Definition
In late December 2025, a consultant adds up what she has collected over the year: €91,000, while the ceiling for her activity stops at €83,600 for the years 2026 to 2028.
She spends the evening looking for how to declare that she is leaving the scheme, at which office and by what date.
There is nothing to declare, and she is still a micro-entrepreneur on 1 January 2026.
A threshold overrun is a calendar year in which the Turnover actually collected rises above the Turnover threshold of the micro scheme.
It is neither a mistake nor a penalty: it is one box ticked in a counter that is read over two years.
The micro scheme only ends if the ceiling was exceeded in both of the two preceding calendar years, N-1 and N-2 in the administration's vocabulary.
Staying under the threshold in either of those years is enough to remain in it. That is how the BOFiP, the official tax doctrine database, states the rule.
The ceilings to compare against appear in the official scale published for the years 2026 to 2028: €203,100 for the sale of goods and hotel accommodation, €83,600 for BIC services (commercial and craft work), BNC liberal activities, classified tourist furnished rentals and bed and breakfasts.
The first figure does not cover the letting of furnished homes: a classified holiday cottage falls under the €83,600 ceiling.
A mixed activity does not add the two ceilings together: the total has to stay under the sale-of-goods ceiling and the services share alone under the services one, both conditions at once.
The calculation, over three years
Take the consultant from the opening, taxed under BNC rules, with round numbers. She collected €70,000 in 2024 and €91,000 in 2025, then ends 2026 at €95,000.
For 2026, the administration looks at 2025 and 2024, and compares them with the new thresholds applicable in 2026, not with those in force at the time. €91,000 exceeds €83,600, €70,000 does not: a single overrun, so she stays in the micro scheme for the whole of 2026.
For 2027, the administration looks at 2026 and 2025: €95,000 and €91,000, both above. The counter is full.
The switch to the actual-profit regime happens on 1 January 2027, never mid-year, and never on the day the ceiling is crossed.
"The moment I go over, I am out" is the most widespread false belief on this subject, and it makes people close micro-enterprises that had no reason to close.
A trader at €220,000 in 2025 but €160,000 in 2024 stays in the scheme. Watch what you add up, too: the counter records turnover excluding VAT that has actually been collected, not invoiced.
A December invoice paid in January counts towards the following year, as the Cash receipt entry explains.
One case escapes this calculation entirely: the first year.
The ceiling is pro-rated over the days the business existed, that is 83,600 × 306 / 365 = €70,087 for a start on 1 March 2026, but that pro-rata has no consequence for the year of creation itself.
The micro scheme applies as of right in the year of creation and the following year, whatever the turnover.
The VAT threshold is not the ceiling
This is the most expensive neighbouring confusion, because the two sets of figures are unrelated.
In 2026, the VAT exemption scheme ends at €85,000 of total national turnover collected in the previous year, or €93,500 during the year itself, with a sub-threshold of €37,500 and €41,250 for services, amounts set by article 293 B of the French tax code.
Crossing a VAT threshold costs you neither the micro scheme nor the status: a consultant at €45,000 charges VAT to her clients and remains a micro-entrepreneur.
The dates have nothing in common either.
Crossing the higher VAT threshold makes you liable on the very day it happens, including on an invoice in progress, whereas leaving the micro scheme waits for 1 January and two years of overrun.
And a single year above the basic VAT threshold is enough to lose the exemption: the two-year rule has no equivalent on that side.
What the switch changes
Switching to the actual regime is not only a tax matter: the micro social-security scheme follows the micro tax scheme, so the auto-entrepreneur status goes as well.
Social contributions are no longer a percentage of what comes in, but are calculated on actual income, with minimum contributions and an annual adjustment whose amounts URSSAF (the body collecting social contributions in France) publishes for that scheme.
The reassuring logic of "nothing collected, nothing to pay" disappears.
Leaving is not permanent, however.
If turnover falls back below the threshold, the actual-profit regime still applies for the year of the drop, then the micro scheme applies again as of right the following year, unless you have opted otherwise.
Frequently asked questions
What happens if I exceed the ceiling in a single year?
Nothing at all: no declaration to file, no change of regime, no penalty. An isolated overrun merely enters the counter of the two reference years.
If the following year falls back below the threshold, the counter never fills and you stay in the micro scheme without any formality whatsoever.
Is the overrun measured on invoices issued or on money received?
On money received, and that nuance decides a great many borderline cases.
The micro scheme works on cash receipts: work invoiced on 20 December and paid on 8 January belongs to the following year's turnover.
Deliberately shifting a payment to avoid an overrun is therefore possible, provided the client agrees to it.
Can you return to the micro scheme after leaving it?
Yes, and believing otherwise pushes many founders into changing legal form for no reason.
In the year turnover falls back below the threshold, the actual-profit regime still applies; from the following year, the micro scheme returns as of right, unless you have opted for an actual-profit regime.
Does the pro-rated ceiling apply to seasonal activities?
No. Businesses whose activity can, by its very nature, only be carried on during part of the year are expressly excluded from the first-year pro-rata.
They compare their turnover with the full ceiling, which avoids penalising a ski instructor or a beach operator.