Faced with the persistent weakening of construction companies, the AGS and the FFB have signed an agreement in order to better detect difficulties and guide managers.
THE economic difficulties of construction companies are no longer limited to failure situations alone: cash flow under pressure, rising production costs, still degraded activity and more complicated access to credit weaken some of the craftsmen and entrepreneurs. In this context, the Association for the management of the Employee Claims Guarantee Scheme (AGS) and the French Building Federation (FFB) have signed a partnership agreement in order to strengthen prevention.
The agreement, announced on August 26, aims to intervene further upstream, before the difficulties become irreversible. The two organizations particularly want to facilitate companies’ access to existing systems and improve their orientation towards the competent contacts.
This initiative comes as the financial situation in the sector remains tense. According to the latest data from the FFB, the cash flow of companies with more than ten employees deteriorated in the first quarter of 2026while production costs increased. Over the three months to the end of April, business failures in construction also increased by 4.6% over one year.
Detecting difficulties before the collective procedure
The principle of the partnership is to bring together the networks and expertise of the two organizations in order to enable earlier intervention. Three axes have been defined:
– anticipate the economic risks specific to buildings ;
– Strengthen information and training for businesses;
– And quickly guide managers towards the systems likely to respond to their situation.
The objective is in particular to make systems that are sometimes poorly identified by business leaders more readable. The partnership should therefore enable weakened companies to be directed more quickly towards players capable of supporting them, and this before collective procedures.
“Building craftsmen and entrepreneurs are facing profound changes and real economic tensions. This partnership with the AGS strengthens our collective capacity to anticipate these difficulties, to better inform our members and direct them towards suitable solutions, in a logic of prevention and responsibility” indicates Frédéric Carré, president of the FFB, here in photo. © FFB
A challenge that goes beyond the mere survival of the company
For the AGS, the issue is also social. Created in 1974, the regime intervenes when a company is faced with collective proceedings in order to guarantee the payment of salary debts under the conditions provided for by law. In 2025, AGS supported nearly 250,000 employees and advanced 2.23 billion euros to guarantee the payment of salary debts. More than 26,000 businesses were supported during the year.
The system therefore intervenes when the company is already engaged in collective proceedings. THE new partnership with the FFB is located further upstream, with the stated objective of limiting the arrival at this stage as much as possible. “In a more uncertain economic environment, the challenge is to intervene before difficulties worsen. This partnership with the FFB will make it possible to raise awareness of existing systems, provide more effective support to vulnerable companies and secure employee pathways, with concrete responses as close as possible to the field.“, underlines Christian Nibourel, president of the AGS.
The construction industry remains under pressure
The FFB estimated in June that the construction production was declining 1.2% at constant prices in the first quarter of 2026; improvement-maintenance notably recorded a drop of 2.6% over the period. Employment also remains affected: between the first quarters of 2025 and 2026, the construction industry lost around 16,000 salaried positions and just over 5,000 full-time equivalent temporary positions. The increase in self-employed employment only partially offsets these losses, with an overall decline estimated at 11,000 jobs.
The FFB also believes that failures remain at a high level. At its June press conference, it projected more than 13,000 companies affected over the whole of 2026, based on data available for the first five months of the year. In this context, prevention becomes a concrete issue for VSEs and SMEs in the sector. A study published by the AGS a few days before the announcement of the partnership also shows that 50% of the managers of very small companies surveyed consider their company to be in a fragile or difficult situation. Among them, 19% mention significant difficulties or a critical situation.
Common analyzes and territorial coverage
Beyond individual support, the agreement also provides for increased sharing of information between the AGS and the FFB. The two organizations wish to regularly produce analyzes on the economic situation of the building like the needs of businesses. This work should in particular contribute to better identifying risks and fueling the discussions of public and professional stakeholders on the prevention of failures.
Cooperation will finally be based on the territorial networks of the two organizations. The objective is to bring the systems closer to companies, in particular craftsmen and small structures which may have fewer internal resources to quickly identify suitable solutions.
The AGS has already developed several partnerships of this type with economic and institutional players, with the same logic of coordination around companies in difficulty. In particular, in August it signed an agreement with CCI France aimed at strengthening early detection and support for managers of VSEs and SMEs.
