Commissaire de justice: third-party funds accounting in 2026

Quick answer. A commissaire de justice practice keeps regulated accounts that strictly separate the funds held for third parties (sums recovered for creditors, consignments) from the practice's own income. Its revenue splits into regulated-tariff emoluments, free fees and disbursements. The activity falls under non-commercial profits (2035 return), and the pension depends on CAVOM, not the lawyers' fund. Since 1 July 2022, the bailiff and the judicial auctioneer have formed a single profession.

You run a practice, you recover sums for creditors, you serve acts, you organise sales. And each month the same question returns: how do you guarantee, to the euro, that third-party money is never mixed with the practice's own funds? This requirement is not red tape. It shapes your entire accounting and underpins the peace of mind that you, your clients and any inspection expect. It lies at the heart of what makes a public and ministerial officer specific.

Since 1 July 2022, the bailiff and the judicial auctioneer have merged into a single profession, the commissaire de justice (ordinance no. 2016-728 of 2 June 2016). Many people still search for the word bailiff, but the scope has broadened, notably towards the sale of movables and inventories.

You remain a public and ministerial officer. This status carries precise accounting obligations that distinguish your practice from an ordinary consulting firm. You now combine, under one structure, activities with heterogeneous accounting treatments: tariffed monopoly acts, free amicable recovery, official reports, and activities inherited from the former judicial auctioneer (court-ordered and voluntary sales, valuation, inventories). This diversity calls for rigorous organisation from the moment of billing.

We covered this transition step by step in our article on the merger of the bailiff and judicial auctioneer into the commissaire de justice. For practices that build a genuine sales activity, the questions of an auction house and OVV status quickly become concrete.

A significant share of the sums passing through the practice do not belong to it. When you recover 10,000 euros for a creditor, that money is not income: it is a deposit you must return, net of your costs and emoluments. The same logic applies to consignments and sums pending allocation.

These funds must pass through dedicated accounts, distinct from the practice's own funds, and their representation must be justifiable at any time. In practice, at any given date, the balance of the third-party accounts must match, to the cent, the sum of the amounts owed to creditors and consignors.

In the files we support, the most costly error is almost never a wrong calculation: it is a mixing of logics between practice income and funds held for third parties. Three mechanisms recur:

• a global collection not split between the creditor's share and the practice's share (emoluments and costs), which artificially inflates turnover;
• disbursements paid from the practice's cash and then rebilled, without rigorous tracking of the corresponding third-party account;
• delayed repayments to creditors, which swell the balance of third-party accounts and hide a possible gap.

Hayot Expertise tip. Put in place a formalised monthly reconciliation between the bank balance of the accounts allocated to third parties and the detailed statement of sums owed, file by file. Any gap, however small, must be explained before the month-end close. This is the first reflex we install in a practice, before even discussing tax.

A practice's turnover is made up of three kinds to be distinguished from the moment of billing. Confusing them distorts the reading of margin and, above all, the VAT treatment.

Emoluments remunerate monopoly acts at a rate set by regulation: you do not freely set their amount. Free fees cover what falls outside the monopoly (amicable recovery, reports, advice, certain sales), and that is where much of your profitability is decided. Disbursements are costs advanced on the client's behalf and rebilled at cost: they are neither income nor an expense of the practice and remain outside the scope of VAT, provided they are tracked as such and documented.

This split drives both the reading of margin and the correct VAT treatment. A disbursement rebilling wrongly treated as a fee triggers undue VAT; conversely, a fee slipped into a disbursement account understates your taxable base. Both expose the practice in the event of an audit.

The activity falls under non-commercial profits (BNC) and is declared via the 2035 return. This implies cash-basis accounting (income received, expenses paid) unless an option for acquired receivables is chosen, and particular care at the boundary between professional and personal expenses.

On the social side, the pension depends on CAVOM, the fund for ministerial officers, and not on the lawyers' fund or the regime for unregulated professionals. This affiliation has concrete consequences for the level of contributions and for the holder's remuneration trade-offs, especially when the practice is operated through a company. The choice of operating form deserves regular review, as it governs both the taxation of profits and the director's social status.

For practices structured as a company, the trade-off between remuneration and distribution is worked out case by case. Our legal advisory in Paris and our bookkeeping and review support work together on these matters, because the legal and accounting dimensions are inseparable in a practice.

Some points deserve constant attention, because they are both frequent and sensitive in the event of an inspection:

1. Representation of funds. At any time, the third-party accounts must be fully represented. A repayment delay is not neutral: it must be traced and justified.
2. Anti-money-laundering obligations. As a fund-handling professional, you are subject to due diligence obligations. The documentation of those diligences (identification, retention of supporting documents) must be real, not formal.
3. VAT on disbursements. Out-of-scope status is not presumed: it is documented. Keep proof that the disbursement was incurred in the name and on behalf of the client.
4. Consistency between billing and accounting. The split chosen at billing must reappear identically in the accounts. Loose software settings are a source of recurring discrepancies.

A practice's profitability is steered less by price, constrained on the monopoly, than by the share of free fees and time spent. Many holders underestimate this: on tariffed acts you cannot play on price, only on productivity; so margin is built on amicable recovery, reports and sales.

An anonymised example illustrates what we often see. A practice consults us because its cash position seems comfortable, yet it cannot explain why its taxable result stays modest. As we reconstruct the accounts, the explanation fits in one sentence: part of the sums recovered for creditors had been collected on the practice's account and had not been clearly isolated. The cash looked abundant because it contained money that did not belong to the practice. No fraud, no bad intent: a simple failure to separate, which could have proved very uncomfortable during an inspection. Once put back in order, the practice regained a reliable reading of its situation and a monthly reconciliation that secures each close.

Our conviction is simple: in this profession, compliance and steering do not conflict, they reinforce each other. A practice that knows, at any moment, what belongs to it and what it owes to third parties is a practice that sleeps easy and decides well. The separation of funds and the documentation of anti-money-laundering due diligence are the two points an inspection looks at first. This is where the support of a firm experienced with fund-handling professions makes the difference.

A few situations call for specific treatment. Auctions, inherited from the former judicial auctioneer, raise their own questions of seller and buyer costs and VAT, sometimes with a margin-VAT regime. Practices that build a genuine sales activity must consider the right status, which we set out in our guide to opening an auction house. Finally, conversion into a company or transfer of the practice changes the accounting organisation of third-party funds and deserves early preparation.