You are driving home to your village in the Dordogne, or merging onto the périphérique around Paris, when another car hits you. In the minutes that follow you will be shaken, possibly hurt, and facing a form you have never seen before: the constat amiable, the joint accident report that French insurers treat as the foundation of the whole file. Since Brexit you are driving in France as a third-country national, often with a UK-registered car, a UK licence and a UK insurance policy, or with a French-registered car and a French policy, and the rules that decide who pays for your injuries and your car are entirely French. Two clocks start running at the moment of impact. The first is short: you must declare the accident to the insurer within five working days, and a late declaration can cost you your cover. The second is long: the insurer owes the bodily-injury victim an offer within strict deadlines, and you have years, not weeks, to challenge a refusal or an offer that is far too low. This guide walks through both clocks in order: what to do at the roadside, how to declare, how French law compensates drivers, passengers and pedestrians differently, what happens when the other driver flees or is uninsured, and exactly how to fight back when the insurer says no or offers a fraction of what your injury is worth.

If nobody was hurt and your dispute is only about bent metal, start with our companion guide for British motorists on the roadside steps after a crash in France, which covers securing the scene, the criminal risk of leaving it, and how courts assess blame when each driver accuses the other. This article is the bodily-injury companion to that guide: what happens once someone is hurt, how French law prices the injury, and how to fight an insurer that refuses or lowballs you.

Two ideas organise everything that follows. First, France runs road accidents through a special compensation system, built around the law of 5 July 1985, that is far more protective of victims than ordinary fault-based liability: pedestrians and passengers are compensated in full, and even a driver who made a mistake keeps a partial right to compensation in most cases. Second, that protection only works if you build the paper file from the first hour: the signed constat, photographs, witness details, same-day medical certificates, repair invoices and every letter sent in a provable way. Part I covers the roadside and the declaration. Part II covers money: who pays for bodily injury, the deadlines the insurer must meet, and the precise steps for challenging a refusal or a low offer.

I. You have just had a road accident in France: the constat at the roadside and the five-day declaration to the insurer

A. At the scene of the crash: the constat amiable, photographs, witnesses, and the police report when someone is injured

Start with safety and the vocabulary, because every document you receive will use French terms. The constat amiable (joint accident report) is the standard European form, usually blue, with two columns, one per driver, and a sketch box in the middle. It is not an admission of guilt in itself: it is a joint factual record of where, when and how the vehicles collided. In France it carries decisive weight, because insurers and often judges treat a signed constat as the agreed version of the facts. Fill it in on the spot, calmly, one column each, then read the other driver’s column before anyone signs. Check the boxes that describe the manoeuvre of each vehicle, draw the positions of the cars, note the road, the direction of travel, the weather and any skid marks. Each driver keeps one signed copy. If the other driver refuses to sign or refuses to fill in the form, do not argue at the roadside: note the registration number, take photographs, and call the police or the gendarmerie (the military police force that covers rural areas).

Photographs decide more files than witness statements do. Photograph both vehicles from several angles, the number plates, the damage in close-up, the road layout, traffic signs, traffic lights, skid marks, debris and the final resting positions before the cars are moved, where it is safe to do so. If your car has a dashcam, preserve the footage immediately and back it up the same day. Take the names and telephone numbers of any independent witnesses, including passengers of neither car, shopkeepers and other drivers who stopped. A witness whose identity is recorded on the day is worth far more than a witness remembered months later. If your car is driveable and the accident is minor, French practice is to move the vehicles to free the road once the constat is signed and the photographs are taken. If the car cannot be driven, call your assistance line: most motor policies include dépannage (breakdown recovery) and remorquage (towing), but check the number on your green card or policy schedule before you need it.

When someone is injured, even slightly, the procedure changes. Call the emergency services on 15 (medical emergencies, SAMU), 17 (police), 18 (fire brigade, pompiers) or the European number 112, and ask for the police or the gendarmerie to attend. Officers will draw up a procès-verbal (official report), take measurements, breathalyse the drivers and record witness statements. Always ask for the reference of that report and the name of the unit that attended: your insurer and your lawyer will need both. Go to a doctor, an urgent-care centre or the hospital emergency department the same day, describe every symptom including shock, stiffness and headaches that seem minor, and keep the initial medical certificate (certificat médical initial) that records the injuries and any days of total incapacity for work (ITT, incapacité totale de travail). That first certificate is the baseline against which every later medical examination will be compared, and insurers scrutinise gaps between the accident date and the first medical record. If you were driving a UK-registered car, also telephone your UK insurer from the scene or the same evening to log the accident, and ask for written confirmation that your policy covers driving in France and which proof of cover you should carry for the rest of your stay.

B. Declaring the accident within five working days: which insurer to notify, which documents to send, and why a late declaration can cost you your cover

The official service-public guidance states the short deadline plainly: the accident must be declared to the insurer within five working days, with your copy of the report attached, whether it was completed on paper or through the electronic e-constat application. The same guidance warns that declaring late can lead to a refusal of cover. Five working days (jours ouvrés) means Monday to Saturday in practice, excluding Sundays and public holidays, so an accident on a Friday evening leaves very little room. Send your copy of the constat, the photographs, the witness details, the police report reference where one exists, and your initial medical certificate if you are injured. Keep proof of sending for everything: registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt (lettre recommandée avec accusé de réception) remains the gold standard, and most insurers also accept declarations through the customer portal or the e-constat system, which generates its own receipt.

Declare to the right insurer the first time. If your car is registered and insured in France, notify your French insurer. If you are visiting or newly arrived with a UK-registered car covered by a UK policy, notify the UK insurer immediately and ask how it handles claims in France, including whether it appoints a French correspondent or loss adjuster. Your French-law duties as a policyholder are set by Article L. 113-2 of the Insurance Code, which lists what the insured owes the insurer, starting with paying the premium when due and answering the insurer’s questions accurately when the contract is taken out. An insurer that looks for a way out will examine that declaration of risk closely, so never exaggerate, never invent a witness and never alter the constat after signature: fraud destroys the file and can itself be prosecuted.

Two related duties deserve attention in the same week. First, check that you were lawfully on the road. Article L. 211-1 of the Insurance Code provides that “Toute personne physique ou toute personne morale autre que l’Etat, dont la responsabilité civile peut être engagée en raison de dommages subis par des tiers résultant d’atteintes aux personnes ou aux biens dans la réalisation desquels un véhicule est impliqué, doit, pour faire circuler celui-ci, être couverte par une assurance garantissant cette responsabilité”, which means that anyone whose civil liability may arise from damage to third parties involving a motor vehicle must hold insurance covering that liability before driving. Driving without insurance is a criminal offence in France, punished with severe fines and possible confiscation of the vehicle, and it complicates but does not destroy the victim’s compensation, as Part II explains. Second, hold a valid licence for the vehicle: British visitors and new residents should confirm that their UK licence is recognised for the category driven, because an invalid licence gives the insurer a separate argument. If the accident involved drink or drugs, read our guide on drink- and drug-driving charges in France alongside this article, since the criminal case and the insurance file will run in parallel and influence each other.

For damage to the car itself, the insurer must offer an expert assessment (expertise): the appointed expert identifies the vehicle, records the damage and values the repair or, where repair is uneconomic, the total loss. You are entitled to be present, to submit invoices and photographs, and to commission your own counter-assessment if the first one understates the damage. Keep every invoice from the first day: towing, guarded parking (gardiennage), hire car, repairs, and any damaged objects inside the car such as child seats, spectacles and telephones. If the insurer delays appointing an expert, put it on notice in writing and set a short deadline, because delay at this stage usually predicts delay on the bodily-injury offer later.

II. You are injured, your car is written off, or the insurer’s offer looks far too low: compensation rights and how to challenge the decision

A. Who pays for bodily injury in France: full compensation for passengers and pedestrians, shared fault for drivers, and the guarantee fund when the other driver flees or is uninsured

French road-injury compensation rests on the Law No. 85-677 of 5 July 1985 on improving the situation of road-traffic victims and speeding up compensation procedures, known to every practitioner as the Loi Badinter. Its cornerstone is Article 3 of that law, which provides that “Les victimes, hormis les conducteurs de véhicules terrestres à moteur, sont indemnisées des dommages résultant des atteintes à leur personne qu’elles ont subis, sans que puisse leur être opposée leur propre faute à l’exception de leur faute inexcusable si elle a été la cause exclusive de l’accident”, meaning that victims other than the drivers of motor vehicles are compensated for bodily injury without having their own fault raised against them, except for inexcusable fault that was the exclusive cause of the accident. Its logic is deliberately victim-friendly and it sits alongside the ordinary fault rule of Article 1240 of the Civil Code, under which “Tout fait quelconque de l’homme, qui cause à autrui un dommage, oblige celui par la faute duquel il est arrivé à le réparer”, meaning any act that causes damage to another obliges the person at fault to repair it. The practical scale runs from full compensation to nothing, depending on who you were in the accident. Pedestrians and passengers, who are victims outside any vehicle, receive full compensation for bodily injury: their own fault can almost never be held against them. Drivers are compensated according to their share of fault: a driver who committed no fault is compensated in full, a driver who committed an ordinary fault (faute simple), such as a moment of inattention or a misjudged priority, receives partial compensation reduced in proportion to that fault, and only two situations extinguish the right entirely, namely an inexcusable fault that was the exclusive cause of the accident, or deliberately seeking the damage.

The content of those two exceptions is fixed by the highest civil court and must be understood exactly, because insurers invoke them routinely. In its judgment of 28 March 2019, the Second Civil Chamber of the Court of Cassation, appeal No. 18-15.168, published in the Bulletin (ECLI:FR:CCASS:2019:C200446), recalled that Article 3 of the law of 5 July 1985 provides that a pedestrian victim of a traffic accident is compensated for bodily injury “sans que puisse lui être opposée sa propre faute à l’exception de sa faute inexcusable si elle a été la cause exclusive de l’accident (alinéa 1), ou lorsqu’elle a volontairement recherché le dommage (alinéa 3)”, meaning the victim’s own fault cannot be raised against them except for inexcusable fault that was the exclusive cause of the accident, or where the victim deliberately sought the harm. The court applies the settled definition of inexcusable fault as “la faute volontaire d’une exceptionnelle gravité exposant sans raison valable son auteur à un danger dont il aurait dû avoir conscience”, a voluntary fault of exceptional gravity exposing its author without valid reason to a danger of which they should have been aware. In that case a man standing safely on a refuge next to his properly parked car suddenly stepped onto a motorway carriageway at the exit of a bend that hid visibility, in front of a lorry travelling at the authorised speed that had no room to avoid him: the court held that this characterised inexcusable fault as the exclusive cause of his damage and rejected the appeal. The lesson for British drivers, passengers and pedestrians is symmetrical: ordinary mistakes reduce but rarely erase compensation, while only extreme, deliberate exposure to obvious mortal danger does, and an insurer that cites inexcusable fault for a routine error should be challenged.

When the other driver cannot pay, a public safety net steps in. Article L. 421-1 of the Insurance Code provides that “Le fonds de garantie des assurances obligatoires de dommages indemnise, dans les conditions prévues aux 1 et 2 du présent I, les victimes ou les ayants droit des victimes des dommages nés d’un accident survenu en France dans lequel est impliqué un véhicule”, meaning the guarantee fund for compulsory damage insurance compensates victims of accidents occurring in France involving a motor vehicle. For bodily injury the fund pays where the person responsible is unknown, which covers hit-and-run cases (délit de fuite), and where the person responsible is uninsured, subject to legal exemptions. The official service-public guidance confirms that where the person responsible is unknown or uninsured, it is the Fonds de garantie des assurances obligatoires de dommages (FGAO) that intervenes, under conditions. File the police complaint for fleeing the scene immediately, because the complaint number anchors the FGAO file, and notify the fund without waiting for the police inquiry to end. The fund later recovers what it paid from the uninsured or fleeing driver, so this route protects the victim without letting the wrongdoer off.

Two limitation periods run side by side and must never be confused. Contract claims against your own insurer are subject to the short insurance limitation: Article L. 114-1 of the Insurance Code states that “Toutes actions dérivant d’un contrat d’assurance sont prescrites par deux ans à compter de l’événement qui y donne naissance”, meaning all actions arising from an insurance contract are time-barred two years after the event giving rise to them. Liability claims for bodily injury benefit from the long period: Article 2226 of the Civil Code provides that “L’action en responsabilité née à raison d’un événement ayant entraîné un dommage corporel, engagée par la victime directe ou indirecte des préjudices qui en résultent, se prescrit par dix ans à compter de la date de la consolidation du dommage initial ou aggravé”, meaning the liability action for bodily injury is time-barred ten years from the date the initial or aggravated injury stabilises (consolidation). In practice, act within the two-year window against the insurer while preserving the ten-year bodily-injury action, and never assume that negotiating with the insurer suspends either clock unless the suspension is recorded in writing.

B. Challenging a refusal or an offer that is far too low: medical examination rights, the insurer’s deadlines, complaint, ombudsman and court action

Before challenging anything, understand what a proper offer looks like, because most low offers count on the victim not knowing the timetable. Article 12 of the same law sets the headline deadline: “L’assureur qui garantit la responsabilité civile du fait d’un véhicule terrestre à moteur est tenu de présenter dans un délai maximum de huit mois à compter de l’accident une offre d’indemnité à la victime qui a subi une atteinte à sa personne”, meaning the insurer covering motor third-party liability must present a compensation offer to the bodily-injury victim within eight months of the accident at the latest. The official service-public guidance, verified in April 2025, sets the rhythm: after the medical examination, the expert’s report must be sent by the insurer within twenty calendar days of the examination, and a compensation offer must then be made within three months of the victim’s claim. Where the insurer cannot yet assess the full extent of the harm, or liability for the accident is not yet established, it may instead make an offer within a maximum of eight months after the accident, with the deadline most favourable to the victim applying. Those words matter: the insurer that stays silent for a year and then blames medical uncertainty is already outside the legal timetable, and the silence itself becomes your first argument. The same guidance allows the victim to be accompanied at the medical examination by a doctor of their choice (médecin-conseil de victimes), which is not a luxury but the single most effective protection against an examination that minimises your injuries. Never attend the insurer’s medical examination alone where significant injuries are at stake: your own doctor prepares you, attends, notes what the insurer’s expert omits, and later measures the report against your real symptoms.

Prepare the medical file as if the judge will read it, because one day a judge may. Keep the initial certificate, every hospital report, every prescription, every physiotherapy and psychotherapy invoice, every certificate of sick leave (arrêt de travail) with the daily allowances paid, and every payslip showing lost earnings. Keep a dated diary of pain, sleepless nights, care received from relatives, cancelled trips and abandoned activities: French compensation lists each head of loss separately, from temporary suffering (souffrances endurées) and temporary functional deficit (déficit fonctionnel temporaire) to permanent impairment (déficit fonctionnel permanent), disfigurement (préjudice esthétique), loss of enjoyment (préjudice d’agrément) and the related professional losses, and each one needs its own proof. Photograph visible injuries and scars at regular intervals with dates. If your state of health worsens after a first settlement, the law allows aggravation claims (aggravation), provided the worsening is medically documented and linked to the accident, so never sign a final receipt (quittance) while your condition is still evolving unless a lawyer has measured the risk with you.

When the insurer refuses cover or makes an offer that bears no relation to the injury, escalate in writing through four levels. First, send a detailed recorded-delivery complaint (réclamation) that answers each reason given: attach the missing document if one is genuinely missing, correct the factual error with the constat and photographs, and cite the applicable deadline the insurer has missed. Ask expressly for a provision (advance payment) where liability is not seriously disputed, since insurers can and do pay advances while the final assessment is pending, and a refusal to pay any advance while keeping you waiting is a fact judges notice. Second, if the written complaint fails, refer the dispute to the insurance ombudsman (médiateur de l’assurance), whose details must appear in your policy documents: the procedure is free, in writing, and it suspends neither your court deadlines nor the insurer’s, so calendar both in parallel. Third, for disputes with your own insurer about the contract itself, remember the two-year limitation of Article L. 114-1 and interrupt it in time by one of the acts the law recognises, such as a registered letter that the insurer acknowledges or the appointment of an expert, rather than by informal telephone calls that prove nothing.

Fourth, go to court with an expert already secured where possible. Article 145 of the Code of Civil Procedure provides that “S’il existe un motif légitime de conserver ou d’établir avant tout procès la preuve de faits dont pourrait dépendre la solution d’un litige, les mesures d’instruction légalement admissibles peuvent être ordonnées à la demande de tout intéressé, sur requête ou en référé”, meaning that where there is a legitimate reason to preserve or establish evidence before any trial, any legally admissible investigation measure can be ordered at the request of any interested party, by petition or in urgent proceedings. In road-injury practice this is the référé-expertise: you ask the urgent-applications judge to appoint an independent medical expert before suing on the merits, which fixes the injuries on record while the insurer’s file is still thin. The court-appointed expert examines you with both parties’ doctors present, both sides submit observations (dires), and the resulting report frames the later negotiation or trial. Where liability is disputed, the same procedure can order the preservation of vehicle evidence or CCTV before it is erased. File where the accident happened or where the defendant is based, serve within the deadlines the court order sets, and bring the complete bundle: constat, police report, full medical records, income proofs and the insurer’s correspondence showing its refusal or its low offer.

A final warning specific to British victims: do not sign English-language settlement documents from a UK insurer, or French quittances from a French insurer, without understanding that a full and final settlement in either language normally closes the bodily-injury file subject only to proven aggravation. Check the exchange-rate and tax position of any lump sum paid from abroad with your French tax adviser before acceptance, keep the settlement funds identifiable in case of later dispute, and never return the signed receipt before the money has actually arrived. Where the accident left you unable to work, coordinate the insurance claim with your employer’s statements, your French sick-pay records and any invalidity procedure, so that no body pays twice for the same loss and no body denies payment on the ground that another body already paid. Consistency across files is what turns a contested claim into a paid one.

Conclusion

A road accident in France rewards the victim who acts fast on paper and stays patient on medicine. Secure the scene, sign an accurate constat, photograph everything and collect witness details before the road is cleared. Declare within five working days with the constat attached and keep the proof of sending, because a late declaration hands the insurer its easiest refusal. See a doctor the same day and build the medical file visit by visit, attend the insurer’s examination with your own doctor, and measure every offer against the legal timetable of twenty days for the report, three months for the offer and eight months at the most. Remember the scale: passengers and pedestrians compensated in full, careful drivers compensated in full, drivers at partial fault compensated in part, and only inexcusable fault as the exclusive cause, or deliberate self-harm, removing the right. If the other driver fled or was uninsured, turn to the guarantee fund with the police complaint in hand. And if the insurer refuses or lowballs you, complain in recorded writing, use the ombudsman without letting deadlines drift, secure a court-appointed expert under Article 145, and sue within the two-year contract limit while the ten-year bodily-injury period protects the substance of the claim. The French system is generous to victims who prove their case and ruthless to files built on memory and telephone calls: choose the first category from the roadside.

Need a quick opinion on your case?

For a telephone consultation within 48 hours with a lawyer of the firm, call +33 6 46 60 58 22 (Maître Reda Kohen). You can also write via the contact page of kohenavocats.fr. The firm assists British residents in Paris and across Île-de-France with road-accident declarations, challenges to insurer refusals and low offers, medical-expertise strategy and compensation claims after a crash in France.