Registering with the Urssaf of Alsace: is it mandatory?

The Urssaf network comprises several regional funds, some of which have a specialised role. This is the case for the Urssaf of Alsace, which manages foreign companies without an establishment in France employing at least one staff member on French territory. This dedicated service, historically called the National Centre for Foreign Firms (CNFE), is now known as the Urssaf service Firmes étrangères (SFE). It is your single point of entry for your administrative formalities as well as for the declaration and payment of contributions.

As an employer, you are required to declare and pay employer and employee contributions to this service so that your employees benefit from social security and unemployment insurance.

Any company employing at least one staff member in France must contribute to the Urssaf. Two cases arise:

• You have an establishment in France (subsidiary, branch): you fall under the general scheme via the Urssaf of your region, after registration on the Single Window for business formalities.

• You have no establishment in France: your contact is the Urssaf service Firmes étrangères (Alsace). Your employees must fall under the general social security scheme, whatever their nationality and place of residence.

Registration is now done online (the paper form E0 is no longer the reference route). You request your registration directly with the Urssaf service Firmes étrangères, which will assign you a SIRET number via INSEE along with your access to your employer account.

The Urssaf then takes charge of informing the other bodies with which the company must be registered: INSEE, Carsat, and the Directorate of taxes for non-residents (DINR). For any question, the service can be reached at sfe@urssaf.fr.

To simplify your formalities, the Urssaf provides the Titre Firmes Étrangères (TFE), a free service. It allows companies with fewer than 20 employees and no establishment in France to carry out the formalities related to hiring (pre-hire declaration and employment contract) and to make the social declarations enabling the payment of contributions.

A few practical points: you must first be registered with the Urssaf service Firmes étrangères; after obtaining your SIRET number, you must wait 72 hours before being able to sign up for the TFE, free of charge, on the service’s website. Beyond 20 employees, the declaration is made via the DSN (Déclaration Sociale Nominative) on net-entreprises.fr.

Regarding supplementary retirement, it is the Malakoff Humanis group (Malakoff Humanis International Agirc-Arrco) that is the competent body — it has replaced the former designation “Humanis international”.

Charges are applied to the gross remuneration of your employees: one part financed by the employer (employer charges), another by the employee (employee charges). They finance the risks of illness, invalidity, death, old age, unemployment… To understand the gross / net mechanics, read our article How to convert gross salary into net?.

The contribution collected via the TFE incorporates all of these charges and is calculated as a percentage of the gross salary (bonuses and variable pay included). French legislation imposes a minimum contribution base. Payment is made quarterly up to 9 employees. To estimate the amount payable, the Urssaf provides a simulation tool.

Finally, the declaration to the Urssaf allows your employees to be reimbursed by social security in the event of a health expense. In addition, you are required, as an employer, to take out a group supplementary health insurance contract to top up these reimbursements.