Definition
Your main client accounted for three quarters of what you collected. They switch supplier in January, and within three weeks there is nothing left to invoice.
You search for "unemployment benefit for the self-employed" and land on three French acronyms that do not mean the same thing.
The allocation des travailleurs indépendants (ATI, the allowance for self-employed workers) is paid by France Travail (the national employment agency) to self-employed people who have had to cease trading.
It is not unemployment insurance: no unemployment contribution is taken from your turnover, and no line of your flat-rate charge funds it. Read the breakdown of your Social protection again: the word unemployment appears nowhere in it.
The ATI is a solidarity safety net, flat-rate and paid for a fixed period, so the consultant who invoiced a great deal and the craftsman who invoiced very little receive exactly the same amount.
That amount, the payment period and the minimum income required are set by regulation and revised regularly: read them on the France Travail website rather than on a blog, because they have already moved since the scheme was created.
What is assessed: your income, not your turnover
This is where most applications are decided, and where most applicants get it wrong.
The income condition does not look at what you collected, but at the activity income retained by the tax administration.
In a micro-entreprise those two figures are never equal: your Turnover is cut by a Standard allowance before it appears in your taxable income.
Take 30,000 euros collected in 2026 and deduct the allowance: 30,000 euros less 71%, which comes to 8,700 euros of retained income for a shopkeeper.
Here is what the same amount collected gives in all three cases.
| Activity carried out | Tax allowance in 2026 | Income retained out of 30,000 euros |
|---|---|---|
| Sale of goods (BIC, commercial profit) | 71% | 8,700 euros |
| Commercial and craft services (BIC) | 50% | 15,000 euros |
| Liberal activity (BNC, non-commercial profit) | 34% | 19,800 euros |
On identical turnover, the income used as a reference more than doubles depending on the activity carried out. A shopkeeper has to collect far more than a consultant to show the same income, and that mechanism alone decides the fate of two people who worked just as hard.
Two points matter here. These percentages are the 2026 tax allowances; the social-security allowances are not identical everywhere, and one is never used to illustrate the other.
And the turnover retained is the amount actually collected within the calendar year, not the amount invoiced: a December invoice paid in January moves to the following year, which is sometimes enough to shift an entire reference year.
Deregistration comes first, never afterwards
The application assumes an actual cessation and a recorded Deregistration: the ATI cannot be combined with a business kept open just in case.
The accepted grounds are narrow, built around court-ordered liquidation or receivership and the cessation of an activity that has become unviable, evidenced by a fall in income.
An activity that simply pays badly is therefore not enough: the fall must be established by your tax returns, and the file is prepared with those returns in front of you.
Deregistration is irreversible, and it comes before the decision, never the other way round. You close the business, you then file your claim, and a refusal leaves you with no allowance, no SIRET number and no trading history.
Have your grounds for ceasing and your recent tax returns checked by an adviser before you start the deregistration, not the day after.
ARE, ARCE, ATI: three schemes mistaken for one
Unemployment benefit (ARE) is the standard allowance, opened by the loss of a salaried job, calculated on your former salary, and it can be combined under conditions with a micro-entreprise created afterwards.
Capitalised unemployment benefit (ARCE) is not an extra scheme: it is a portion of those same ARE entitlements, paid as a lump sum to fund a business start.
The ATI, by contrast, is aimed at people with no entitlement opened by salaried employment at all.
If you still hold ARE entitlements, those are the ones to examine first, because they are almost always more generous than a flat rate that is the same for everyone.
Frequently asked questions
I have paid contributions for two years as a micro-entrepreneur, am I entitled to the ATI?
Paying contributions opens no entitlement here, since none of your contributions fund this allowance.
The conditions are cumulative: accepted grounds for ceasing, a minimum period of activity, a minimum income over the reference period, and an active job search.
None of them is acquired through seniority alone.
Can I set up a new micro-entreprise while receiving the ATI?
Any resumption of activity must be declared to France Travail, which then recalculates or stops the payment depending on your situation.
Do not count on a silent overlap: the administrations share your registration data, and an allowance paid in error has to be repaid.
What if I ran my micro-entreprise alongside a salaried job?
Those are two separate stories.
Losing the salaried job opens ARE entitlements under that contract, independently of your self-employed activity: that is the subject of Combining with employment.
The ATI only concerns people with no entitlement opened by a salary at all.
Where can I read the exact amount and the payment period?
On the France Travail ATI page, and nowhere else: the daily amount, the payment period and the minimum income required come from a regulation that has already been amended since the scheme was created, and the articles that copy it age very badly.
Page up to date as of 5 September 2026.