Court of cassation, Social division, January 7, 2026, No. 24-19.410
In a reversal on September 10, 2025 (Cass. Soc., Sept. 10, 2025, No. 23-14.455), in application of the European case law, the Court of Cassation established the principle that paid leave days must be taken into account when determining whether hours worked exceed the legal weekly working hours.
The Social Chamber points out that “any practice or omission by an employer that has a potentially dissuasive effect on a worker’s taking of annual leave is incompatible with the purpose of the right to paid annual leave” (CJEU, Jan. 13, 2022, No. C-514/20), which was the case with the provisions of Article L.3121-28 of the Labor Code.
However, the note attached to this ruling included a warning: “The solution reached remains limited to the weekly calculation of working time that was applied in the case brought before the Court of Cassation and does not prejudge the solution for other methods of calculating working time.”
However, on January 7, the social chamber, which was specifically seized of a specific method of calculating working time, organized over two weeks in the road transport sector, applied the principle resulting from the reversal of September 10, 2025, to this situation.
It recognized that an employee who had worked 78 hours and received 112 hours of paid leave was entitled to payment for 38.33 hours of overtime (corresponding to the excess of the legal monthly limit of 151.67 hours).
It remains to be seen what reasoning the Court of Cassation will adopt, particularly with regard to employees whose working time is calculated on an annual basis.