Private detective since 1994, Fabrice Lehmann sees the man who was responsible for tracking while leaving his home in the Parisian suburbs, dressed to work. Then he begins to follow him while trying to mix with the crowd to go unnoticed.
It follows its goal in a suburban train. The man, who was told that he was licensed by illness since June, spent his trip supported by a laptop. Then it becomes more difficult to continue in the corridors of the Paris Metro and Fabrice Lehmann must approach so as not to lose it. But when the next train arrives, the goal goes up on board before descending immediately when the doors are closed, escaping the detective.
Fabrice Lehmann is more often asked to track white passes such as this employee, who works in the financial services sector and is part of a growing number of suspect French fraud of disease fraud.
Explosion of work stops
According to the National Health Insurance Fund (CNAM), the expenses of the daily assignments increased considerably, with an increase of 27.9 % between 2019 and 2023, the CNAM underlines. If this increase is explained to 60% per demographic (increase and aging of the wage population) and economic (increase in the average or minimum salary), the remaining participation is linked to an increase in judgments and their frequency. “
In a report published in March, the CNM revealed that it had detected and avoided 42 million euros in fraud to the daily assignments linked to labor strikes in 2024, against 17 million of the previous year. But these figures are likely not to reflect the real magnitude of the phenomenon, especially because the CNAM only began to strengthen its controls in 2022. At the same time, many companies distrust their employees hire private detectives to trace them.
A booming activity
While Reuters spoke with five private detectives, they all said that their contracts related to fraud at disease stops were booming. So much so that some have ceased their traditional activities, and surveys in extra marital relationships, to focus only on this issue. Among the detectives interviewed, Baptiste Pannaud said that their contracts related to illness had more than duplicated in the last four years.
According to Fabrice Lehmann, it is suspected that some of their objectives work with competitors of companies that use them, while others use their illness license to launch their own society. Patrice Le Bec, whose agency collaborates with that of Fabrice Lehmann and that she was committed to research in Paris, said she had already seen absent people due to a disease and go to the airport to go on vacation.
These fraudulent behaviors cost in any case loved for social security. The maximum amount of the daily allocation paid by health insurance due to a disease amounts to 41,47 euros, for a period of up to three years. However, employers complete a large part of the rest of their employees’ salary during a defined period. And depending on the agreements of the branch, some also take care of the three days of deficiency before the SEP compensates for employees at the stop.
According to a report by the General Inspection of Finance of 2024, the absences for health reasons in the public service reached 14.5 days per agent in 2022, against 11.7 days in the private sector. This difference can be explained by the fact that public officials only suffer a single day of deficiency, known as public order, that is, or Social Security, or by the employer or provident. In Germany, where services are also generous, employees were on illness 14.8 days on average in 2024, according to official statistics, which do not specify the distribution of the sectors.
“It is not acceptable in a country like ours”
In France, checks revealed that half of the illness license for 18 months were unjustified, said François Bayrou in July, without providing details. “This is not acceptable in a country like ours and in a period like we live,” he said.
According to Bruno Boivin, one of the detectives interviewed, the government’s promises to fight fraud, by attacking, for example, doctors who grant false illness license, are “absurd” because the acts in question are rarely subject to sanctions.
Bruno Boivin explained that he was hired by a large public transport company where 30% of the personnel of a service was on illness.
Bruno Boivin also explained that his agency had trouble finding an employee who has stopped working for ten years, but that he appears to his employer once every three years to renew his service car.
Generalized fraud, “a pure fantasy”
It should be said that absenteeism has accelerated since the COVVI-19 crisis, according to official data. According to Mercer’s latest barometer, the absenteeism rate amounted to 5.8% in 2024 against 4.8% in 2021. And one in three employees (31%) was absent at least once last year. According to some experts, management culture in France does not help.
Sabrina Ali Benali, an emergency doctor and co -author of the proposals of France rebel in terms of medical care, rejects the image of too greedy workers transmitted by companies. Although some come to request that you get a complacency work strike, she believes that generalized fraud is “a pure fantasy.”
Source: BFM TV
