg. €9.88 x 40 = €395.20. It is claimed as a deduction at the point of paying income tax on the business revenue for the year when the training was done and it is only available to those declaring under the réel tax regime, so not micro-entreprises.
