It is a hybrid status, supposed to allow alternating work and training, and is increasingly popular with companies. Apprenticeship has been encouraged by the government since 2018, and saw a boost in 2020. To support professional integration in the midst of the Covid-19 crisis, a bonus for hiring apprentices is then created, 5,000 euros for a minor and 8,000 euros for an adult (since reduced to 6,000 euros regardless of age) and distributed to all companies, regardless of their size, while a previous system was reserved for SMEs. CAC 40 groups are taking the turn towards alternation, with Carrefour in the lead.
The retail giant is launching an XXL recruitment campaign on the networks. Apprenticeship is sometimes presented as a springboard towards permanent employment. But the elements collected by “Complément d’investigation”, in a survey broadcast Thursday April 25 on France 2, cast doubt on these opportunities, and question the status of these apprentices, who are assigned tasks very similar to those of ordinary employees and do not necessarily benefit from the training hours promised.
The group refused to accommodate the “Complement d’investigation” cameras in its supermarkets. But the France 2 show decided to hire one of its journalists on a work-study basis. At the recruitment interview in a Normandy hypermarket, his interlocutor praises the apprenticeship contract as a passport to the permanent contract: “The person who hits well, who works well and everything, if that happens, they will be sitting in my place in 10 years.”
Less than 10% of apprentices hired on permanent contracts
A few days later, he hired at 5 a.m. in the consumer goods sector, the heart of the hypermarket. After a few days of working in pairs in the store aisles, the journalist was assigned to the pasta section, replacing another apprentice. In this sector known as one of the most difficult, he is supposed to work alone, without a tutor, like any other employee. And without any training days announced on his schedule.
In this hypermarket, work-study students seem to perform the same tasks as permanent employees, for a much lower cost – four times less in the case of the journalist hired in Normandy, according to the calculation of “Additional investigation”. Some hypermarkets are stocked up with apprentices: up to 54 in an establishment in Brest (Finistère), where they represent 15% of the payroll; around forty in Rouen (Seine-Maritime), Montpellier (Hérault) or Marseille, according to information from “Additional investigation”. Trade unionists denounce a situation in which young people are left to their own devices, or even replace older ones, initially pushed to leave by management.
How many of these young people actually land a job at Carrefour after a work-study program? According to a confidential internal document consulted by “Complément d’investigation”, the number of permanent contracts signed by young people in the year following their work-study program represented 8% of the number of apprentices hired between 2021 and 2023. A rate half as high as the average in the retail sector. These figures, which Carrefour has long refused to communicate, revolt Zohra Dirhoussi, general delegate of the CGT Carrefour: “Since 2020, we have seen a little more than 10 000 employees, replaced by work-study workers, she says. We don’t agree.” She believes that the company should not recruit apprentices “to plug holes, put bandages on a leg of drink”but “to train young people, keep them and sustain jobs.“
Training that takes a back seat
For its part, management declares that it is leading “an ambitious learning policy” and ensures that throughout the group, at headquarters in particular, 15% of work-study students are hired on permanent contracts. Are they properly trained? Carrefour has created its own apprentice training center (CFA), which presents itself as “the first private CFA in France”. As a result, the group receives public aid as an employer, but also as a trainer: to the bonus of 6,000 euros received for each new apprenticeship contract concluded, there is added aid of 5,400 euros for each apprentice trained. .
The Carrefour CFA does not have a dedicated campus or classrooms. Training takes place directly in hypermarkets, with, in theory, 406 hours of lessons over the year. But none of the work-study students contacted by “Complément d’investigation” followed all of the planned courses. “In the morning, we did pseudo-exercises, and in the afternoon, in fact, we worked. She put us in the fresh aisles, because those are the ones that move the most”, says an apprentice. Another agrees:
“On the days when the trainer was not there, there was no catch-up time. And out of the 97 hours planned for e-learning, I had to do five or six hours. The same goes for the field days that I had to do, I did three out of eleven.”
A young Carrefour employee on an apprenticeship contractto “Further investigation”
In Marseille, the work-study students met in a hypermarket in working-class neighborhoods have not had any lessons at all for almost a year, like Sarah (whose name has been changed), 23 years old, a cashier on a contract. ‘learning since a year. However, she had high hopes for the diploma she would obtain at the end of the training. “They led us on for a yearshe believes. Every time we asked, they said ‘Yes, next month, next month’. Afterwards, they told us ‘The whole month of January, you will spend a month of training’. But in the end, there was none of that.“
“A unique case”, responds Carrefour
For her last day, Sarah agreed to wear a hidden camera. Surprise: the checkout manager and the store’s human resources director suggested that he do a second year on a work-study contract, but this time in another school. “The Carrefour diploma, honestly, will be of no use to you. I tell you straight awayexplains the HR department. You’re going to apply at Auchan, they’re going to care whether you’ve done that or not.” Not having followed through, Sarah finished her year without the promised diploma, like her ten fellow apprentices in the same store.
After viewing the elements that we have collected, the former Minister of Labor Muriel Pénicaud, architect of the apprenticeship reform, judges the situation “shocking”. According to her, if the facts are confirmed by the regulatory authority, the Carrefour group “will be sanctioned by the public authorities”. She now considers that the bonuses allocated to large companies, which she herself helped to put in place, should be reduced or even eliminated.
Neither the CEO of Carrefour, Alexandre Bompard, nor the group’s French HR department responded to the interview proposals from “Additional investigation”. In an email, the group emphasizes that the situation in Marseille is a “unique case” and that’“a solution has since been found.” The group’s press service ensures that a study carried out by Carrefour among its work-study students showed that 92% of them were satisfied with their apprenticeship.
“Who benefits from the billions of learning?” an investigation by Camille Le Pomellec, Clément Fabre, Bruno Maruani and Jeanne Bureau for Hikari, will be broadcast on the show “Complément d’investigation” on France 2, Thursday April 25 at 11 p.m. hours, and on france.tv.