You signed the share purchase agreement, called a SPA, from London, New York or Dubai, the funds left your account, the French target became yours, and the first months looked quiet. Then the letter arrives: a tax reassessment, called a redressement fiscal, covering years before your purchase, or a social-security bill from URSSAF, the French body that collects employers social charges, or a court judgment ordering your new company to pay a supplier for an invoice issued long before closing. The seller who cashed your cheque stops answering emails, and your French accountant tells you the debt predates the sale but sits on your balance sheet now. This is the exact moment the asset-and-liability warranty, called in France a garantie d’actif-passif, was drafted for: a contractual promise by the seller to compensate you for liabilities rooted before closing that surface afterwards. This guide explains, in plain English, the two battles a foreign buyer must win: first, triggering the warranty with a notification the seller cannot discard as late or vague, and second, forcing payment through a French court from abroad when the seller refuses. Every acronym is explained, every decisive rule is quoted word for word from the statute or ruling with an official link, and the strategy accounts for the fact that you live outside France. If you have not yet signed, read first our guide on foreign-investment clearance before acquiring a French company, because some deals need State approval before closing; this article takes over once you already own the shares and a hidden debt appears.

I. How do you trigger the warranty before the seller declares you out of time

A. What counts as a covered hidden liability and how do you notify the seller so the notice survives

The warranty only protects what the contract says it protects, and French courts hold buyers to the words the parties chose. The starting point is therefore a slow reading of your SPA, with three questions: which events trigger the warranty, within which contractual period must the triggering event have occurred or been revealed, and through which formal notice must you warn the seller. Most French clauses cover any increase in liabilities or decrease in assets whose origin predates closing, including tax, social-security and litigation debts that were unknown, unprovisioned or understated in the closing accounts. The binding force of those words is absolute once signed: Les contrats légalement formés tiennent lieu de loi à ceux qui les ont faits. In practice, that sentence cuts both ways: it forces the seller to pay what the clause promises, but it also lets the seller reject any claim that falls outside the clause, however unfair the outcome feels. A Paris ruling of 11 March 2025 illustrates how strictly courts separate the contractual coverage period from the time you have to act: the court distinguished the period during which the triggering event must have arisen from any procedural delay, holding that the clause fixed the window in which the event giving rise to the warranty must have occurred, and it declared the buyers action admissible because the debt, rooted before the sale and known before the contractual cut-off, fell inside the warranty. The lesson for a foreign buyer is direct: map the contractual window on day one, and never confuse it with the statutory prescription period discussed in Part II.

Once the debt is identified as covered, the notification you send decides the rest of the case. French SPAs almost always require written notice within a short contractual period, often 15 to 30 days from discovery, sent by registered letter with acknowledgment of receipt, called a lettre recommandée avec accusé de réception, or by bailiff, called a commissaire de justice. From abroad, send both: instruct your French counsel to dispatch the registered letter the same day you discover the debt, and keep the postal receipts, the tracking history and a full copy of the contents. The notice must state the facts, identify the SPA clause, describe the debt and its pre-closing origin, quantify the loss or explain why the amount is not yet final, and expressly reserve all rights under the warranty. Vague emails asking the seller to call you back achieve nothing and start no clock. The duty of good faith reinforces this discipline at every stage: Les contrats doivent être négociés, formés et exécutés de bonne foi. Cette disposition est d’ordre public. A seller who receives a precise, documented and timely notice loses the two easiest defences, lateness and vagueness, and must argue the substance instead. Keep every exchange in writing from that point on: French judges distrust reconstructed telephone memories, especially when the buyer testifies from another continent.

Sellers facing a well-drafted notice typically answer that you waived the warranty by staying silent, by paying the debt without protest, or by failing to call them into the underlying dispute. French law sets the bar for that argument very high, and the same Paris ruling of 11 March 2025 states the standard in terms you can quote back: la renonciation à un droit doit être personnelle, certaine, expresse et non équivoque. A waiver must come from you personally, be certain, express and unambiguous; it is never inferred from mere inaction, from paying a creditor under pressure, or from neglecting to join the seller to earlier proceedings unless the SPA expressly imposed that step. The court added that buyers could not even have waived the right before the judgment creating the debt existed, which protects foreign buyers who continued running the company normally while the hidden liability matured. Concretely, never sign a settlement with the tax administration, URSSAF or a creditor that states you abandon recourse against the seller, never accept a transaction protocol that creates a new obligation instead of scheduling payment of the old one without counsel reviewing the wording, and answer every waiver allegation with a registered letter restating that you maintain the warranty claim in full.

B. How do you prove the amount owed and defeat the sellers standard defences

Triggering the warranty opens the second fight inside Part I: proving the loss. French civil procedure places the burden squarely on the claimant: Celui qui réclame l’exécution d’une obligation doit la prouver. Réciproquement, celui qui se prétend libéré doit justifier le paiement ou le fait qui a produit l’extinction de son obligation. You must therefore build a file that a judge can follow without your physical presence: the SPA and its warranty schedule, the closing accounts, the reassessment notice or judgment creating the debt, proof that its origin predates closing, every payment receipt, and a quantified statement linking each euro claimed to the covered event. Interest runs from the formal demand, and the measure of recovery for non-performance is set by statute: Le débiteur est condamné, s’il y a lieu, au paiement de dommages et intérêts soit à raison de l’inexécution de l’obligation, soit à raison du retard dans l’exécution, s’il ne justifie pas que l’exécution a été empêchée par la force majeure. A seller who simply refuses to pay, without proving an external event made payment impossible, meets none of the only statutory excuse, so document the refusal itself: each unanswered registered letter becomes evidence of delay. The broader remedial menu confirms your leverage: La partie envers laquelle l’engagement n’a pas été exécuté, ou l’a été imparfaitement, peut : – refuser d’exécuter ou suspendre l’exécution de sa propre obligation ; – poursuivre l’exécution forcée en nature de l’obligation ; – obtenir une réduction du prix ; – provoquer la résolution du contrat ; – demander réparation des conséquences de l’inexécution. Les sanctions qui ne sont pas incompatibles peuvent être cumulées ; des dommages et intérêts peuvent toujours s’y ajouter. For a buyer, the useful branches are enforced payment and damages, which can be combined, while price reduction and termination remain theoretical fallbacks that show the court the seriousness of the breach.

Against that file, sellers deploy three standard defences, and each has a prepared answer. First, the seller claims the debt was disclosed in the data room or fairly provisioned in the accounts, so the price already reflected it. Answer by producing the disclosure schedule and the closing balance sheet: a generic data-room mention of a tax audit is not disclosure of a quantified debt, and a provision far below the final bill proves understatement rather than coverage. Second, the seller claims you knew about the risk when you signed and accepted it. French practice gives weight to actual knowledge carve-outs only where the SPA writes them clearly; absent such wording, your pre-closing awareness of a vague risk does not erase a warranty given against quantified hidden liabilities, though you should expect a fight on the point and arm your counsel with the negotiation emails. Third, where several individuals or holding companies sold together, each points at the others and invites you to sue everyone at once. The Cour de cassation, the highest French court, answered that tactic in a share-sale warranty case on 24 January 2024, appeal number 20-13.755: la solidarité ne se présume pas ; il faut qu’elle soit expressément stipulée. Cette règle ne cesse que dans les cas où la solidarité a lieu de plein droit, en vertu d’une disposition de la loi. Joint sellers are not automatically liable together for the whole sum; solidarity must have been expressly written into the SPA or imposed by statute. Check your clause before suing: if it states the sellers are solidairement bound, claim the full amount from the most solvent one; if it is silent, apportion the claim according to each sellers share or the allocation key the SPA provides, and sue all of them together rather than discovering mid-trial that the only defendant served is insolvent.

II. How do you force a French seller who refuses to pay when you live abroad

A. Which French court hears your claim and how do you run the case from another country

A warranty dispute between businesses over a company sale belongs, in France, to the commercial court, called the tribunal de commerce. The statute gives that court the field without ambiguity: Les tribunaux de commerce connaissent : 1° Des contestations relatives aux engagements entre commerçants, entre artisans, entre établissements de crédit, entre sociétés de financement ou entre eux ; 2° De celles relatives aux sociétés commerciales ; 3° De celles relatives aux actes de commerce entre toutes personnes. Your claim enforces a commercial undertaking linked to a commercial company, so file there, at the court of the place designated by the SPAs jurisdiction clause if it names one, or otherwise where the defendant lives. The default territorial rule is simple: La juridiction territorialement compétente est, sauf disposition contraire, celle du lieu où demeure le défendeur. Read your SPA first: many acquisition contracts contain a clause attributive de juridiction, a clause assigning disputes to a specific court, or a clause compromissoire, an arbitration clause sending disputes to private arbitration. An arbitration clause, if validly agreed, removes the case from State courts entirely, which changes cost, language options and enforcement, so have counsel confirm the forum before any summons, called an assignation, is served.

Running the case from abroad is routine for Paris commercial courts but demands organisation. You act through a French avocat, an attorney admitted to a French bar, under a written mandate, called a mandat, that authorises counsel to receive service, appoint a bailiff and represent you at hearings; courts do not deal directly with foreign parties by email. Budget for certified translation, called traduction assermentée, of your passport, powers of attorney and any foreign-language exhibit, plus apostille, the international authentication stamp, where the court requires it for foreign public documents. Hearings can often be prepared by videoconference with counsel, though your personal attendance is rarely required at the pleading stage, and procedural deadlines are served on your counsel, which is why a responsive local representative matters more than your travel plans. Timelines must be stated honestly: expect roughly 12 to 18 months for a contested first-instance judgment in a busy commercial court, longer if an expert valuation, called an expertise judiciaire, is ordered to quantify a disputed loss, and count an additional year or more if the losing party appeals. That duration is precisely why Part II, Section B turns to securing the money before and during the case rather than hoping the seller stays solvent until judgment.

B. How do you secure the money: escrowed price, prescription calendar and the hidden-defect safety net

Money first, judgment second: that is the order experienced buyers follow. Many French SPAs place part of the price with a third party, through a séquestre, an escrow arrangement under which funds are held back and released on defined triggers, or leave a holdback in the buyers hands pending warranty claims. If your deal included such a mechanism, notify the escrow agent in writing the same day you notify the seller, strictly following the escrow agreement, because release clauses often impose their own short objection periods. Where no escrow exists, ask counsel immediately about interim protection: a conservatory seizure, called a saisie conservatoire, over the sellers French bank balances or over the sale proceeds credited to a French account can freeze funds before they leave the country, subject to judicial authorisation and prompt follow-up proceedings. Parallel tools include setting off, called compensation, a liquid warranty claim against any deferred price instalment or vendor loan, called a crédit vendeur, still owed to the seller, provided the SPA permits it. None of these steps replaces the lawsuit; each ensures the lawsuit ends with a solvent debtor rather than a moral victory.

The calendar that kills most warranty claims has two layers, and confusing them is the classic foreign-buyer mistake. The outer layer is statutory prescription: Les actions personnelles ou mobilières se prescrivent par cinq ans à compter du jour où le titulaire d’un droit a connu ou aurait dû connaître les faits lui permettant de l’exercer. Your contractual damages claim in principle lives five years from the day you knew, or should have known, the facts letting you sue, which usually means discovery of the hidden debt, not the closing date. The inner layer is the SPAs own survival period, often 12 to 36 months for general warranties and longer, sometimes up to the tax administrations own audit window, for tax and social-security matters: once that contractual window closes without compliant notice, the claim dies even if the five-year prescription still runs. Two consequences follow. First, notify inside the contractual period even when the loss is not yet quantified, with an express reservation for the final amount, because a late quantified claim beats a timely vague silence only when the contract tolerates updates. Second, diarise both dates separately from the day you take control: the contractual notice deadline and the five-year prescription horizon, and serve the assignation before the earlier of the two expires.

Where the SPA warranty is weak, expired or capped below the real loss, a fallback exists under the general law of sale: the warranty against hidden defects, called garantie des vices cachés. The Civil Code defines it in terms every buyer recognises: Le vendeur est tenu de la garantie à raison des défauts cachés de la chose vendue qui la rendent impropre à l’usage auquel on la destine, ou qui diminuent tellement cet usage que l’acheteur ne l’aurait pas acquise, ou n’en aurait donné qu’un moindre prix, s’il les avait connus. Applied to shares, courts examine whether the hidden liabilities so reduced the value of the holding that you would not have bought, or not at that price, had you known. The deadline is short and runs from discovery: L’action résultant des vices rédhibitoires doit être intentée par l’acquéreur dans un délai de deux ans à compter de la découverte du vice. Two recent teachings of the Cour de cassation make this fallback genuinely usable. First, the hidden-defect warranty travels with the asset as an accessory: la garantie des vices cachés accompagne, en tant qu’accessoire, la chose vendue. Second, in that same 16 October 2024 ruling, appeal number 23-13.318, the court held that la connaissance qu’a le sous-acquéreur du vice de la chose lors de sa propre acquisition est indifférente aux fins d’apprécier le bien-fondé de son action contre le vendeur originaire, meaning the buyers own knowledge at the time of its purchase does not defeat the action against the original seller where the defect predates the first sale. Use this route as a complement, not a substitute: plead the contractual warranty first, where caps and baskets are at least predictable, and add the hidden-defect claim in the alternative, watching that it targets the seller of the shares and respects its own two-year discovery deadline. After closing, update the company register, called the RCS, registre du commerce et des sociétés, kept by the greffe, the court registry, through the INPI single portal, called the guichet unique, so that later filings reflect the ownership you are now defending: a buyer whose own corporate standing is messy starts every enforcement discussion on the back foot.

Conclusion

A hidden debt discovered after buying a French company does not have to stay your loss, but recovery follows a strict order. Confirm the SPA warranty covers a liability rooted before closing, notify the seller by registered letter within the contractual period with facts, clause, origin and amount, and state expressly that you reserve every right, since no waiver is ever inferred from silence. Prove the loss euro by euro with closing accounts, the reassessment or judgment, and payment receipts, and split the claim correctly among joint sellers unless the SPA wrote solidarity in plain words. Sue before the commercial court designated by the contract, or that of the sellers domicile, through a mandated French avocat, secure the funds early through escrow notice, set-off or conservatory seizure, and serve the assignation before the contractual survival period and the five-year prescription expire. Keep the hidden-defect action as a second arrow with its own two-year discovery clock. Run that sequence from the week of discovery, and the distance between your home country and Paris becomes an administrative detail rather than the reason the seller keeps your money.

Need a quick opinion on your case

Bought a French company and facing a hidden tax bill, a URSSAF reassessment or a seller who refuses to honour the warranty? Our firm offers a consultation by telephone within 48 hours with an attorney of the firm. Call +33 6 46 60 58 22 or reach us through our contact page, and keep the share purchase agreement, the warranty schedule and the reassessment or summons ready for the call.