Dematerialization, use on Sundays, shopping: the government presents a reform of restaurant vouchers

Dematerialization in 2027, possible use on Sundays and throughout France and, above all, permanent use for paying for food shopping in supermarkets : Minister of Commerce and SMEs Véronique Louwagie presented her reform of restaurant vouchers on Wednesday.

"This reform simplifies, secures, and modernizes the restaurant voucher system, to which all French people are attached," the minister said in an interview with Le Parisien published online Wednesday.

Created in France in the late 1960s, meal vouchers are now used by more than five million employees to pay for meals and food shopping at some 244,000 retailers.

The reform, which has been in the works for two years but has been delayed by changes in government, is intended to modernize the system while "providing greater incentives for consumption," the ministry said. The form it will take (draft or proposed law) has not yet been finalized, nor has its timeline been set; the ministry hopes it will be debated before the end of 2026.

The most sensitive point was the use of receipts to pay for all food shopping in supermarkets (except alcohol, confectionery, baby products and pet food), a temporary system launched in 2022 and extended every year since.

It is currently in force until the end of 2026 and its last renewal was a bit chaotic, with the parliamentary calendar having been disrupted by the government's censure.

Criticized by restaurateurs who see it as a loss of revenue, estimated at more than a billion euros over two years by the main organization in the sector, Umih, the system is very popular with employees.

For the government, it's about "encouraging consumption and responding to new habits," with 6 out of 10 French people bringing their home-cooked meals to work. Not to mention the widespread adoption of teleworking. To encourage consumption, it will no longer be possible to extend the validity of vouchers beyond one year.

The daily limit, set at 25 euros, remains unchanged, but use will be possible every day of the week, including Sundays, except on public holidays, and throughout France (currently it is limited to the departments bordering the workplace).

The dematerialization, planned for 2027, should simplify procedures for merchants and reduce the fees they pay to issuers, while employees will be able to pay to the nearest cent. Around 20% of meal vouchers are issued in paper format, and it is the coexistence of both formats, paper and electronic, that weighs on commissions, according to issuers.

The reform does not include a cap on commissions, fees paid by retailers and restaurateurs to issuers of meal vouchers (Ticket Restaurant, Chèque Déjeuner, etc.), but the government would like to see them reduced.

To achieve this, the reform plans to ban end-of-year discounts, a commercial process that involves selling restaurant vouchers to employers at low prices, which in turn generates higher commissions for retailers.

She also plans to implement a transparency charter that will allow merchants to better understand how commissions are broken down. The minister also hopes to bring together issuers and merchants "to try to ensure that the cost of the system is less of a burden on merchants."

In another measure, the minister intends to recover frozen securities—unused sums when an employee leaves a company, estimated at around ten million euros—and direct them to a food aid fund. To facilitate donations through digitalization, the government also wants to require issuers to provide a space on their apps reserved for charitable donations.

Finally, the reform aims to address the governance of the sector by abolishing the National Commission for Restaurant Vouchers (CNTR), the current supervisor, by dematerializing and simplifying the approval of traders and by setting up an authorization procedure supervised by the Bank of France for issuers.

Authorised issuers will sit on an economic interest group (GIE) which will be responsible, in particular, for ensuring that retailers only accept meal vouchers for food use.