Employers · HR managers · Social Law Lawyers
Private investigator for suspected sick leave fraud
Assess concrete concerns about sick leave abuse or undisclosed work. INVESTIPOLE investigates observable facts without making medical judgments or assuming fraud.
Confidentiality. Each request is examined in terms of its legitimacy, necessity, and proportionality before any quotation.
Abusive or fraudulent sick leave
Fake sick leave: what can the employer actually do?
A sick leave can disrupt a service, delay a project, and increase the cost of salary maintenance. When an employee on sick leave appears to be working elsewhere, engaging in undeclared work, or serving a competitor, suspicion alone is not sufficient. An outing, an extension, or a photo posted on social media does not, in itself, prove abusive sick leave.
For nearly 20 years, Investipole has been assisting executives, HR directors, insurers, and employment law lawyers. Its specialty: abusive and fraudulent sick leaves, particularly in cases of paid side activities, undeclared work, unfair competition, or work-related accidents that are difficult to reconcile with repeated efforts. All your detectives have at least 10 years of experience. The mission is to observe facts, never to assess a person's health.
Choose the right lever
Medical re-exam, private investigation or procedure: which option should you pick?
Medical re-exam
Issue addressed: the medical justification for the leave and its duration.
Field Investigation
Issue addressed: what the employee actually does during their leave.
discreet monitoring, surveillance and timed photographs document what the counter-visit does not see: a construction site, a store maintained, customers out of business, repeated physical efforts.
Decision with your lawyer
Issue addressed: the steps to be taken following the observations.
Fraudulent sick leave
Employee on sick leave working elsewhere: cases that justify an investigation
The mission is based on precise indices and a legitimate objective; the employee's intimate life and state of health remain out of scope.
Working off the books during leave
Activity for a competitor
Disputed work accident
Carrying loads, movings, masonry or intensive sports while the stop follows an accident at work: your detectives describe the gestures, frequency and duration of effort, without medical conclusion.
Repeated leave and fake medical certificates
Leave adjacent to weekends, consecutive extensions, questionable sick leave notices: a schedule alone proves nothing. Cross-referenced with external indicators, this schedule can justify a targeted investigation.
Field investigation and counter-visit are complementary: one finds facts, the other appreciates the medical sick leave.
For leaders and HR managers
HR: how to prove an abusive sick leave?
First reflex: gather what the company already knows. Dates of stops and extensions, position occupied, physical constraints, internal testimonies, publications accessible to the public, reports from customers or suppliers. Investipole analyses these elements with you, checks that monitoring is useful and proportionate, then fixes in writing the objective of the mission.
Your detectives do not contact the attending doctor, do not seek any pathology or enter any private place. From the public space, the mission records visible facts: hours of departure, journeys, presence on a site, opening of a business, loading of equipment, meeting with customers. No picture is taken of a person who is in a private place.
- written agreement, specific objective
- Cranels selected according to indices
- No medical data collected
- Two-month delay
Investipole method
From Indication to Report: A Sick Leave Investigation in Four Steps
Each surveillance answers a specific question. The procedure is adapted to the field and stops as soon as the monitoring no longer provides useful evidence.
Confidential analysis
Context of the judgment, post office, indices, company objective and legal risks are studied before the free quotation, if possible with your lawyer.
Written guidelines
Public places, days and time zones are defined in the written agreement. An overly large or intrusive request is tightened, or refused.
Surveillance and observations
Your detectives follow the useful moves, record each schedule and make time-bound photographs, without ever causing the observed situation.
Report and next steps
On the ground
Moonlighting during a sick leave
Accumulating hours of surveillance is no use. A convincing record links facts: arrival at a place of activity, loaded tools, exchanges with customers, performed service, regular travel over several days.
"The report does not describe the fault. Its strength lies in a precise chronology, which your lawyer can oppose denials."
discreet surveillance, photographs and open source verifications are measured as required by the file.
A dated and localised activity
Places, schedules, gestures, frequency, point of contact and context, timed photographs in support.
A medical diagnosis
Your detectives don't comment on the pathology, the ability to work, or the medical justification for stopping.
With your lawyer
Injuries, faults, two-month prescriptions, work injury regime: the legal qualification belongs to your council and then to the judge.
Anonymized
Fraudulent sick leave: four anonymised investigations
Each case remains different: the outcome of an inquiry does not prejudge either the judge's decision or the employer's strategy.
Sick leave · Moonlighting
An employee on sick leave visits clients of another company
The company had serious evidence: an employee on sick leave appeared to be working regularly for a third-party structure. After scoping of schedules and public places, several discreet surveillance sequences were carried out. Investipole detectives observed repeated trips to construction sites, the transport of tools and interventions with clients, photographs and supporting chronology.
Accident at work · Handling
Sick leave due to a work accident: repeated relocations observed
Following an accident at work reported for back pain, the employer had received specific information about a move activity during the stopover. The mission was limited to a few targeted time windows. From the public space, the detectives saw the employee load and unload furniture, carry large cartons and drive a utility between several addresses.
No medical conclusions were drawn from these actions. The report described the nature of the efforts, the repetition, the schedules and the places, photographs in support. The company's board then appreciated the possible follow-up, including with the competent bodies.
Stop control · Supposedly removed
A short investigation avoids an unfair sanction
A team leader suspected an employee of taking advantage of extended sick leave to run a business. Checks using open-source information and limited surveillance revealed no client reception, no deliveries, and no regular presence at the reported location. The observed movements corresponded to ordinary outings.
Investipole reported on the lack of useful facts, without prolonging the mission. The employer ruled out the hypothesis of hidden work and dealt with the difficulty on the managerial field. A serious investigation also serves to avoid false accusations.
Obligation of loyalty · Competition
A salesperson on sick leave develops a competing offer
During a period of sick leave, a salesperson was suspected of preparing a competing offer using their professional contacts. The mission combined open-source research, reconnaissance, and occasional surveillance. Appointments, document handovers, and visits to prospective clients were observed in public places and then cross-checked with information already held by the company.
The report did not legally qualify the facts. Its verifiable chronology allowed the employer's lawyer to assess the breach of the duty of loyalty, damage and proportionate response.
Investipole in France
An employee on leave working in another city? The monitoring continues.
An employee who stops can leave his or her home, change vehicles, join a remote site or intervene on an ad hoc basis in another region. Investipole agencies ensure the continuity of follow-up, with a single contact person and a homogeneous relationship.
Analysis and field experience
Sick leave in France: understanding absenteeism before taking action
David Liobard, co-founder and manager of Investipole, has published a statistical, economic, and legal analysis of sick leave from 2010 to 2025. This study is based on public sources: Court of Auditors, Senate, CNAM, DARES, and OECD. This work places field observations in context, without reducing absenteeism to fraud. Interviewed on France 2 news about abusive sick leave, David Liobard presented the investigation method and a sample reportFR.
See the report on data.gouv.frEmployers' and HR managers Issues
Abusive sick leave: the employers' questions
General answers, to be adapted with your board: collective agreement, maintenance of wages, work injury scheme and circumstances of the case change the analysis.
Employer: can you hire a private investigator in case of abusive sick leave?
Yes, when there are serious indications that the employee is engaged in an activity that is incompatible with his or her obligations: work in the dark, work in a competitor, physical effort in contradiction with an accident at work. The mission remains limited to useful facts and public places; your detectives do not seek any medical data.
What is abusive or fraudulent sick leave?
A sick leave becomes abusive when the employee diverts its purpose: unauthorised paid activity, working for a competitor, or extensions of convenience. Fraud additionally implies deception, such as a false sick note or undeclared work. An authorised outing does not constitute abuse; an unauthorised activity, even if occasional, may require repayment of benefits without constituting a wrongdoing towards the employer.
How does a medical re-examination requested by the employer work?
The employee shall indicate his place of rest and, in the case of free trips, the hours at which a check remains possible. The doctor shall pass to the home without warning, outside authorized hours of leave, or call the employee to his office. A sick leave deemed unjustified, or an inspection made impossible, allows the supplement to be suspended; the doctor shall transmit his opinion to the medical examination department of the caisse within 48 hours.
Repeated sick leaves: what can the employer do?
Analyze the schedule, ask for a counter-visit for sick leave that qualify for employer supplement and look for external clues. Since 1 September 2026, an initial prescription is in principle limited to 31 days and each extension to 62 days, unless medical justification. Repeated stops are not a fault. However, repeated absences may justify non-disciplinary dismissal if the company is disorganized and must provide for the permanent replacement of the employee.
How much does a private detective cost for a sick leave?
The pricing of a private detective for an investigation into sick leave ranges from €90 to €120 excluding VAT per hour depending on several criteria, with a free quote. In practice, expect around €975 excluding VAT per day of intervention, or a five-day package at €4,750 excluding VAT all-inclusive for a complete mission. Detailed grid: price of a private detectiveFR.
How long does an investigation into sick leave take?
Depending on the evidence and the regularity of the activity sought: some targeted vacations are sometimes sufficient, when other files require several days discontinuous. A step point allows to stop, adapt or continue monitoring.
And if the investigation doesn’t confirm the suspicion?
The report makes this clear, and the mission stops. The employer thus avoids unjustified punishment and high-risk litigation.
First confidential exchange
Suspicious sick leave? Lay out the facts.
Your detectives will tell you if an investigation is useful. Specify the context, position of the employee, dates of arrest, indications available to you, known locations and your objective: checking a suspicion, preparing a decision or documenting a report. Investipole first examines the legality, feasibility and proportionality of the mission, then submits a free quotation.
Request a confidential study free quotation · Answer in general within 24 hours · France as a whole