Posted Dec 27 2022 at 11:12Updated 27 Dec. 2022 at 15:49
At Bercy, we persist and sign: the electronic one-stop shop for business formalities will see the light of day on 1is January 2023 as the government has committed to. This will then be the only way to declare operations that can mark the life of a company – creation, modification of the statutes, cessation of activity, filing of annual accounts, etc. -, where 56 forms existed so far. All administrative formalities will be dematerialized, compared to 30% currently. A major change.
While some of the stakeholders want the date of entry into force of this project to be postponed, skeptical about the functioning of the new platform, the executive opposes them with an end of inadmissibility. “It would take a law to change the calendar”, we explain to the Ministry of the Economy where we assure to be “serene” despite the magnitude of the shift.
Negative feedback
Created by the Pacte law of 2019, the counter operated by the National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) will replace the six networks of Business Formalities Centers (CFE) managed by the Chambers of Commerce and Industry (CCI) , chambers of trades and crafts, chambers of agriculture, clerks, tax authorities and Urssaf. “It will be a gateway,” we stress at Bercy. The CFEs will continue to validate the information received in the “back office”.
On paper, the electronic one-stop shop should make life easier for businesses. However, the negotiations around the implementation of the platform have been difficult, the project coming up against the opposition of certain stakeholders. In recent days, press articles have echoed negative feedback from them on several aspects: connection difficulties, heavier forms, inaccessible fields, etc. This raises fears of malfunctions after kick-off.
100,000 business creations but “only 11 bugs”
At Medef, we recognize “concerns about the capacity of the INPI to ensure a good quality of services from the start of 2023, particularly on deadlines”, we confide to “Echos”. “The tool is much too complicated: we go from 6 screens to 38 and from 20 questions to 196”, warns François Hurel, the president of the Union of autoentrepreneurs.
At Bercy, there is no denying that the time needed to fill out the forms has been lengthened by the new ergonomics. However, the ministry tempers by recalling that the platform was already accessible for business creations in 2022 and that “out of more than 100,000 registrations, only 11 bugs have been identified and they have all been resolved”. “Faced with a project of this magnitude, we must be prepared for small hiccups but we are doing everything we can to ensure that there are as few as possible”, we add.
Helpline
A continuity plan has been planned. At the start of the one-stop shop, some requests will be rerouted to the INPI business desk, which has been in force for years, and to the CFEs. To counter the difficulties that companies could encounter, a telephone assistance “calibrated to receive 100,000 calls per week” will also be put in place. At Bercy, we recognize room for improvement to simplify the course of declarants in particular. Improvements will be made early next year, it is promised.