Private Detectives Tail French Workers to Root Out Surging Sick Leave Fraud

By Gabriel Stargardter
PARIS (Reuters) -Fabrice Lehmann caught sight of his target as he left his suburban Paris home, dressed for work. He began tailing him, trying to blend in with the commuters heading into the city.
A private detective since 1994, Lehmann has increasingly found himself tracking white-collar employees like the financial services worker, who forms part of a growing cohort of French people suspected of abusing their sick leave.
It is hard to assess how prevalent fraudulent absenteeism is in France, but experts say it has been rising alongside a 60% increase in sick leave since 2012 that now costs over 10 billion euros a year – money the country can ill afford as it grapples with a chronic budget crisis.
Former Prime Minister Francois Bayrou, who lost his job this month over proposals to slash the euro zone’s largest deficit, had set his sights on France’s ballooning sick leave costs as part of a plan to trim 5 billion euros in healthcare spending from the 2026 budget. He also vowed to crack down on fraud.
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France’s National Health Insurer said it prevented 42 million euros worth of sick leave fraud last year, more than double the 2023 total. That number is unlikely to capture the true scale of the problem as the insurer only began toughening its anti-fraud controls in 2022 and many audits are undertaken by professional sleuths contracted by private companies suspicious of employee behaviour.
Reuters spoke with five private eyes, who all said their fraudulent sick leave business was booming – so much so that some agencies have ditched traditional gigs like extra-marital affairs to focus solely on employees suspected of skipping work.
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Private detective Baptiste Pannaud said his sick leave-related contracts had more than doubled in the last four years.
Lehmann said some of his targets were suspected of working with rivals, while others used the paid time off to launch their own companies. Lehmann’s collaborator Patrice Le Bec, who was hired to conduct the Paris probe, said he had seen people sign off sick and head straight to the airport on vacation.