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Court orders AFP to disburse vacation pay

Wednesday 13 January 2016

All the versions of this article: [English] [français]

Summer scam: continuation or conclusion?

A Paris court has ordered AFP to immediately calculate and disburse vacation pay due to its employees in a ruling handed down on January 12.

The lawsuit followed a change introduced on the sly by AFP’s management in June 2015 to no longer calculate and pay the vacation differential potentially due to employees each time they take time off. The change meant that most people on French contracts were involuntarily advancing funds to AFP. With our salaries having been frozen since November 2012, SUD opposed this measure. AFP’s management failed to heed our protests, so we were forced to bring the matter before a judge (see our communique Court to review AFP’s summer scam in Nov) [1].

EXCERPT FROM THE RULING

"The court

  • Orders Agence France-Presse to carry out the immediate calculation of the vacation indemnity and pay the amount more favorable to employees the month following each use of vacation time, in conformity with the practice in place in the company since 2011;
  • Orders Agence France-Presse to pay vacation indemnities due to employees for vacation taken since the decision taken in June 2015 to defer payment;
  • Considers there is no reason to order measures to enforce payment;
  • Orders Agence France-Presse to pay the trade union SUD AFP the amount 1,500 euros (one thousand five hundred euros) in damages and interest;
  • Orders Agence France-Presse to pay the legal costs;
  • Orders Agence France-Presse to pay the trade union SUD AFP the amount 2,000 euros (two thousand euros) under the provisions of article 700 of the civil procedural code;
  • Orders the provisional execution of this judgment."

The ball is now with management, which should soon pay what is due to us. But given their lack of sincerity, we shouldn’t be surprised by further dirty tricks. We should remain ready to mobilize, ready to mount new legal battles.

This success is the result of collective efforts: tenacious employee representatives, courageous employees who volunteered their paysheets and other information as evidence, SUD members who financed the lawsuit and skilled lawyers willing to help workers.
Everyone can see that even at moments when our social rights and benefits are under attack that it is possible to resist, that submission is not our only option.

Paris, 13 January 2016
SUD-AFP (Solidarity-Unity-Democracy)

Read the complete judgement (in French) here


[1Read the communique here