Recent happenings prove the French court in Versailles still holds sway over the international use of language. This time, though, the court is a legal one, not a royal one.

In the busy French courts, behemoth General Electric found that there’s a price to pay for relying on English in the land of Victor Hugo. Seven hundred and fourteen thousand dollars to be precise. That’s what a French appeals court said a subsidiary of the “We bring good things to life” multinational has to pay as a fine for its experiment in English as a main language.

The republic has a law that makes French compulsory in situations ranging from advertising to workplace documents. After several years of the English experiment, GE Healthcare’s French arm must now translate into French its software, instruction and training manuals, as well as documents concerning health and safety.

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