Taxi unions called for a national mobilization this Monday March 4 to oppose the agreement which binds them to Health Insurance and decides on the prices and reimbursements of medical transport.
Taxis are mobilizing all over France this Monday March 4 for their fifth action in the space of three months. Taxi drivers are reinvesting the roads to oppose the agreement which binds them to the national health insurance fund (Cnam), in particular article 30 of the 2024 Social Security financing law which relates to transport sanitary. This mobilization could be one of the most important and for good reason, “this time the initiative for the demonstrations does not come from the unions, but from the base” indicated the president of the National Taxi Federation (FNDT), Emmanuelle Cordier, at the Parisian.
Ile-de-France and Paris should be particularly affected by the mobilization of taxis. “There will be at least 2,000 taxis [dans la capitale]. And who will all pass through the ring road, from 8 a.m.” warned the trade unionist a few days before the mobilization. Processions planned from the Ile-de-France departments, but also from the entire French territory must “converge towards Paris” and the Place du Trocadéro at the end of the morning. Mobilizations are also organized in other French cities such as Lyon, Toulouse, Bordeaux or Nîmes with blockages on motorways, main roads and even tolls.
Insufficient fares for taxis
The new agreement plans to increase the price of medical shopping by 3.5% when a patient is taken care of. The figure was decided unilaterally by the Cnam in the absence of an agreement with the taxi unions and federations. But it does not compensate for inflation according to Emmanuelle Cordier, interviewed by franceinfo : “Bercy estimates that our expenses have increased by 5.4% in one year”. “With all the discount games, in the end, the increase they are offering us amounts to zero,” she added. Taxi drivers believe that the rate applied is not sufficient in relation to the charges which have increased, but according to them it also does not take into account the time involved and the support necessary for treating patients.
Reimbursement of medical transportation in question
Reimbursement of medical transport, conditioned by the agreement with Health Insurance, is also one of the main demands. Article 30 of the 2024 Social Security financing law financially encourages patients transported by taxis or other medical transport to share the journey with another patient when “their condition is not incompatible with such a solution. transport and that the proposal meets the conditions for implementing transport” with regard to the journey or pick-up at the place of care. And patients who refuse to share medical transport cannot claim the same reimbursement.
According to the agreement, a patient who refuses to share medical transport must “advance the costs and then send a paper care sheet to their home fund to obtain reimbursement for their journey”. But above all, Health Insurance can be satisfied with a reimbursement based on the price of shared transport and not individual transport, which is more expensive. The difference is left to the patient.
The measure has repercussions on the pricing of medical transport, explains the president of the FNDT, who points out and denounces “a reduction of 30% on the reimbursement rates for medical transport by taxi”. “This means that we will return to the prices that were in force in… 2014! This is not possible. Taxis, which are already suffering from competition from VTCs, did not need that. They are at their wits’ end” she added in The Parisian. This new pricing, deemed “unsustainable” by the profession, “could force taxi companies to refuse support to protect the economic balance of their VSEs”. The unions are therefore demanding a renegotiation of the remuneration conditions for medical transport.