Declaring a home-tutoring service in France

Declaring your business as a "service à la personne" (SAP) provider is a free administrative step that lets your students deduct 50% of the cost of at-home lessons from their French income tax. For an independent tutor, it is often the argument that makes a family accept €30 an hour instead of €20, because they really pay only half.

What the declaration changes for your students

Without it, your lessons are an ordinary service. Once you are declared as a services à la personne provider, your clients qualify for the French home-employment tax credit.

In practice:

• The credit is 50% of what the family pays during the year.
• The general ceiling is €12,000 of spending, so up to €6,000 back.
• It rises by €1,500 per dependent child or household member over 65, up to €15,000.

Worth knowing: unlike gardening (capped at €5,000) or IT help (€3,000), at-home lessons have no separate sub-ceiling. They sit directly under the general limit.

A quick example: a family paying €25 an hour for two lessons a week spends roughly €2,000 over a school year. The credit hands €1,000 of that back, so their real cost falls to €12.50 an hour. That gap is what a declared tutor can point to when a parent hesitates on the rate.

Even a family that owes no income tax receives the money, because the state pays the credit out directly. It is real cash, not a line on a tax notice.

Which lessons qualify, and which do not

The eligible activity is "soutien scolaire ou cours à domicile": individual lessons, academic or hobby, taught at the student's home. Two limits matter before you declare.

• The lesson must take place at the student's home. A lesson in a rented room, a library or your own flat does not open the tax credit.
• Remote lessons are excluded. A video call on its own does not count. It can stay a complement, but the tax benefit rests on being physically present.

If you teach mostly online, the SAP declaration brings you nothing. If you travel to your students, it changes your sales pitch.

Declaring on NOVA, step by step

You declare online, free of charge, on the NOVA service. For tutoring, a simple declaration is enough: formal approval (agrément) is required only for vulnerable groups such as young children or elderly people.

Before you start, gather:

1. Your SIRET number, so you must already be registered, usually as a micro-entrepreneur.
2. The APE code for your teaching activity.
3. A clear description of the service: private lessons at the student's home.

The declaration is recorded within a few days and takes effect on its filing date. You then receive a declaration number to keep.

Your obligations once declared

The tax benefit comes with a few rules.

• Exclusive-activity condition. In principle your business carries out only services à la personne. Since 2025 the rule is looser: a side activity is allowed if it stays under 30% of turnover.
• Quarterly activity report. Each quarter you report your volume on NOVA, with an annual summary on top.
• Itemized invoices. Every invoice states the lesson type, date, length and hourly rate. A dedicated invoicing tool saves rebuilding those details by hand.

The yearly tax attestation

Early each year you give every student a tax attestation summarising what they paid the previous year. The family enters that figure on its tax return to claim the credit.

Producing it for ten or twenty families by hand is tedious work. The guide on the tax-credit attestation covers the required mentions and the timing. Software that tracks your payments can generate these attestations in one click.

Declaring as an SAP provider takes about an hour and adds a quarterly report. In return your lessons cost half as much to the family, a decisive edge over a tutor who has not declared. To handle the follow-up, compare the plans on the pricing page.

Sources

• Tax credit for employing someone at home – service-public.gouv.fr
• Services à la personne organisation: declaration, approval or authorisation – Service Public Entreprendre
• NOVA online service – SAP declaration
• Regulatory obligations of SAP providers – servicesalapersonne.gouv.fr
• Home employment tax rules – impots.gouv.fr