Sf the constraints imposed on the population by the global Covid pandemic are still in everyone’s memory, this is not the case for the aid paid to businesses to survive during this period. However, the State had been able to be very generous, largely granting financial relief, exemptions from social contributions and payment assistance, all administered by Urssaf.
Of course, it was expected that, in a second phase, Urssaf would want to ensure that aid was granted to actually eligible companies, but the attitude adopted by this institution from 2023 was particularly surprising. By procedures that are questionable to say the least and on the basis of often hazardous reasoning, Urssaf has sought by all means to call into question the aid granted.
This approach did not go unnoticed, forcing the National Council of the Order of Chartered Accountants to issue a press release in the summer of 2023, while proposing a legal argument aimed at helping affected companies defend themselves. The BPI also intervened to relay the same defense position.
The subject is far from closed: hundreds of disputes are already underway against Urssaf, not to mention the thousands of procedures carried out by Urssaf and which have not yet been the subject of a challenge. The extent of the phenomenon is, however, difficult to quantify, as Urssaf is very silent on the subject, and no official statistics exist to date. Only a rise in the ground observed by accountants with their clients, as well as by legal professionals, made it possible to sound the alarm among the companies concerned.
Aid during Covid
The stakes for Urssaf are very high, with millions of euros likely to be recovered. But the stakes for the companies concerned are even higher, faced with the need to repay tens, or even hundreds, of thousands of euros overnight.
The angle of attack used by Urssaf to question eligibility for Covid aid is the NAF/APE code. This code assigned to a company represents an administrative classification of its main activity. However, benefiting from this aid requires belonging to very specific sectors of activity.
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The strategy chosen by Urssaf is clear: as soon as the NAF/APE code of a company did not belong to a sector of activity eligible for aid, it was automatically requested a full reimbursement of the aid received during the health crisis. However, if the code provides an idea of a company’s activity, it is very common in practice to find that the actual activity of said company is very different from its presumed activity.
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