Your employer informs you that your pay slips will now be available in a digital safe. No more paper, no more envelopes. The natural reflex: to wonder if this is legal, if you can refuse, and what really protects your documents. The French legal framework precisely regulates the dematerialization of pay slips, but some obligations remain unknown, even on the employers’ side.
The rules surrounding the Arkevia pay slip and digital safe are based on several legislative and regulatory texts. Their articulation deserves to be detailed point by point.
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2018 Decree on Digital Safe: Specific Technical Obligations
Before discussing pay slips, it is essential to understand what the term “digital safe” means legally. Decree No. 2018-853 of October 5, 2018, codified specific requirements for any provider claiming this status. A simple online storage space is not enough.
In practice, a service like Arkevia, to carry the label of a digital safe, must meet three technical constraints that most consumer cloud solutions do not fulfill:
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- Data portability on demand: the employee can retrieve all their documents in a usable format at any time, without additional costs.
- Unalterable logging of operations: each deposit, consultation, or modification is recorded in a register that cannot be altered afterwards. This mechanism guarantees the evidential value of the archived document.
- Prior information to the user before any substantial modification of the service: if the provider changes its storage conditions or technical architecture, the employee must be notified in advance.
These obligations distinguish a true digital safe from a shared folder on a company server. For an employer, choosing a provider that does not comply with this decree exposes them to legal risk in case of a dispute regarding the effective delivery of the pay slip.
Employee’s Right to Object and Dematerialized Pay Slip
You may have heard that the dematerialization of the pay slip is mandatory. This is not accurate. Since the El Khomri law of 2016, the employer can decide to switch to electronic format without seeking the prior consent of each employee. The nuance is here: the employee retains a permanent right to object.
In practice, this works in two stages. First, the employer informs the employee, at least one month before the first dematerialized sending, about the switch to the digital format. Then, the employee can request to continue receiving their pay slip in paper form at any time, not just at the start.
When Refusal Becomes Problematic
The employer cannot sanction an employee who exercises their right to object. Some recent labor court decisions have also reminded that a lack of prior information can render the dematerialization unenforceable against the employee. In other words, if the employee was never clearly notified, they can contest the validity of the electronic delivery.
This point is often overlooked in rapid deployments. A company that activates an Arkevia digital safe for all its teams without formalizing individual information exposes itself to disputes, even if the technical solution is impeccable.
Permanent Availability of Pay Slips: The Requirement That the CNIL Reminds
Having a digital safe compliant with the 2018 decree does not solve everything. The CNIL emphasized, in its updated practical guide in 2023 on the dematerialized pay slip, a point that many employers underestimate: the employer remains responsible for the permanent availability of the pay slip, even in the event of a change of provider.
Imagine a company using Arkevia for several years, then deciding to migrate to another provider. What happens to the already archived pay slips? The employee must be able to access them without interruption. If the contract between the employer and the provider ends, the responsibility for ensuring access to the documents remains with the employer.
Long-Term Storage and Employer-Provider Contract Termination
The Labor Code requires that dematerialized pay slips be accessible for fifty years or until the employee turns seventy-five. This duration far exceeds the average contractual relationship between a company and a software publisher.
A serious provider includes reversibility clauses. Before signing, the employer should check what happens if the provider ceases operations or if the contract is not renewed. The portability provided by the 2018 decree takes on full meaning here: the employee must never find themselves without access to their own documents.
Security of Employee Data and GDPR Compliance
A pay slip contains the name, address, social security number, net and gross salary. These are sensitive personal data under GDPR. The choice of the digital safe engages the employer’s responsibility in terms of data protection.
The company must ensure that the provider implements appropriate security measures: encryption of stored documents, enhanced authentication for employee access, and a clear incident management policy. An electronic safe that does not encrypt documents at rest does not meet the expected standards.
Transfer Outside the EU and Subcontracting
Another point to check: the location of data hosting. If the provider stores pay slips on servers located outside the European Union, additional guarantees are necessary (standard contractual clauses, for example). Arkevia, as a Cegedim solution, communicates about hosting in France, which simplifies compliance.
The choice of a digital safe for managing pay slips is not just a matter of convenience. The 2018 decree sets a technical foundation, the El Khomri law regulates the right to object, and the CNIL reminds that the availability of documents over several decades remains the employer’s responsibility. Checking these three pillars before deploying a solution avoids unpleasant surprises, for both the company and the employees.