You hired your first employee in France with enthusiasm: a local contract, a French payroll, registration with URSSAF, the public body that collects social contributions. A few months later the reality is harsher. The business is slower than expected, the fit is wrong, or the position you created no longer makes sense. You live in London, New York, Dubai or Singapore, and you now have to separate from that employee under French law, one of the most protective employment systems in Europe. This article explains exactly how to do it: the dismissal procedure you must follow step by step, the severance pay and final documents you owe, the negotiated exit that often costs less than a conflict, and what a claim before the French labour court, the conseil de prud’hommes, would cost you if the separation goes wrong. Every rule below is drawn from the French Labour Code as in force on 23 September 2026 and from recent rulings of the Cour de cassation, the French supreme court for employment disputes, with verbatim quotations and links to the official texts so that you, or the local counsel acting for you, can check each point.
I. Dismissing your first employee in France while you live abroad: the procedure that decides everything
In France, the dismissal of an employee hired on a CDI, a contrat à durée indéterminée, the standard permanent contract, follows a mandatory procedure. The substance of your reason matters, but the procedure matters just as much: skipping one registered letter or one deadline can by itself turn a justified dismissal into an unfair one and add damages to your bill. When you manage the company from abroad, the practical difficulty is organisation, not distance. French law does not require the founder to be physically present, but it does require every step to happen in France, on time, with the right documents. The word Kbis, which you met when you incorporated, will not help you here; what counts now is the paper trail of the dismissal. If your company was set up as explained in our guide to setting up a company in France as a foreign founder, with its bank account, Kbis extract and VAT number, you already have the administrative backbone; the dismissal uses the same discipline.
A. How to invite, hold and document the preliminary meeting from abroad
Everything starts with the invitation to a preliminary meeting, the entretien préalable. Article L1232-2 of the Labour Code provides: “L’employeur qui envisage de licencier un salarié le convoque, avant toute décision, à un entretien préalable. La convocation est effectuée par lettre recommandée ou par lettre remise en main propre contre décharge. Cette lettre indique l’objet de la convocation. L’entretien préalable ne peut avoir lieu moins de cinq jours ouvrables après la présentation de la lettre recommandée ou la remise en main propre de la lettre de convocation.” In plain English: before any decision is taken, you must invite the employee to a meeting by registered letter or by letter delivered by hand against a signed receipt, the letter must state its purpose, and the meeting cannot take place less than five business days after the letter is presented or delivered. The five business days, jours ouvrables, exclude Sundays and public holidays, and the meeting itself must physically take place in France, normally at the workplace. From abroad, the reliable solution is to give a written mandate to someone on the ground: the president of your SAS, the French company form with a president, or a local employment lawyer, who sends the letter and holds the meeting in your name. Telephone or video participation by the founder from abroad does not replace that meeting and creates proof problems later.
The invitation letter must also tell the employee that he or she may bring a companion. Article L1232-4 of the Labour Code states: “Lors de son audition, le salarié peut se faire assister par une personne de son choix appartenant au personnel de l’entreprise. Lorsqu’il n’y a pas d’institutions représentatives du personnel dans l’entreprise, le salarié peut se faire assister soit par une personne de son choix appartenant au personnel de l’entreprise, soit par un conseiller du salarié choisi sur une liste dressée par l’autorité administrative. La lettre de convocation à l’entretien préalable adressée au salarié mentionne la possibilité de recourir à un conseiller du salarié et précise l’adresse des services dans lesquels la liste de ces conseillers est tenue à sa disposition.” Because your company has only one employee, there is no staff representative, so the employee may be accompanied either by any person of his or her choice, in practice often nobody in a one-employee company, or by an outside staff adviser, the conseiller du salarié, chosen from an official list drawn up by the administrative authority and available at the town hall, the mairie, or the labour inspectorate, the inspection du travail. Omitting this mention from the letter is a procedural irregularity that the labour court sanctions. During the meeting, your representative states the contemplated grounds and listens to the employee’s explanations; no decision may be announced there. Write a short memorandum of what was said, dated and signed by your representative, and keep proof of every sending. If the employee does not attend, the procedure continues, but the absence must be recorded in writing.
One special case deserves attention because it is common with a first hire: the employee is still in the trial period, the période d’essai. Ending the contract during the trial period is not a dismissal and escapes the whole preliminary-meeting procedure, but it requires a notice period, the délai de prévenance, set by article L1221-25 of the Labour Code: “le salarié est prévenu dans un délai qui ne peut être inférieur à : 1° Vingt-quatre heures en deçà de huit jours de présence ; 2° Quarante-huit heures entre huit jours et un mois de présence ; 3° Deux semaines après un mois de présence ; 4° Un mois après trois mois de présence.” The same article adds that the trial period, renewal included, cannot be extended by the notice period, and that failure to observe the notice gives the employee a compensatory payment equal to the wages and benefits he or she would have received until the notice expired, paid-holiday compensation included. Note the important boundary: once the trial period, including any renewal, has expired, even by one day, you are back in full dismissal procedure. Many foreign founders discover too late that the trial period they wrote into the contract had already ended, because French trial periods have short legal maximums and renewal requires both a contractual clause and a collective agreement, the convention collective, authorising it. Check the dates before choosing this route.
B. How to notify the dismissal, calculate severance and deliver the final documents
After the meeting, you must wait before notifying the dismissal. Article L1232-6 of the Labour Code provides: “Lorsque l’employeur décide de licencier un salarié, il lui notifie sa décision par lettre recommandée avec avis de réception. Cette lettre comporte l’énoncé du ou des motifs invoqués par l’employeur. Elle ne peut être expédiée moins de deux jours ouvrables après la date prévue de l’entretien préalable au licenciement auquel le salarié a été convoqué. Un décret en Conseil d’Etat détermine les modalités d’application du présent article. Un arrêté du ministre chargé du travail fixe les modèles que l’employeur peut utiliser pour procéder à la notification du licenciement.” Three lessons for a founder acting from abroad. First, notification goes by registered letter with acknowledgment of receipt, the lettre recommandée avec avis de réception, sent from France by your representative; an email or a phone call has no legal value. Second, the letter must state the grounds, and it cannot be sent less than two full business days after the scheduled meeting date. Third, the labour minister has published official model letters, and using them is the safest way to avoid a defective notification; the government guidance on personal dismissal procedure confirms the mechanism that lets the employer clarify the stated grounds, on his own initiative or at the employee’s request, within fifteen days of the notification, as explained on the official service-public page for dismissal on personal grounds.
The reason your letter matters so much is that it freezes the dispute. The Cour de cassation held on 16 September 2020, appeal no. 18-25.943, that “si la lettre de licenciement fixe les limites du litige en ce qui concerne les griefs articulés à l’encontre du salarié et les conséquences que l’employeur entend en tirer quant aux modalités de rupture, il appartient au juge de qualifier les faits invoqués” (Cass. soc., 16 Sept. 2020, no. 18-25.943). In other words, the court cannot hear grievances that are not in the letter, but it requalifies the facts freely: if you invoke serious misconduct, the faute grave, and the judge finds only ordinary misconduct, the dismissal can still be upheld on that requalified basis. The practical consequence is direct: draft precise, dated, provable facts, never vague dissatisfaction, and never add new grievances after sending the letter. A founder who writes from abroad in haste, in English, with general complaints about performance, hands the employee the exact weapon the labour court needs. Have the letter drafted or reviewed in French by someone who knows the case law, because the French version alone counts.
Money comes next, and the minimum cheque is set by statute. Article L1234-9 of the Labour Code provides: “Le salarié titulaire d’un contrat de travail à durée indéterminée, licencié alors qu’il compte 8 mois d’ancienneté ininterrompus au service du même employeur, a droit, sauf en cas de faute grave, à une indemnité de licenciement.” So an employee dismissed with at least eight months of continuous service receives statutory severance, except in cases of serious or wilful misconduct. The amount is fixed by article R1234-2 of the Labour Code: “L’indemnité de licenciement ne peut être inférieure aux montants suivants : 1° Un quart de mois de salaire par année d’ancienneté pour les années jusqu’à dix ans ; 2° Un tiers de mois de salaire par année d’ancienneté pour les années à partir de dix ans.” For a first employee with, say, fourteen months of service, the legal minimum is therefore a fraction of one month’s pay, calculated on the gross salary including bonuses and pro-rated for incomplete years. Your collective agreement or the contract may grant more, and many do, so check both before computing. On top of severance, you owe the notice period, the préavis, whose length depends on seniority and the applicable collective agreement, worked or paid in lieu, plus compensation for unused paid holidays, the indemnité compensatrice de congés payés. Social contributions and income-tax withholding apply to these sums under the DSN, the nominative social declaration your payroll provider files monthly; using a French payroll provider is strongly recommended when you live abroad, because contribution mistakes trigger the URSSAF audits described in our guide to URSSAF audits of foreign-owned companies.
The separation is not complete until you deliver three documents. Article L1234-19 of the Labour Code provides: “A l’expiration du contrat de travail, l’employeur délivre au salarié un certificat dont le contenu est déterminé par voie réglementaire.” That is the work certificate, the certificat de travail. Article R1234-9 of the Labour Code adds: “L’employeur délivre au salarié, au moment de l’expiration ou de la rupture du contrat de travail, les attestations et justifications qui lui permettent d’exercer ses droits aux prestations mentionnées à l’article L. 5421-2 et transmet sans délai ces mêmes attestations à l’opérateur France Travail.” France Travail is the public employment operator, formerly Pôle emploi, that examines unemployment-benefit claims; the attestation you hand over and transmit lets the former employee assert those rights. Finally, article L1234-20 of the Labour Code provides: “Le solde de tout compte, établi par l’employeur et dont le salarié lui donne reçu, fait l’inventaire des sommes versées au salarié lors de la rupture du contrat de travail. Le reçu pour solde de tout compte peut être dénoncé dans les six mois qui suivent sa signature, délai au-delà duquel il devient libératoire pour l’employeur pour les sommes qui y sont mentionnées.” The final payslip receipt therefore only protects you for the sums it lists, and only once six months have passed without challenge. Late or missing documents expose you to additional damages, so calendar them from the last day of the contract, not from your return to France.
II. Choosing a negotiated separation or facing the labour court from abroad
A dismissal imposed from abroad often poisons the relationship, and with a single employee the human cost turns quickly into legal cost. French law offers a second route, the rupture conventionnelle, the mutual separation agreement, which ends the permanent contract by common consent with an approved procedure. It is usually faster, financially predictable, and far easier to manage at a distance than a dismissal, provided you understand its conditions and its price. If no agreement is possible, you need to know what a labour court case looks like from abroad and what it can cost under the current compensation scale. This second part compares the two paths so that you can choose with full knowledge of the figures.
A. When a mutual separation agreement saves time and controls the cost
The mutual separation is defined by article L1237-11 of the Labour Code: “L’employeur et le salarié peuvent convenir en commun des conditions de la rupture du contrat de travail qui les lie. La rupture conventionnelle, exclusive du licenciement ou de la démission, ne peut être imposée par l’une ou l’autre des parties. Elle résulte d’une convention signée par les parties au contrat. Elle est soumise aux dispositions de la présente section destinées à garantir la liberté du consentement des parties.” Neither side can impose it; it results from an agreement signed by both parties, concluded during one or more discussion meetings under article L1237-12 of the Labour Code, at which the employee may be assisted, and the official service-public guide to mutual separation details the interviews, the assistance rights and the drafting of the agreement. From abroad, this route has a decisive practical advantage: instead of orchestrating a unilateral procedure whose every deadline can be attacked, your representative negotiates a price and a date, and both sides sign. The employee keeps the benefit of the France Travail attestation for his or her subsequent benefit claim, which makes the proposal attractive and often unlocks the signature.
The price of the agreement has a legal floor. Article L1237-13 of the Labour Code provides that the agreement sets the terms of the termination, “notamment le montant de l’indemnité spécifique de rupture conventionnelle qui ne peut pas être inférieur à celui de l’indemnité prévue à l’article L. 1234-9 . Elle fixe la date de rupture du contrat de travail, qui ne peut intervenir avant le lendemain du jour de l’homologation. A compter de la date de sa signature par les deux parties, chacune d’entre elles dispose d’un délai de quinze jours calendaires pour exercer son droit de rétractation.” The separation payment, the indemnité spécifique de rupture conventionnelle, cannot be lower than the statutory severance described above, and in practice the employee will ask for more, often several months’ salary, in exchange for a clean and immediate exit. Each party then has fifteen calendar days to retract. Only after that period can the agreement be sent for homologation, the administrative approval, to the DREETS, the regional directorate for the economy, employment, labour and solidarities, through the online portal TéléRC, which the labour ministry operates as the online channel for filing the homologation request for a mutual separation on a permanent contract. Article L1237-14 of the Labour Code gives the administration “un délai d’instruction de quinze jours ouvrables, à compter de la réception de la demande, pour s’assurer du respect des conditions prévues à la présente section et de la liberté de consentement des parties. A défaut de notification dans ce délai, l’homologation est réputée acquise”, meaning silence for fifteen business days equals approval, and the contract can only end the day after homologation. Count roughly five to seven weeks from the first discussion to the exit date, and never let the employee leave or stop paying wages before that date.
Two warnings shape the negotiation. First, consent must be genuine. The Cour de cassation held on 23 January 2019, appeal no. 17-21.550, published in the Bulletin, that “en l’absence de vice du consentement, l’existence de faits de harcèlement moral n’affecte pas en elle-même la validité de la convention de rupture intervenue en application de l’article L. 1237-11 du code du travail” (Cass. soc., 23 Jan. 2019, no. 17-21.550). A difficult context, even with allegations of moral harassment, does not by itself void the agreement; only a defect in consent, such as fraud, threat or proven pressure, does. Symmetrically, pressuring an employee to sign, threatening a dismissal for misconduct to extract a cheap signature, or exploiting a manifestly distressed state of mind exposes the agreement to annulment, and an annulled agreement is requalified as an unfair dismissal with full damages. Negotiate firmly but cleanly, document each meeting, let the employee take advice, and never present the mutual separation as the only alternative to a misconduct dismissal. Second, the agreement cannot be used to circumvent protections: during pregnancy, maternity leave or a suspension following a work accident, the route is closed or strictly framed. Verify the employee’s situation before proposing anything.
B. What an unfair-dismissal claim costs before the French labour court
If the employee challenges the dismissal, the case goes to the conseil de prud’hommes, the labour court composed of employer and employee elected judges, starting with a conciliation hearing and continuing, if no settlement is reached, to a full judgment hearing. You do not need to fly in for every hearing: a French employment lawyer represents the company under a written power of attorney, and most of the case is fought on documents, which is why the dismissal letter, the meeting memorandum and the proofs of sending described above decide the outcome more than any speech. The central question the court asks is whether the dismissal rests on a real and serious cause, the cause réelle et sérieuse. If the answer is no, article L1235-3 of the Labour Code applies: “Si le licenciement d’un salarié survient pour une cause qui n’est pas réelle et sérieuse, le juge peut proposer la réintégration du salarié dans l’entreprise, avec maintien de ses avantages acquis. Si l’une ou l’autre des parties refuse cette réintégration, le juge octroie au salarié une indemnité à la charge de l’employeur, dont le montant est compris entre les montants minimaux et maximaux fixés dans le tableau ci-dessous.” Reinstatement is almost always refused on both sides with a single position, so the case turns into money, and the money is framed by the statutory scale, the barème Macron, whose minimum and maximum depend on seniority in complete years, with higher ceilings once the employee has several years of service. Certain dismissals declared void, for example for discrimination or violation of a fundamental protection, escape the scale entirely and expose you to much higher awards, which is another reason to keep the procedure clean.
Foreign employers often ask whether this scale can be set aside as incompatible with international treaties. The answer is now settled at the highest level. On 9 April 2025, appeal no. 24-13.958, the Cour de cassation held: “Il en résulte que les dispositions de l’article L. 1235-3 du code du travail sont compatibles avec les stipulations de l’article 10 de la Convention précitée”, that is article 10 of International Labour Organisation Convention no. 158 on termination of employment, and added that the provisions of the European Social Charter invoked against the scale “ne sont pas d’effet direct”, have no direct effect before the courts (Cass. soc., 9 Apr. 2025, no. 24-13.958). The court reasoned that the scale, combined with the cases where it does not apply and with the automatic application by the judge of article L1235-4, reasonably compensates the unjustified loss of employment and keeps a deterrent effect on employers. For your budgeting, this means predictability: counsel can bracket the risk from the seniority table, add the severance, notice and holiday pay already owed, the reimbursement orders the judge makes automatically, and the procedural costs, then compare that total with the price of a negotiated agreement. In most first-employee cases with short seniority, the negotiated exit costs less than a full trial, while buying certainty and a clean employment record for the company’s future hires, visas and financing rounds.
Distance adds one final layer of cost that founders underestimate: enforcement and reputation. A labour court judgment is enforceable in France against the company’s bank account and assets, whether or not the founder ever attends, and unpaid awards accrue interest. The judgment is also public, and future candidates, partners and investors can find it. Conversely, a well-managed separation, with correct documents delivered on time and contributions properly declared, closes the file and protects the company’s standing with URSSAF, France Travail and the tax administration. Keep every proof for at least the limitation periods: the dismissal letter with its acknowledgment of receipt, the meeting memorandum, the payroll records, the certificate, the France Travail attestation and the signed final receipt. Store them in France with your counsel or accountant, not only in the founder’s personal email abroad, so that the company can defend itself years later even if the founder has moved on.
Conclusion
Parting with your first French employee from abroad is manageable, but only if you respect the order of operations. During the trial period, a short notice with compensatory pay can end the contract; after it, the dismissal procedure is mandatory, with its five-day invitation, its meeting in France, its two-day wait and its reasoned registered letter. Statutory severance, notice, holiday pay and the three final documents follow automatically, and the dismissal letter sets the boundaries of any future trial. Wherever possible, compare that imposed route with a mutual separation agreement: a higher negotiated payment, a fifteen-day retraction period and a fifteen-day administrative approval buy speed, discretion and finality, provided consent is genuine. And if the dispute reaches the labour court, the compensation scale now confirmed by the Cour de cassation lets you price the risk instead of fearing it. Act early, mandate someone competent on the ground, and document everything; the founders who pay the most are rarely those whose reason was weakest, but those whose procedure was sloppiest.