WANT TO WORK AS FREELANCER, INDEPENDENT PROFESSIONAL, FOOD DELIVERY PARTNER OR BECOME A TRAVELLING VENDOR…
If you’d like to work independently or start a business in France, or you’ve an idea of starting an individual project beside your regular job, you’ve to register yourself as a Micro-entrepreneur.
In the beginning, in 2009, the status was designated as ‘Auto-entrepreneur’ to allow people with low paying jobs to supplement their income by providing services to individuals or companies, with the exception of certain regulated activities.
In 2016, the two legal statuses, Auto-entrepreneur and Micro-enterprise, were merged into a single status ‘Micro-Entrepreneur’ to facilitate stronger economic activities.
The benefits of Micro-entrepreneur status :
1. Social charges to be paid as a percentage of revenue depending on the line of work. For example, if you work as a food delivery partner, you’ve to pay 22.10% of your income to URSSAF
2. Exempt from Value added Tax (TVA) on a turnover limit of €34,400 for services, and €85,800 for the sale of goods
ACRE - reduction of contributions
NOTE: Support for business creators and takeovers (ACRE) is a contribution reduction scheme designed to encourage the creation and takeover of businesses. Currently, for food delivery services, you have to pay 11% of your income to URSSAF after the reduction for the first three quarters of the working year, after which the contribution rate will increase in instalments to the normal rate.
- Job seeker receiving unemployment benefits
- Job seeker registered with Pôle Emploi (Work office) for 6 months during the period of last 18 months who is not receiving unemployment benefits
- Recipient of Revenu de Solidarité Active (RSA) or Allocation de Solidarité Spécifique (ASS)
- Young people between 18 and 25 years old
- A person under 30 years who does not receive unemployment benefits (insufficient employment period to qualify) or person under 30 years of age who is recognized as disabled
- An employee who is dismissed from a company in safeguard, in recovery or in judicial liquidation takes over the activity of the company
- A person who has signed a business project support contract (mentioned in article L. 127-1 of the French Commercial Code), provided that he or she meets one of the 6 conditions listed above on the date of signing this contract
- Person creating a company located in a priority district of the city policy (QPPV)
- Recipient of the shared child education benefit (PrePare)
Additional conditions to benefit from the ACRE :
- Not having benefited from it during the previous 3 years
- Have complied with a waiting period of one calendar year in case of resumption of activity
Important information:
If you are considered to be under one of the above conditions, you must submit a certificate to that effect to apply for ACRE. This request must be made within 45 days following the date of publication of the K-Bis.
Micro-entrepreneur: maximum turnover ceiling
Attention: In the micro-entrepreneur regime, maximum turnover ceiling is set at €72,600 for services, and the selling activities cannot exceed €176,200.
If your revenues are higher than the abovementioned slabs, you are obliged to move your business to a different legal structure, such as an individual enterprise (EI) or a limited company (SASU, SAS, SARL or EURL).
Important information on quarterly declaration to URSSAF
If you don't want to start working after receiving your K-bis, it will be valid for two years. On the other hand, even if you do not work, you must declare quarterly income to URSSAF mentioning '0' . If you don't do that, you may have to pay fines in the future.
Do you have to pay Cotisation Foncière des Entreprises (CFE) for food delivery service?
Being a micro-entrepreneur, you've to pay the CFE at the end of the year, except in the following cases:
- If you are in your first year of activity, for example, you've started working in 2021, you will not pay CFE in 2021, but in 2022.
- If your annual turnover is less than €5,000 (even after the first year of activity)
In this case you will receive an email from the Income Tax Office (impôts.gouv.fr) instructing you to open a professional account. You can pay CFE through that account.
Micro-entrepreneur status is not appropriate for all lines of work, such as artistic or a regulated profession. Before registration make sure whether your professional activity complies with the law. In case of doubt, talk to a competent person or write to us.
Attention: Salaried resident card holders (Titre de séjour -salarié) are not entitled to open micro-entrepreneur account.
Please note that a 4 years subsidiary protection card is not very compatible with the registration system. There are 50% chance of rejection.
Students holding nationality of one of the twenty-eight countries of the EU and Algeria can become a micro-entrepreneur. The only condition is that the address of his/her micro-enterprise should be in France. But this is not possible for students from other countries. They need to change status. Those who want to give up their student residence permit and apply for a temporary professional residence permit, to validate the change of status, they will need to justify a viable project and provide all the documents in this regard to the prefecture (projections over three years, business plan, etc.).
HOW TO WORK WITH UBER EATS AS A FOOD DELIVERY PARTNER
When you sign up as a food delivery partner on Uber Eats platform, you must first submit your K-bis, Uber modified crime report and your photo ID (selfie).
After that, they will ask you to submit your Uber bag photo along with your resident card or French identity card. Then you’ve to wait for an activation message that may take a few days or more depending on the partner requirement of the platform.
Once your account is activated, you should work very carefully and be punctual. You must pick up orders from the restaurants quickly and deliver those to the customers on time.
You have to stay alert when Uber asks you for a selfie because you are obliged to send the selfie within 10 minutes. Otherwise, they will consider your activity as fraudulent and it will result in permanent deactivation of your account.
Your customer satisfaction rate must always be above 90%, otherwise your account will be deactivated.
Every six months, Uber asks for a certificate of vigilance issued by the URSSAF and it is mandatory to provide this document on your account, otherwise your Uber Rider account could be temporarily suspended.
How to obtain vigilance certificate?
It is the URSSAF that issues the document. If you are regular with the URSSAF regarding the quarterly declaration of contributions & payment, it is possible to download the certificate from your URSSAF account.
HOW TO BECOME A DELIVEROO RIDER
To become a DELIVEROO Rider, it is possible to register on the platform with K-bis and Bank RIB. The applicant has to choose his/her vehicle among bikes, electric bikes, scooters and electric scooters. If the applicant chooses another vehicle instead of a normal bike, it is mandatory to present the proof of ownership of this particular vehicle (such as purchase invoice, registration certificate known as certificat d’immatriculation in French) and the photo of the vehicle along with the resident card or French identity card of the applicant.
Specifically, for electric bikes and electric scooters, it is mandatory to present the purchase invoice. Registration certificate (Carte Grise) is mandatory for a scooter.
Note that if the registration date of the K-bis is older than 5 months, the vigilance certificate will be required.
After the activation of the DELIVEROO rider account, the applicant will receive an email to create an account on the PROVIGIS platform where the user will submit his vigilance certificate, the status of K-bis (known as Avis de situation de SIRENE in French) and a declaration of non-existence of foreign employees, and these 3 documents must be renewed every 3 months.
A rider must be careful about the time while picking up orders at the restaurants and delivering those to the customers. DELIVEROO gives priority to the satisfaction of its customers. The rider’s account can be permanently deactivated after a customer’s complaint. DELIVEROO has a zero tolerance policy on non respect of delivery rules.
Since a few months, DELIVEROO asks Riders to take selfies at work, just like Uber Eats.
Note that since a couple of days, DELIVEROO is asking new applicants to submit ‘casier judiciaire (police record)’ during the registration process.
HOW TO WORK WITH STUART
The following documents are required to work with STUART:
KBIS (Micro-entrepreneur)
Bank details (RIB)
Identity card
Attestation de vigilance (if the micro-entreprise is more than six months old)
Otherwise, the rules for working with STUART are exactly the same as for the other platforms mentioned above.
Note: To finalise applicant’s registration, STUART arranges an appointment at its office. You have to take your bicycle there. This platform will host a training session lasting one to two hours.
Learn how to talk or send messages to clients while delivering food
You’re working as a food delivery partner in France, but finding it difficult to communicate with your clients due to lack of proficiency in French. We’re now making some videos on this topic which will help you to broaden your written and verbal communication skills in the field.