State liability lawyer in Paris: prior claim and compensation action.

Where an application seeks a sum of money, Article R. 421-1 of the Code of Administrative Justice makes it subject to a decision taken by the administration on a claim first addressed to it. This letter is therefore not a courtesy formality: it sets the framework of the future proceedings. It identifies the public body concerned (State, municipality, département, hospital, public establishment), describes the act complained of with its dates, explains why that act is a fault or falls under a no-fault regime, and then lists each head of loss with an amount and the documents that support it. The quantification may be provisional, provided that this is stated and that the items still awaited, such as an expert report or medical consolidation, are indicated.

Two points matter in practice. The letter must claim compensation explicitly: the Paris Administrative Court of Appeal declared inadmissible the claim of a police officer whose earlier letter contained no request for money (CAA Paris, 28 June 2024, No. 23PA02177). Next, the date of receipt must be capable of proof, because Article R. 421-2 of the Code of Administrative Justice requires the date of filing to be established in support of the application. The firm drafts this claim with the pleading it will later have to submit to the administrative court already in mind.

Not necessarily, and this is a frequent source of inadmissibility. An informal administrative appeal (recours gracieux) asks the administration to withdraw or amend its decision; a compensation claim asks it to pay. Both steps may appear in the same letter, but the judge checks that the letter does contain an identifiable request for compensation. In the case decided by CAA Paris, 28 June 2024, No. 23PA02177, the official relied on an earlier informal administrative appeal; the court noted that this letter requested no sum and upheld the inadmissibility of the compensation claims. It also recalls that the judge may raise this defect even if the administration, in its defence, merely argued the merits.

Caution therefore calls for sending a separate claim, or at the very least a self-contained paragraph, claiming an amount for each loss. Where the application has already been filed without a claim, it remains possible to send one and to follow the reply, but regularisation is not automatic and depends on the stage of the proceedings. The firm reviews the correspondence already exchanged before choosing between a supplementary claim and a new one.

Everything depends on the originating event. A new head of loss can in principle be added if it flows from the same event as the one put to the administration. By contrast, damage that stems from a different event was not submitted to the public body and the rejection decision does not cover it. CAA Douai, 19 Jan. 2023, No. 22DA00552 gives an unfavourable illustration: a local authority official had claimed compensation for the refusal to pay them an index-point bonus (bonification indiciaire), then asked the judge for compensation for reprisals they attributed to that refusal. The court held that these reprisals were a separate originating event and that the corresponding claims were inadmissible, as they had not been put forward in the claim.

The same decision recalls the opposite, more favourable rule: the claimant may detail on appeal the consequences of the event already relied on, and add heads of loss connected to it, as long as the total remains within the amount quantified at first instance, increased where applicable by items that arose after the judgment. Hence the value of describing every event complained of in the claim itself, even those whose quantification remains uncertain.

Yes, on one precise condition. The Council of State (Conseil d'État) accepts that the victim may increase the claims on appeal where the damage worsened, or became fully apparent, after the judgment under appeal; otherwise, the appeal judge awards compensation within the limit of the total amount claimed before the first-instance judges (CE, 29 Dec. 2020, No. 432775). In that case, the administrative court of appeal had refused to examine two losses relied on for the first time on appeal, without answering the specific medical evidence describing a deterioration after the judgment. Its decision was annulled on that point, and the Council of State, settling the case itself, awarded additional compensation of €60,000 with interest and its capitalisation.

For this rule to apply, the worsening must be documented and dated: medical reports, a new expert report, later invoices, evidence of a change in professional situation. A mere upward reassessment of a loss already known is not enough. If the worsening is significant and the appeal proceedings are closed, a new claim based on this new damage may also be considered, subject to the limitation period specific to that worsening.

Very probably, but three points must be checked. First, a financial claim left without a reply for two months gives rise to an implied refusal (Article L. 231-4, 3°, of the Code of Relations between the Public and the Administration), against which Article R. 421-2 of the Code of Administrative Justice opens a two-month time limit for challenge. Second, that time limit can be relied on against you only if the administration sent you the acknowledgement of receipt provided for by Article L. 112-3 of the Code of Relations between the Public and the Administration, containing the required information, including the means of redress and time limits (Article R. 112-5 of the same code). Failing that, Article L. 112-6 of the same code rules out reliance on the time limit, unless an express decision was duly notified to you before the implied refusal arose.

Finally, the Council of State, in its opinion of 30 January 2019, specified that the two-month rule applies to implied refusals in full-jurisdiction matters arising since 1 January 2017, and that it combines with the requirement of a complete acknowledgement of receipt, except in relations between the administration and its staff (CE, opinion, 30 Jan. 2019, No. 420797). A public official therefore cannot rely on the absence of an acknowledgement of receipt in the same way. In every case, the absence of a time limit for challenge does not suspend the four-year limitation period, which keeps running.

No. For challenges directed against an individual decision notified without information on means of redress and time limits, the Council of State set a one-year limit in 2016, based on legal certainty. It then refused to extend it to liability actions (CE, 17 June 2019, No. 413097, Centre hospitalier de Vichy). The reason lies in the purpose of the action: a compensation application does not seek to annul or reform the rejection of the claim, it seeks an order against the public body. Stability of situations is then ensured by the limitation rules of the Law of 31 December 1968 or, for personal injury linked to medical care, by the Public Health Code.

In that case, a patient had received the hospital's rejection of her claim in 2010, without being told that referral to the conciliation and compensation commission interrupts the time limit for challenge. She brought the matter before the administrative court only in 2013. The Council of State held that the two-month time limit could not be relied on against her and dismissed the establishment's appeal to the Council of State. This outcome protects the victim, but it never removes the need to monitor the limitation deadline, which remains the real limit.

The Law of 31 December 1968 extinguishes any claim left unpaid at the end of four years, counted from 1 January following the year in which the rights arose (Article 1 of Law No. 68-1250 of 31 December 1968). For personal injury, the Council of State takes as the reference year the one in which the impairments were consolidated, for all heads of loss, temporary or permanent (CE, 20 Nov. 2020, No. 434018). Consolidation starts the period for all losses already certain on that date, including for the future. This four-year regime does not apply to damage caused by acts of prevention, diagnosis or care in a public hospital: Article L. 1142-28 of the Public Health Code (Code de la santé publique) subjects them to a ten-year limitation period from consolidation.

The same decision protects the victim when their condition worsens: the expiry of the period does not prevent compensation for new losses arising from a worsening after consolidation, and the limitation period for that worsening runs only from its own consolidation. In that case, an employee of the municipality of Pau, injured on duty in 2001, had been met with two distinct consolidation dates for disorders arising from the same accident. The appeal judgment was annulled for failing to examine whether the psychological disorders amounted to a worsening. The firm therefore reconstructs the medical chronology before quantifying, because it is the chronology that fixes the relevant date.

Yes, where that challenge concerns the same originating event. Article 2 of that law provides for interruption by any judicial challenge relating to the originating event, to the existence, amount or payment of the claim, whoever brings it. The new four-year period then runs from 1 January following the year in which the decision became final; an appeal to the Court of Cassation or the Council of State lodged afterwards is a new challenge that interrupts the limitation period again.

CAA Lyon, 29 Apr. 2026, No. 24LY00963 draws concrete consequences from this. An orchard operator sought compensation for grubbing-up imposed by unlawful prefectoral orders made in 2003, 2008 and 2009. The court of first instance had held the claim barred by limitation. The court held that the challenge for abuse of power (excès de pouvoir) brought in 2004 by another company against the 2003 order, followed by its compensation actions and its appeal, had interrupted the limitation period in the operator's favour, since they concerned the same originating event. The State was ordered to pay €666,303. The same court nevertheless refused to postpone the starting point on the ground that the unlawfulness had been recognised by the judge only later: publication of the orders was enough to reveal the claim. A search for litigation brought by others on the same decision is therefore part of the analysis.

Article 3 of the Law of 31 December 1968 suspends the limitation period against a creditor who cannot act, in particular by reason of force majeure, and against one who may legitimately be regarded as unaware of the existence of their claim. This ignorance must be proved and is assessed strictly. The Paris Court of Appeal, hearing an action against the State, held that "it is for the person relying on the suspension of the limitation period under Article 3 of the Law of 31 December 1968 to establish that they remained legitimately unaware of the existence of their claim and that they had no means of knowing of the originating event within the limitation period" (our translation) (CA Paris, pôle 4 ch. 13, 13 June 2023, No. 20/11158). The action, brought more than twenty years after the originating event, was declared barred by limitation: the decision is unfavourable to the claimant.

The administrative judge reasons in the same way. In CAA Lyon, 29 Apr. 2026, No. 24LY00963, the late revelation of the unlawfulness by a judgment was not enough to postpone the starting point, because the published orders already made it possible to know of the claim. The argument of legitimate ignorance is therefore useful only if it rests on specific facts: information held only by the administration, damage that was not visible, a document revealed late. Otherwise, it is better to reason from the least favourable date and act before it.

No. Unlawfulness is a fault, but the loss must be its direct and certain consequence. The judge examines whether the same decision could lawfully have been taken and would have been taken in the circumstances of the case; if so, the causal link is missing (CE, 11 March 2021, No. 437138). In that case, a surveyor had been refused an approval because of a diploma requirement that no text imposed. The court had dismissed his claim on the ground that he had not proved he would have obtained the approval; the Council of State annulled that judgment, because it was for the judge to form a view on the basis of all the evidence produced.

A procedural defect is the hardest ground. CAA Nantes, 6 March 2020, No. 18NT03757 dismissed the appeal of an educator subject to a ban on practising, annulled for breach of the right to be heard, who claimed €177,500: only that irregularity remained, and nothing indicated that the prefect would have decided otherwise after a proper procedure. The €6,500 awarded at first instance stood, but no additional sum was granted: the decision is unfavourable to the appellant. Before starting an action, the exact ground of annulment must therefore be identified, and it must be checked whether a substantive ground, and not only one of form, makes the decision unjustifiable.

An official irregularly removed from post is entitled to full compensation for the loss actually suffered, but only for losses directly linked to the unlawfulness, taking into account the respective weight of that unlawfulness and of the official's own faults (CE, 28 March 2018, No. 398851). In that case, the dismissal of a contract employee had been annulled as disproportionate; the court had nevertheless reduced the compensation because of their faulty conduct, and the Council of State dismissed their appeal.

The decision in CE, 13 Oct. 2023, No. 462580 goes further and remains unfavourable to the official. A teacher excluded for six months had obtained annulment of the sanction, held disproportionate. The judge considered that a sanction with the same effects on pay could lawfully have been imposed, given the seriousness of the remarks made in front of their pupils. The loss of salary during the exclusion was therefore not compensated, nor was the moral loss claimed. For an official, what is at stake in the prior claim is therefore twofold: to quantify the loss of pay and bonuses, and to show that the unlawfulness, rather than the facts complained of, is the source of those losses.

The judge rules head by head and on the documents. CAA Paris, 10 Nov. 2022, No. 21PA01464 shows this: after an assignment decision held unlawful and then withdrawn for lack of a security clearance, the court rejected the loss of pay, since the end of the previous contract predated the decision, and then the material loss linked to the sale of furniture, for lack of supporting documents. It did, however, compensate the disruption caused by the loss of the housing, terminated because of the decision, and raised the compensation from €3,500 to €7,500. Each amount claimed must therefore be tied to a document and a period.

Interest at the statutory rate may be claimed from the time of the claim. CAA Lyon, 29 Apr. 2026, No. 24LY00963 has it run from the date the prefect received the application, then grants capitalisation at each annual anniversary, the first falling one year after that starting point. The mechanism rests on Article 1343-2 of the Civil Code (Code civil), under which interest due for a full year itself bears interest where a court decision so provides. Capitalisation must be requested; it may be requested at any time before the trial court. On an old claim, this interest often represents a significant part of the sum finally obtained.

Yes, and this loss is distinct from the one arising from the delay in rehousing. In a case decided in Paris, the mediation commission had refused in June 2018 to recognise a family as a priority, although an eviction judgment was pending against it. The refusal was annulled, the family was recognised as a priority in 2019, and the administrative court then compensated only the failure to rehouse it after that second decision. The Council of State held that the unlawfulness of the first refusal caused separate disruption to living conditions, for the period running from the expiry of the six-month period following that refusal until the starting point of the other compensated period (CE, 7 Nov. 2024, No. 465886). It awarded €1,000 under this head.

The example illustrates a method that is useful beyond housing: divide the chronology into periods of liability, link each to a specific decision or failure to act, then quantify the disruption suffered during each period according to the make-up of the household and living conditions. The prior claim must cover each originating event, failing which the judge can compensate only the one that was put to the administration.