Other news for february 2025

Meal Vouchers

Created more than 50 years ago, meal vouchers are payment vouchers offered optionally by employers to their employees. They are jointly funded by the employer and the employee. With these vouchers, employees can pay for meals at restaurants or purchase food products for immediate consumption in some shops (cold cuts, caterers, bakeries, food distribution businesses, fruit, and vegetable retailers…). To support the purchasing power of the French public, employees have been allowed since 2022 to use meal vouchers for any food product, whether or not it is directly consumable (e.g., rice, pasta, flour, eggs, cereals, butter, unprocessed meat, or fish), except for alcohol, confectionery, infant products, and animal feed. This exemption has been extended until December 31, 2026.

Learning French

As part of the “immigration and integration” law, the government has adopted measures to facilitate French language learning for allophone employees—those whose native language is a foreign language—particularly by allowing them to take time off during work hours for training courses.

Public Procurement

To improve access to public procurement for VSEs and SMEs, public authorities have implemented several measures to simplify applicable rules. Notably, the measure allowing public buyers to conclude works contracts without prior advertising or competitive bidding for needs valued under €100,000 (excluding tax) has been extended until December 31, 2025. Similarly, an exemption from prior advertising and competitive bidding is now permitted for innovative defense or security contracts with an estimated value below €300,000 (excluding tax). Additionally, the maximum amount of the retention of security for public contracts with SMEs has been reduced from 5% to 3% when the public buyer is the State, a public administrative establishment (excluding health establishments with annual operating expenditures over €60 million), or a local authority with similar expenditure thresholds.

Economic Activity Courts

Starting January 1, 2025, and on an experimental basis for four years, several commercial courts will be replaced by “economic activity courts” (TAEs :Tribunaux des activités économiques (TAE) ) with extended jurisdiction, particularly regarding the prevention and resolution of business difficulties. The twelve commercial courts transitioning to TAEs are located in Avignon, Auxerre, Le Havre, Le Mans, Limoges, Lyon, Marseille, Nancy, Nanterre, Paris, Saint-Brieuc, and Versailles.