New figures released late on 23 December by the Interior Ministry—and first analysed by Le Monde—show that France approved just 11,012 ‘admissions exceptionnelles au séjour’ (AES) between January and September 2025, down from 19,001 in the same period of 2024. The plunge follows January’s so-called Retailleau Circular, which raised the residency requirement for undocumented migrants from five to seven years and made French-language tests compulsory.
Labour-market regularisations, once a fast-track for cleaners, carers and kitchen staff, have almost dried up: only 702 permits were issued under the separate “worker shortages” pathway introduced last year. Prefects are now instructed to issue an automatic Obligation de Quitter le Territoire Français (OQTF) when an AES request is denied, raising the legal stakes for applicants and their employers.
![France’s Tougher Regularisation Rules Slash Residence-Permit Approvals by 42 %]()
In this increasingly complex environment, VisaHQ’s France desk (https://www.visahq.com/france/) can help employers and individual applicants pre-check documents, book prefecture appointments and monitor status updates online, reducing the risk of an automatic OQTF and the hefty fines that follow.
For multinational companies this means greater scrutiny of subcontractors in sectors such as logistics, food services and construction. A single undocumented worker can now trigger fines of €18,750 under amended CESEDA rules plus reputational risk during public tenders. Mobility teams should audit vendor compliance, verify right-to-work documents and budget longer lead times for in-house change-of-status filings.
Trade unions and NGOs accuse the government of creating a “deportation trap” that deters eligible migrants from applying. The Interior Ministry counters that the circular restores public confidence by ending “paper fraud” and harmonising practices across prefectures. A parliamentary review is scheduled for March 2026; business groups are lobbying for clearer, nationwide processing timelines.
Labour-market regularisations, once a fast-track for cleaners, carers and kitchen staff, have almost dried up: only 702 permits were issued under the separate “worker shortages” pathway introduced last year. Prefects are now instructed to issue an automatic Obligation de Quitter le Territoire Français (OQTF) when an AES request is denied, raising the legal stakes for applicants and their employers.
In this increasingly complex environment, VisaHQ’s France desk (https://www.visahq.com/france/) can help employers and individual applicants pre-check documents, book prefecture appointments and monitor status updates online, reducing the risk of an automatic OQTF and the hefty fines that follow.
For multinational companies this means greater scrutiny of subcontractors in sectors such as logistics, food services and construction. A single undocumented worker can now trigger fines of €18,750 under amended CESEDA rules plus reputational risk during public tenders. Mobility teams should audit vendor compliance, verify right-to-work documents and budget longer lead times for in-house change-of-status filings.
Trade unions and NGOs accuse the government of creating a “deportation trap” that deters eligible migrants from applying. The Interior Ministry counters that the circular restores public confidence by ending “paper fraud” and harmonising practices across prefectures. A parliamentary review is scheduled for March 2026; business groups are lobbying for clearer, nationwide processing timelines.
