Any document containing obligations for the employee or provisions knowledge of which is necessary for the performance of his work must be written in French.
This rule is not applicable to documents received from abroad or intended for foreigners.
Incurs the cassation judgment which to dismiss the employee's request for payment of back pay on variable remuneration holds that the circumstance according to which the working documents in the company are written in English cannot be sufficient to make the employee's remuneration plans setting the objectives necessary for determining the contractual variable remuneration, although it had noted that these plans were not drawn up in French, without noting that they had been received from abroad
This is what the Court of Cassation affirms in a judgment of October 13rd, 2023 (n°22-13.770).
1) Facts and procedure
An employee was hired as mission director by the company Unisys France as of March 15, 2004. Ultimately, he performed the functions of pre-sales resource project manager.
On December 27, 2017, the employee submitted requests to the industrial tribunal relating to the execution and termination of his employment contract.
The employment relationship ended on December 31, 2017.
The Versailles Court of Appeal, in a judgment dated January 20, 2022, rejected the employee's request for payment of back pay on variable remuneration.
The employee then filed a cassation appeal.
2) Means
The employee complains about the decision to reject his requests for payment of variable remuneration reminders, while:
- documents setting the objectives necessary for determining an employee's variable remuneration which are not written in French cannot be enforced against him;
- that in this case, the court of appeal, which noted that the documents setting the objectives necessary for determining the employee's variable remuneration were written in English, but nevertheless decided that "this circumstance cannot suffice to make remuneration plans unenforceable against the employee” thus violated article L. 1321-6 of the labor code.
3) Solution
The social chamber of the Court of Cassation overturns and annuls the judgment of the Court of Appeal of Versailles under article L. 1321-6 of the Labor Code which provides that “any document containing obligations for the employee or provisions whose knowledge is necessary for the execution of his work must be written in French. This rule is not applicable to documents received from abroad or intended for foreigners.”
In this case, the Versailles Court of Appeal rejected the employee's request for payment of back pay on variable remuneration, considering that the sole circumstance that the working documents were written in English cannot be sufficient to make it unenforceable against the employee. employee compensation plans.
The Court of Cassation considers that the Court of Appeal violated the above-mentioned text because:
“In ruling thus, although it had noted that the documents setting the objectives necessary for determining the contractual variable remuneration were not written in French, the Court of Appeal, which did not note that they had received from abroad, violated the above-mentioned text.
4) Analysis
This solution is not new.
It is in line with the previous case law of the social chamber of the Court of Cassation which had already ruled in this sense and considered that it was of little importance that the company had an international activity (Cass. Soc., May 3, 2018, no ° 16-13.736), that the employee is bilingual ((Cass. Soc., June 29, 2011, n° 09-67.492), or that he works in both languages (French and English) (Cass. Soc., 2 April 2014, n° 12-30.181).
The social chamber has also already recalled this solution in a ruling dated June 7, 2023.
Thus, it does not matter whether the working language of the company is English and whether the employee understands English perfectly, if the objectives are not written in French, the employee is entitled to full payment of his variable remuneration because the documents setting the objectives are unenforceable against it.
Sources
Cass. soc., 13 octobre 2023, n° 22-13.770 https://www.courdecassation.fr/decision/65265beafe43be831806aac5
Rémunération variable : les objectifs doivent impérativement être rédigés en français.
Salariés, cadres, cadres dirigeants : objectifs rédigés en anglais = inopposabilité au salarié https://www.legavox.fr/blog/frederic-chhum-avocats/salaries-cadres-cadres-dirigeants-objectifs-15114.htm
Rémunération variable des salariés : mode d’emploi https://www.village-justice.com/articles/Remuneration-variable-salaries-emploi,10594.html
Frédéric CHHUM avocat et ancien membre du conseil de l’ordre des avocats de Paris (mandat 2019-2021)
CHHUM AVOCATS (Paris, Nantes, Lille)
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