URSSAF

The URSSAF (pronounced [yʁsaf]; Unions de Recouvrement des Cotisations de Sécurité Sociale et d'Allocations Familiales, meaning the Organizations for the Collection of Social Security and Family Benefit Contributions) is a network of private organizations created in 1960 whose main task is to collect employee and employer social security contributions that finance the Régime general (general account) of France's social security system, including state health insurance (Assurance maladie en France [fr]).

They also manage two other salary deductions for the French Ministry of Public Action and Accounts: URSSAF employees are not, as commonly assumed, civil servants, and thus they are covered by the same employment agreements as other social security employees.

Each of them (including the national fund) is controlled by an Administrative Council made up in equal parts of managers and workers.

The objectives of ACOSS (Agence centrale des organismes de sécurité sociale [fr], or the central agency for social security organizations) have been recorded in three successive COGs (conventions d'objectifs et de gestion, or agreements on objectives and management), the first covering the period 1998-2001, the second 2002–2005, and the current version covering 2006-2009.

ACOSS is the national fund for the entire group of organizations (as decreed by the law of July 25, 1994), including the CNAM-TS for health insurance, the CNAF for family benefits and the CNAV for retirement.