Bourquin amendment (annual cancellation of borrower insurance)
A 2017 provision that allowed borrowers to switch loan insurance every year on the policy anniversary, for all existing contracts from January 1, 2018.
The Bourquin amendment, named after senator Martial Bourquin, was inserted into the act of February 21, 2017 ratifying two ordinances on home loans. It extended to the whole loan term the substitution right that the Hamon Act had limited to the first twelve months: borrowers could now cancel their insurance on each annual anniversary, with two months' notice, and replace it with a policy of equivalent cover. Its reach came from applying to existing contracts, not just new loans, which opened a stock of several million contracts to competition. Banks challenged this retroactivity before the Constitutional Council, which upheld it in the general interest of consumer protection. In practice, the notion of anniversary date led to disputes, which prompted lawmakers to remove it with the Lemoine Act.
In its decision of January 12, 2018, the Constitutional Council upheld applying annual cancellation to existing contracts from January 1, 2018, rejecting the priority constitutional question raised by the French Banking Federation.
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