Automotive Expertise in France
Automotive expertise is a technical field which started in France in the thirties in order to help insurers in the imputation (link between the claim made and the mentioned damage), the causes (quality of the opposing party, intern cause, etc.) and the cost of damage compensation.
This field has become professional in the sixties with the compulsory insurance imposed to terrestrial motor vehicles owners. Since then the professions of insurer and automotive expert have been experiencing a significant development which reached its peak in the late eighties.
In 1972 was created the 1st automotive expert degree.
In 1995, the degree was replaced by a diploma. The total number of vehicles and claims has started to decrease due to the combined effects of vehicles sophistication, improvement of the road network, the raise of awareness regarding “lack of road safety as national concern” and the crackdown of law infringements.
From that moment on, the automotive expert has started to diversify his business, oriented towards safety (VGA* procedure, then VEI and since 1st January 2009, VE for damaged vehicle),) the audit of fleets (assessment of damage consecutive to rentals) and the analysis of defaults causes.
Today any expert in France must have achieved a BTS (two-year higher education diploma) in the specialty (AVA or MCI). Then he/she must spend one year as professional experience in automotive repair (which can be replaced by a year of studies after the above mentioned diploma.) to get the status of “Trainee expert in automotive”. Thus the trainee expert fulfills some assessment tasks and even drafts and expertise report, but always under the responsibility of an official automotive expert. After a minimum of 24-months internship in an automotive expert firm, the trainee is authorized to sit for the last part of his diploma sophisticated vehicles, based on technical subjects (law, assessment, test of roadworthiness). If he gets the required marks, the trainee will become automotive expert and will be registered on the “national list of automotive experts”. This list is controlled and updated by the Ministry.
