Busy Business Ombudsman

This service set up by the Ministry of Economy and Finance has been terribly busy since the beginning of the health crisis. Despite that, 75% of mediations undertaken by it are successful.

According to Bercy, from 60 a week before the crisis, the number of applications has jumped to 600 after the lock-down.

In concrete terms, between March 16 and June 16, 2020, the Business Ombudsman received more than 5,000 requests for mediation. 98% of the applications made during this period of crisis came from SMBs (small and medium businesses).

Unfair practices accounted for 40% of the complaints to the Ombudsman, such as brutal breaching of contracts, imposing a unilateral price reduction on suppliers, or claiming for penalties for late delivery while companies were unable to deliver due to the lock-down...). As for the difficulties of paying rents, they accounted for 10% of the applications filed by companies.