Driving lorries in France: licence, qualification and 2026 pay
Driving a lorry for a living in France takes a category C licence, a professional qualification and a payslip read against the minimum wage.
Checked by Radif Partners · Editorial policy · Method and sources
Heavy goods driving in France needs two separate qualifications. The C licence, for vehicles over 3,500 kg gross weight, can be taken at 21 (C1, up to 7,500 kg, at 18), once you hold a car licence and a favourable medical opinion (Highway Code, R221-5 and R221-10). Then comes the initial driver qualification: the 140-hour FIMO over 4 weeks lets you drive C vehicles from 21, the 280-hour long course from 18, and a 35-hour refresher (FCO) follows every 5 years. On pay, the latest goods-transport scale published on Légifrance, the agreement of 11 October 2023, runs from €12.09 an hour for coefficients 110 M to 120 M up to €12.43 at 150 M, the highly qualified driver. The French minimum wage (Smic) has been €12.31 an hour since 1 June 2026, so it overrides the scale at hiring for every coefficient up to 138 M. Employee contributions of 20.84% below the social security ceiling take you from gross to net.
HGV driver: gross and net pay by coefficient
Estimated monthly net, before tax
€1,689
| Monthly gross | €2,134 |
| Hourly rate 138M (minimum wage applies) | €12.31 |
| Hours paid a month, of which at a premium | 169.0 / 17.3 |
| Employee contributions | €445 |
Excludes road allowances, bonuses, company health and protection cover, overtime contribution relief and income tax.
The licence: C1, C or CE
French licence categories for lorries depend on gross vehicle weight (PTAC). C1 covers vehicles over 3,500 kg and up to 7,500 kg, built for no more than eight passengers besides the driver. C covers anything over 3,500 kg with no upper limit. C1E and CE add a trailer over 750 kg, and a C1E combination stays within 12,000 kg.
| Category | Vehicles | Licence age | Must hold first |
|---|---|---|---|
| C1 | 3,500 to 7,500 kg | 18 | B |
| C1E | C1 + trailer over 750 kg, 12,000 kg max | 18 | C1 |
| C | over 3,500 kg | 21 | B |
| CE | C + trailer or semi-trailer over 750 kg | 21 | C |
Article R221-5 sets the ages and the categories you must hold first: no CE without C. Article R221-10 adds a rule for heavy licences: they are only issued and renewed after a favourable medical opinion. Ask your prefecture how the check works before booking a driving school. A licence from outside the EU may first need exchanging for a French one.
The qualification: FIMO or long course
The licence shows you can drive the vehicle; the initial qualification shows you may drive it for a living. The Transport Code offers two routes, with different minimum ages for goods work:
| Route | Minimum length | C and CE from | C1 and C1E from |
|---|---|---|---|
| Long course (R3314-2, R3314-4) | 280 h, final exam | 18 | 18 |
| Fast-track FIMO (R3314-5, R3314-6) | 140 h over 4 consecutive weeks | 21 | 18 |
The long course ends with an exam and a professional title and is mostly taken by young entrants. The four-week FIMO (formation initiale minimale obligatoire) is the career-change route, often run together with the C or CE licence. A coach driver switching sectors only needs 35 extra hours (R3314-7 and R3314-8). The passenger side is covered in our guide to becoming a bus driver. Courses and tests are in French.
The five-yearly FCO
Article R3314-10 requires periodic training every 5 years, the FCO (formation continue obligatoire). It lasts 35 hours, over 5 consecutive days or in blocks of at least 7 hours, can be finished up to a year early and counts for goods and passengers alike. Miss the deadline and you must complete it before driving again (R3314-14).
What the licence and FIMO cost
No law sets the price of a C or CE licence or of a FIMO course; each provider sets its own, so we publish none, and we name or recommend no training centre. Before paying, ask hauliers in your area how they recruit: some hire first and fund the training, which is worth raising at the first interview.
Working time on the road
Road haulage counts hours its own way. Article D3312-45 of the Transport Code sets the “service time” treated as equivalent to the legal working week:
| Driving staff | Per week | Per quarter |
|---|---|---|
| Long-distance (“grands routiers”) | 43 h | 559 h |
| Other drivers | 39 h | 507 h |
| Parcel delivery drivers, cash escorts | 35 h | 455 h |
Under article D3312-46, service hours from the 36th each week are paid “according to custom or collective agreements”. Beyond the thresholds in the table they count as overtime (R3312-47). Article R3312-50 caps a single week at 56 hours for long-distance drivers and 52 for others, with lower averages over the period, and a day at 12 hours (R3312-51). The calculator lets you enter the premium on your own contract, 25% by default.
Pay: a scale overtaken by the minimum wage
The pay scale for manual staff in goods haulage, marked with an “M”, is in the agreement of 11 October 2023, extended by order of 19 December 2023 and in force since 1 December 2023. It is the latest “M” scale we found on Légifrance as of 5 October 2026. The rates build in seniority:
| Coefficient | On hiring | After 2 yrs | After 5 yrs | After 10 yrs | After 15 yrs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 110M-120M | €12.0900 | €12.3318 | €12.5736 | €12.8154 | €13.0572 |
| 128M | €12.1200 | €12.3624 | €12.6048 | €12.8472 | €13.0896 |
| 138M | €12.1400 | €12.3828 | €12.6256 | €12.8684 | €13.1112 |
| 150M | €12.4300 | €12.6786 | €12.9272 | €13.1758 | €13.4244 |
The Smic, France’s legal minimum wage, has been €12.31 gross an hour since 1 June 2026, according to service-public. Every hiring rate is below it except 150 M, and where that happens the Smic applies: no employer may pay less. Seniority lifts most coefficients back above the Smic after two years. The calculator always takes the higher of the two rates.
Which coefficient for which lorry
The goods driving staff classification sorts drivers into groups, and amendment no. 72 links each group to a coefficient:
| Group | Job | Coefficient |
|---|---|---|
| 3 bis | vehicle up to 3.5 tonnes | 118M |
| 4 | lorry over 3.5 t, up to 11 t | 120M |
| 5 | lorry over 11 t, up to 19 t | 128M |
| 6 | lorry over 19 t | 138M |
| 7 | highly qualified driver, at least 55 points | 150M |
Group 7 is not about the lorry alone: points are awarded for weight, long-distance work, rest taken away from home, international trips, articulated combinations and qualifications, with 55 needed. Check the group on your contract; we do not guess it for you.
From gross to net
Net pay uses the 2026 employee rates published by Urssaf, the body that collects social contributions, and by Agirc-Arrco, the supplementary pension fund. Below the social security ceiling, €4,005 a month, a non-managerial employee pays:
| Employee contribution | Rate | Base |
|---|---|---|
| State pension, capped | 6.90 % | pay up to the ceiling |
| State pension, uncapped | 0.40 % | all pay |
| Supplementary pension, band 1 | 3.15 % | up to the ceiling |
| General balancing contribution, band 1 | 0.86 % | up to the ceiling |
| CSG and CRDS (social levies) | 9.7 % | 98.25 % of pay |
That adds up to 20.84 % of gross pay. Applied to the monthly Smic, €1,867.02, it gives exactly the net figure service-public publishes, €1,477.93. Left out: company health and protection cover, the contribution relief on overtime, the extra 1.3 % in Alsace-Moselle, road allowances and income tax withheld at source.
Two examples with a 25% premium after 35 hours: a driver of vehicles over 19 tonnes at 138 M working 39 hours earns at least €2,134 gross and €1,689 net; a highly qualified long-distance driver at 150 M on 43 hours, €2,424 gross and €1,919 net. These are hiring minimums, not averages.
Lorry, coach or taxi
Lorry drivers are nearly always employees. So are coach drivers, under a separate scale raised in 2026 and fully above the Smic: see bus driver pay. Ambulance crews face the same squeeze as hauliers, with hiring rates below the Smic (ambulance pay). For van deliveries, employed or self-employed, read becoming a delivery driver, and the taxi income page shows the self-employed logic instead.