In a judgment delivered on 18 June 2026, sitting as a Section Formation and published in the Official Bulletin, the Second Civil Chamber of the French Supreme Court (“Cour de cassation”) clarified the drafting requirements applicable to the operative part (“dispositif”) of appellate submissions.

📌 In the present case, the appellant’s submissions, filed within the time limit prescribed by Article 908 of the French Code of Civil Procedure, did not expressly seek the reversal (“infirmation”) or setting aside (“annulation”) of the first-instance judgment. They nonetheless requested that the judgment be “rendered null and void” (“mettre à néant”) and invited the Court of Appeal to reconsider the challenged heads of the judgment.

The Court of Appeal held that these submissions failed to contain an express application for the reversal or annulment of the judgment and, on that basis, declared the notice of appeal to have lapsed (“caducité de la déclaration d’appel”).

The Supreme Court was asked to consider whether the absence of the terms “reversal” or “annulment” from the operative part of the submissions necessarily results in the lapse of the notice of appeal, despite it being clear from both the submissions and the notice of appeal that the appellant seaks reversal of the judgment.

The Supreme Court answered this question in the negative. It held that requiring the exclusive use of the terms “reversal” or “annulment”, on pain of the notice of appeal being declared lapsed or the judgment being affirmed, constitutes excessive formalism.

🔎 In reaching this conclusion, the Court first recalled the provisions of Article 954 of the French Code of Civil Procedure. That provision requires that the parties’ claims be set out expressly in the operative part of their submissions. The Court of Appeal is therefore bound to rule only on those claims.

The Court further held that, “even in the absence of the terms ‘reversal’ or ‘annulment’, if the wording of the operative part of the submissions, read in conjunction with the notice of appeal where necessary, shows that the appellant seeks reversal or annulment of the judgment, the Court of Appeal must find that such a claim is properly before it.”

In the present case, the operative part of the submissions requested that the judgment be “rendered null and void” and invited the Court of Appeal to rule afresh on specifically identified claims. Additionally, the notice of appeal limited the challenge to certain operative provisions of the first-instance judgment. The Supreme Court held that these elements necessarily established that the appellant sought reversal of those provisions.

Accordingly, the Supreme Court ruled that “the Court of Appeal had applied excessive formalism and thereby infringed the relevant provisions by failing to find that the claim for reversal had been properly brought before it.”

📚 This ruling is part of the evolving case law of the Second Civil Chamber of the Court of Cassation, which takes into account the requirements established by the European Court of Human Rights regarding excessive formalism to ensure compliance with Article 6, paragraph 1, of the European Convention on Human Rights, which guarantees the right to a fair trial.