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WORKING IN GERMANY

Will German employers really have to monitor staff working hours?

An overhaul in the way working hours are tracked in Germany is on the cards following a recent court decision. But it remains unclear what it actually means for the world of work. The Local asked experts what's going on, and what happens next.

A woman demonstrates the method of recording working hours with a chip card.
A woman demonstrates the method of recording working hours with a chip card. Photo: picture alliance/dpa/PCS Systemtechnik | -

What’s happening?

Last week, the Federal Labour Court (BAG) declared that employers in Germany should be recording the working hours of all employees.

READ ALSO: Why German employers will soon have to record staff working hours

The decision brings into force a 2019 ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ), which stated that employers in member states should be implementing systems to record how many hours per week employees were working, which until now, has not been brought into law by the German government.

The main reason for this, according to the ECJ, is to protect staff from excessive working hours and unpaid overtime. 

What are the consequences of the ruling?

Labour Law specialist Dr. Michael Fuhlrott explained to The Local that the ruling has an immediate legal effect: the court decided that the ECJ ruling means that the German Occupational Health and Safety Act must now be interpreted in such a way that it includes an obligation to record working hours.

“In other words, the obligation applies directly, to every company with immediate effect,” Fuhlrott said.

Updating the German law book to include the original judgement of the European Court of Justice from 2019 had been on the coalition government’s agenda for some time, but was put on hold due to the pandemic. When a relevant case came to the Federal Labour Court, the judges took the opportunity to address this gap in the law.

An electronic clock for recording working hours on display in the Chemnitz Industrial Museum. Photo: picture alliance/dpa/dpa-Zentralbild | Jan Woitas

But in the absence of a written law, it’s unclear exactly how the new rules will be enforced. 

Dr. Fuhlrott said: “There is currently a high degree of uncertainty as to how the ruling is to be understood. We will have to wait for the court’s exact reasoning. In view of this current lack of clarity, companies should first wait for the exact reasoning behind the decision and then consider how to respond to it.”

It seems unlikely, for example, that the decision will give employees a right to take legal action against employers for not enforcing mandatory working time logs. But what could happen, is that authorities could start to check up on companies to see if they are keeping tabs on their staff’s working hours. Though in the absence of clear government regulations, this also seems unlikely. 

READ ALSO: Jobs in Germany: Should foreign workers join a union?

One thing that is clear, however, is that the federal government is now under pressure to define exactly how the law will work. 

Speaking to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Labour Lawyer Philipp Byers said “it creates enormous legal uncertainty, which the German government must now urgently address.”

When it comes to bringing in new legislation to incorporate the ECJ decision, it’s likely that there will be a little bit more room for manoeuvre when it comes to defining exactly how the law will work. 

It may be possible that companies that operate on a “trust model” will be able to keep some degree of flexibility in the way time recording is carried out.

A spokesman for the German Labour Ministry told the Local that any further consequences of the ruling can only be fully assessed after the court publishes its reasoning for the decision. That is expected in the coming weeks. 

“The Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs will examine this and is working on a corresponding draft law,” a spokesman said. 

What’s the reaction from people in Germany?

Following the decision, a survey conducted by the opinion research institute Civey for T-online, showed that the majority of Germans see the development as a good thing.

In answer to the question, “How do you view the fact that all employees will have to record their working hours in the future?” 61 percent of respondents answered either “very positively” or “positively” while only 22 percent responded with the answer “negatively” or “very negatively”. A total of 17 percent were undecided.

However, there is lots of disagreement on the ruling. On the one hand, it could strengthen workers’ rights and help prevent unpaid overtime, while on the other, it introduces a significant bureaucratic hurdle for workers and organisations which have previously operated on a  “trust model” of timekeeping. 

A woman works from home in her living room in Stuttgart. Photo: picture alliance / dpa | Daniel Naupold
A man sits with a laptop and a screen at a table in front of a window in his home office. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Fabian Strauch

The shift towards working from home also throws up possible advantages and disadvantages for the new rule. On the one hand, it may mean that employees working from home will now have to document every minute they are not actually working, while on the other hand, those for whom working from home means more overtime will be fairly compensated. 

READ ALSO: Nearly a quarter of employees in Germany ‘continue to work from home’

North Rhine-Westphalia’s labour minister Karl-Josef Laumann (CDU), welcomed the decision and called for the ruling to be implemented quickly.

“Now the years of back and forth between the Federal Ministry of Economics and the Federal Ministry of Labor must come to an end and it must be clearly stated in the reform of the Working Hours Act that hours must be recorded,” he said.

However, the employers’ association BDA slammed the ruling from the court, calling it “hasty and not well thought out”.

BDA CEO Steffen Kampeter said in a statement last week that the decision “overburdens employees and companies” without anything legally being set in stone.

“This decision must not be allowed to call into question proven systems of trust-based working time that are desired by employees,” Kampeter said. 

Vocabulary

Working time recording – (die) Arbeitszeiterfassung

Federal Labour Court – (das) Bundesarbeitsgericht

Trust model – (das) Vertrauensmodell

We’re aiming to help our readers improve their German by translating vocabulary from some of our news stories. Did you find this article useful? Let us know.

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WORKING IN GERMANY

Germany’s biggest trade union seeks 7 percent pay rise

Germany's biggest trade union, IG Metall, said Monday it would push for a seven-percent pay rise for millions of workers in the key electrical and metalworking sectors, despite falling inflation and a sluggish economy.

Germany's biggest trade union seeks 7 percent pay rise

The recommendation by the union’s leadership, which will now be discussed by regional branches, comes ahead of new wage talks starting in September.

“Employees need significantly higher wages to combat persistent price pressures,” the union said in a statement.

Wage demands by IG Metall — which negotiates for some 3.9 million workers in sectors ranging from auto to electrical and mechanical engineering — are closely watched in Europe’s top economy as they often set the tone for negotiations in other industries.

IG Metall’s executive board said it was advising members to seek a seven-percent pay increase over a 12-month period, as well as higher compensation for apprenticeships.

IG Metall chairwoman Christiane Benner said the demands were “reasonable” in these “turbulent times”.

But the head of the Gesamtmetall employers’ federation, Stefan Wolf, urged the union to be “more realistic”.

“The metal and electrical industry is still in recession. But these ideas sound as if we are in an economic boom,” Wolf said in a statement, warning that the focus should be on strengthening Germany’s competitiveness.

In the last wage rounds in 2022, IG Metall clinched an 8.5-percent pay hike over two years to help members cope with soaring inflation after Russia’s war in Ukraine and pandemic-related supply chain issues pushed up consumer prices.

German inflation has eased significantly since then, but at 2.4 percent in May it remained above the European Central Bank’s two-percent target.

The German economy meanwhile shrank slightly in 2023 and the government expects only modest growth of 0.3 percent this year.

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