If you don't have a canteen or company restaurant, you can use meal vouchers to pay for your employees' meals. Conditions of allocation, rules for use, financing... We present the regulations governing employer-side meal vouchers as of January 1, 2023.
Allocation of meal vouchers
Employers are not obliged to provide meal vouchers to their employees. They can also choose to provide a canteen or dining room or to pay a lunch allowance.
If you have chosen to grant meal vouchers to your employees, they are entitled to one voucher per meal included in their daily working hours, whether they are employees (full-time or part-time), trainees or temporary workers.
The meal voucher is partly financed by the employer, who pays between 50% and 60% of its value.
Form of meal vouchers
There are several formats of luncheon vouchers:
- Paper tickets in the form of a chequebook
- Prepaid and reloadable smart card (usable in the same terminals as bank cards)
- Access to an application on a mobile phone (smartphone)
Worklife offers dematerialised meal vouchers in the form of a payment card.
Conditions for obtaining meal vouchers
Who is entitled to meal vouchers?
In the companies that offer it, the allocation of meal vouchers concerns :
- full-time employees, regardless of the employment contract (permanent or fixed-term)
- part-time employees, if the meal break is provided for in their contract (an employee who works only in the morning or only in the afternoon does not receive meal vouchers)
- trainees
- temporary workers
- apprenticeship or qualification contracts
- employees of employer groups
- teleworking employees, if they benefit from the same working conditions as employees working in the company
- employees serving their notice period (except during the cumulative period of job search hours at the end of the notice period)
- public officials, if requested by the employer
However, they are not entitled to meal vouchers:
- Absent employees (due to illness, work accident, paid leave, time off work, etc.)
- part-time employees whose working day ends before or begins after the lunch break
- corporate officers (managers, chairman of SAS, etc.), unless they combine their corporate office with an employment contract
Criteria for awarding meal vouchers
"The meal voucher is considered a social benefit, and it is generally accepted that it should be granted on an equal basis to the company's salaried staff," says the National Commission for Meal Vouchers (CNTR).
The employer may nevertheless make the allocation of meal vouchers subject to certain criteria, provided that these are objective and do not discriminate between beneficiaries.
The mere difference in professional category is not a valid award criterion: for example, the employer cannot treat managers and non-managers in the same situation differently. Nor can he make a distinction between sedentary and non-sedentary employees.
On the other hand, case law has accepted that the employer can determine the allocation of meal vouchers to the employee on the basis of the distance between the workplace and the employee's home.
How many meal vouchers can I get?
The rule for allocating meal vouchers is simple: one meal voucher per eligible employee for one day worked (working day) and only if the meal is included in the working hours, according to article R3262-7 of the Labour Code. Legally, employees are therefore only entitled to one meal voucher per day worked, i.e. a maximum of 220 days per year for a full-time employee, not counting paid holidays, public holidays and sick leave.
However, an employee whose work schedule includes two meals in the same day may receive two meal vouchers.
Financing of meal vouchers
The employer's contribution to meal vouchers
The employer is free to determine the amount of the settlement value (face value) of meal vouchers. In accordance with Article 6A of Annex 4 of the General Tax Code, the meal voucher is partly financed by the employer, who must pay between 50% and 60% of its value. The employee must pay between 40% and 50% of the value of the ticket.
A company that decides to introduce a meal voucher system for its employees must obtain them from one of the private companies specialising in issuing vouchers, including Worklife.
The employer must pay for the restaurant vouchers at the latest when the vouchers are delivered and for their full value in full discharge.
The company issuing the vouchers must reimburse those presented to it by restaurant owners and traders authorised to accept them in the course of their business activity, within a maximum period of 21 days from the date of issue.
To be exempt from social security contributions, the employer's contribution must be within the limit of €6.91 per voucher for 2023 vouchers, as indicated on the URSSAF network website. The value of the meal voucher qualifying for the maximum exemption is between €11.52 and €13.82.
If the employer's contribution exceeds this limit (which is not prohibited), the fraction of the contribution exceeding the legal limit is added back to the company's social security contribution base.
What is the maximum limit for using meal vouchers?
Since October 1, 2022, employees have benefited from more flexible conditions for using their meal vouchers, with an increase in the ceiling from the traditional 19 euros to 25 euros per working day (article R3262-10 of the French Labor Code).
The date of delivery of the meal vouchers
The texts do not set any deadline for the employer to distribute paper meal vouchers or to credit the employee's meal voucher card. He is free to choose the management and organisation he wishes.
Paper luncheon vouchers are generally given to the employee at the end of the month (or beginning of the month) for the previous month, in the form of a booklet. If the employer has opted for the dematerialisation of meal vouchers (a contactless payment card), he can again recharge it whenever he wants during the month, but he can also opt for a quarterly or annual recharge.
What is the validity of meal vouchers?
Luncheon vouchers are valid for a limited period of time (not permanently).
In their paper version, article R3262-5 of the French Labor Code stipulates that luncheon vouchers are valid for the calendar year to which they refer (also known as the "vintage").
In addition, there is an extra period of use, to allow you to use up any remaining meal tickets from the year of issue. This period runs from January 1 of the following year. It lasts one month for paper vouchers: meal vouchers issued in year N are therefore in principle usable until January 31 of year N+1 (the following year).
The dematerialized version of meal vouchers can be used until the last day of February of the year following issue.
How is the postponement of the vintage for dematerialised restaurant vouchers going?
As explained above, the additional period of use lasts two months (compared with one for paper vouchers). Cardholders can use their "vintage" vouchers until the last day of February of the following year (February 28, 2023 for vouchers credited to the card in 2022).
Worklife meal vouchers are automatically converted into credits for the current year, without any action on the part of the company or the employee.
Part-time work, partial unemployment, teleworking: what rights to meal vouchers?
Restaurant vouchers and part-time work
A part-time employee is entitled to a meal voucher when his or her working hours are interrupted by a lunch break, since Article R3262-7 of the Labour Code stipulates that the only condition for obtaining a meal voucher is that the employee's meal is "included in his or her daily working hours". Conversely, an employee who works either in the morning (before the lunch break) or in the afternoon (after the lunch break) cannot benefit from it. On the other hand, an employee who works a certain number of days in the week can claim meal vouchers.
Luncheon vouchers and partial activity
What happens if the employee is placed on partial unemployment (also called partial activity) by his employer? There are two possible situations:
- if the employee is on part-time work several days a week: he is entitled to meal vouchers, provided that his work periods include a meal break and a return to work after this break (he is not entitled if he only comes to work in the morning or afternoon)
- if the company is closed: the employee, whose employment contract is suspended during this period, no longer needs to take a meal break at work. As a result, the employer does not have to give him meal vouchers
Luncheon vouchers and teleworking
As teleworkers have the same rights and benefits as employees working on the company's premises, they are entitled to meal vouchers if their employer has introduced this scheme. Teleworkers are entitled to meal vouchers for each day worked, as long as their working day is interspersed with a break for a meal.
Are meal vouchers taxable?
The employer's contribution to the financing of meal vouchers is not subject to income tax (IR).
Can the employee refuse the meal vouchers and how?
Meal vouchers were introduced as an alternative for companies unable to provide their employees with an in-house restaurant. However, employers are not obliged to issue meal vouchers to their employees. Employees, for their part, are free to accept this benefit or not, in the same way as they are free to choose whether or not to eat in the company restaurant.
There are many reasons for refusing meal vouchers, such as going home during the lunch break, having food allergies or chronic illnesses such as diabetes, following a specific diet, etc. However, an employee is not obliged to justify the reason for refusing the meal vouchers allocated by his or her employer.
An employee may refuse to accept a meal voucher at any time, either on or after hiring. However, they must inform their employer as soon as possible so that the latter can notify the organisation responsible for issuing the meal vouchers.
It is sufficient for the employee to send a letter to his employer in which he expresses his choice not to participate in this scheme and specifies the desired date for the execution.
The letter confirms the employee's decision and protects the company from any accusation of discrimination, as the employer is obliged to offer meal vouchers to all employees without exception.
Good to know: Employees can change their minds and return to the meal voucher solution offered by their company.
What changes if the meal vouchers are refused?
An employee who refuses this benefit will not be able to claim financial compensation from his employer to cover the employer's share of the meal vouchers. The employer's contribution is lost.
Restaurant vouchers: what to do if an employee leaves the company?
When an employee is no longer part of the company, whether he or she resigns, is made redundant or has a contract expired, he or she will no longer be able to benefit from the employee benefits of the same company.
Many companies pay meal vouchers at the end of the month for days worked, which means that when the employee leaves the company, the adjustment at the end will be based on the past month. When terminating the employment contract, the company can give the employee the choice of keeping the meal vouchers and spending them until they are exhausted, or returning them and recovering the unspent advance.
If the employee leaves the company with meal vouchers, provided they are still valid, he/she will no longer be able to request reimbursement in the event that the card is lost, stolen or blocked. The remaining credit on the card cannot be recovered or reimbursed because the balance of all accounts has been signed by the employee and the latter is no longer part of the company's workforce.
In the case of companies that pay the amount of meal vouchers upstream, article R3262-11 of the French Labor Code stipulates that employees leaving the company must return to the employer, at the time of their departure, any meal vouchers in their possession that have been overpaid. He will then be reimbursed for the amount of his contribution to the purchase of these vouchers.
The amount reimbursed by the employer corresponds to the part paid by the employee when purchasing the meal vouchers. This amount is reported on the last pay slip as a net value, without charges or taxes.
