Even if trust-based working hours are agreed upon, time recording is necessary. This was decided by the Munich Regional Labor Court on July 11, 2022 (Case No.: 4 TaBV 9/22).
Employers must set up time recording systems. The Federal Labor Court made it clear with its decision on September 13, 2022, that there is an obligation for systematic time recording in Germany (Case No. 1 ABR 22/21). The BAG thus followed the so-called time clock judgment of the ECJ from May 14, 2019. According to the judgment of the Munich Regional Labor Court on July 11, 2022, it is also clear that even trust-based working hours are no exception and the employer must record the working hours, explains the law firm MTR Legal, which has a focus on employment law. Until now, labor law only required the recording of overtime.
Before the Munich Regional Labor Court, the case concerned the working hours of a company’s field workers. It was contractually stipulated in a works agreement that trust-based working hours would apply in the field. Accordingly, the field workers could allocate their working hours independently. The employer did not monitor their working hours and did not record them.
However, the works council opposed and demanded that the company provide information about the specific working hours in the field. The legal dispute eventually ended up before the Munich Regional Labor Court, and here the employer’s argument that time recording was not necessary if trust-based working hours were agreed upon did not hold. The compliance with labor protection laws is among the responsibilities of the works council, the LAG stated. This includes compliance with working hours. To verify this, the works council is entitled to information about daily working hours, including overtime, work on Sundays, and public holidays. This applies even if trust-based working hours have been agreed upon, according to the Munich Regional Labor Court.
Following the rulings of the Munich Regional Labor Court and the BAG, employers must introduce systematic time recording. This does not necessarily mean the end of trust-based working hours, as the judges have left some leeway for design and did not specify how the time recording must be done.
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