Saisie sur Salaire: Wage Garnishment in France (2026)

Wage garnishment in France is called saisie sur salaire, or more formally saisie des rémunérations. It lets a creditor recover an unpaid debt by having part of a person's pay diverted at source by their employer. It is not a first step: it is one way of enforcing a debt that a creditor already holds an enforceable title for.

French law strictly limits how much of a salary can be taken. The seizable share follows a set of income brackets that are re-indexed every year, and a protected minimum equal to the standard welfare benefit is always left in the worker's hands. This page explains the current brackets, the protected floor, and the procedure, which changed significantly in 2025. It is part of the RecordingLaw guide to French consumer and debt rights within our coverage of law in France.

Information last verified on 22 July 2026. This page presents general legal information, not legal advice.

What saisie sur salaire is

A saisie sur salaire is a legal order that requires an employer to withhold part of an employee's pay and forward it to satisfy a debt. The employer becomes the tiers saisi (the third party holding the funds) and must comply once properly notified.

It is important to see where this sits in the process. Garnishment is the enforcement stage. Before it can happen, the creditor must already hold an enforceable title (titre exécutoire) confirming the debt. One common route to that title is the injonction de payer, a summary payment order; another is an ordinary court judgment.

You need a court title first

A creditor cannot instruct a wage garnishment simply because payment is late. There must be a titre exécutoire behind it. That is the safeguard that separates a lawful garnishment from mere pressure.

The officer who carries out enforcement is the commissaire de justice, the profession still widely called the huissier de justice. Their power to divert wages comes entirely from the title, so a demand that threatens garnishment without a court title behind it does not reflect how the procedure actually works.

The 2026 barème: how much of your pay can be taken

The share of pay that can be seized is capped by a progressive scale, the barème. It applies to net pay after mandatory deductions and is calculated in slices, so higher earners give up a larger fraction only on the upper part of their pay, not on the whole amount.

For 2026 the monthly brackets, set by décret n° 2025-1299 of 24 December 2025 and in force since 1 January 2026, are as follows for a single person with no dependents:

Each threshold is raised by 145 € per month for every dependent person the debtor supports, which reduces the amount that can be taken. Because these figures are re-indexed annually, always confirm the current year's décret before relying on a specific number; the structure of the brackets, however, stays the same.

The protected minimum that is always left

Whatever the calculation produces, French law guarantees a floor. An amount equal to the RSA (revenu de solidarité active), the standard welfare benefit for a single person, must always be left to the debtor. For 2026 that protected minimum is 651.69 €, and it applies regardless of household composition.

This floor is why a garnishment cannot strip a low income to nothing. If the seizable calculation would drop take-home pay below the RSA-equivalent amount, the withholding is reduced so that the protected minimum remains available.

The 2025 reform: a commissaire de justice, not the court registry

The procedure for ordinary wage garnishment changed on 1 July 2025. Under loi n° 2023-1059 of 20 November 2023, and the décret of 12 February 2025 that implemented it, the process was moved out of the court registry and entrusted to commissaires de justice. The reform is in force in 2026.

In practical terms, the creditor's commissaire de justice now drives the procedure rather than the greffe (court registry) and the juge de l'exécution managing each file. A national digital register of wage garnishments (registre numérique des saisies des rémunérations) records active measures so that competing claims against the same salary can be ranked and coordinated. A specific role, the commissaire de justice répartiteur, handles the distribution of the sums collected.

The reform covers ordinary saisie des rémunérations. Certain related mechanisms are outside it, including the assignment of wages (cession des rémunérations), the direct-payment procedure for maintenance (paiement direct de pension alimentaire), and tax collection notices.

Priority debts and multiple claims

Not all claims rank equally. Maintenance debts (such as unpaid child support) benefit from their own faster mechanism, the paiement direct de pension alimentaire, which sits outside the ordinary garnishment scale and is not subject to the same bracket limits in the same way.

Where several creditors pursue the same salary, they do not each garnish separately without limit. The single seizable fraction is calculated once on the pay, and the national register and the distributing commissaire de justice coordinate how the collected sum is shared, so the employee is never left below the protected minimum.

How the calculation works in practice

The scale is applied slice by slice, not as a single flat rate. Take a worker whose seizable monthly pay falls in the middle of the table: only the portion inside each bracket is charged at that bracket's fraction, and the portions below are charged at the lower fractions that apply to them. The result is that the effective share taken rises gradually with income rather than jumping at a threshold.

Two adjustments then apply on top of the raw table. First, each bracket limit is lifted by 145 € per month for every dependent, which shifts more pay into the lower, lighter fractions. Second, the absolute floor equal to the RSA is checked last, so that whatever the brackets produce, the protected minimum is preserved. Because both the bracket limits and the RSA figure are revised by décret each year, the exact euro numbers change even though the method does not, which is why any specific figure should be checked against the décret in force for the current year.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much of my salary can be taken by a saisie sur salaire in France?

Only a fraction, set by a progressive annual scale. For 2026 it runs from 1/20 of the lowest slice of monthly pay up to the full amount on pay above about 2,150 € per month, per décret n° 2025-1299. Each threshold rises by 145 € per month for each dependent, and an amount equal to the RSA (651.69 € in 2026) is always left.

Can my wages be garnished without a court order?

No. An ordinary saisie sur salaire requires an enforceable title (titre exécutoire), such as a court judgment or a final injonction de payer. A creditor cannot garnish pay simply because a payment is late, and a demand threatening garnishment without a title behind it does not reflect the actual procedure.

Who handles wage garnishment in France now?

Since 1 July 2025, following loi n° 2023-1059 of 20 November 2023, an ordinary wage garnishment is handled by a commissaire de justice rather than the court registry. Active measures are recorded in a national digital register, and a commissaire de justice répartiteur coordinates the distribution of collected sums.

Is there a minimum amount that cannot be taken from my pay?

Yes. An amount equal to the RSA welfare benefit for a single person, 651.69 € in 2026, must always be left to the debtor, whatever the household size. If the seizable calculation would drop take-home pay below that floor, the withholding is reduced so the protected minimum remains.

What happens if several creditors garnish the same salary?

The single seizable fraction is calculated once on the pay, not separately for each creditor. The national register of wage garnishments and the distributing commissaire de justice coordinate how the collected sum is shared among creditors, and the employee is never taken below the protected RSA-equivalent minimum.