An employee’s financial liability towards their employer only arises in the event of wilful misconduct (faute lourde), meaning misconduct committed with the intention of harming the employer or the business. This rule departs from the ordinary law of contractual liability, under which a breach causing loss is enough.
In this case, a research and development manager dismissed for gross misconduct returned her work phone and laptop more than two years after the end of her contract, and only after the labour court had ordered their return under a daily penalty (astreinte). The Court of Appeal ordered her to pay €300 in damages for breach of her contractual obligation to return the equipment, the employer having been deprived of its use.
The Court of Cassation quashed that ruling : the lower court had relied on the contractual breach and the resulting loss without finding wilful misconduct. Neither the seriousness of the breach nor the extent of the loss establishes an intention to harm, which the employer must prove and which the courts accept only exceptionally, essentially in cases of unfair competition or poaching customers.
The requirement of wilful misconduct only concerns damages claims. It does not apply to the return of property or sums held on the employer’s behalf, nor to the recovery of expenses wrongly reimbursed. As in this case, an order for return under a daily penalty is the effective remedy.
