In the worst case, anyone who cheats with their working hours can expect to be fired. However, employers may not always use video recordings to prove fraud.
If alleged working time fraud is to be proven in court, employers cannot simply use video recordings. A video surveillance system at the entrance gates of a company premises is usually neither suitable nor necessary for checking the hours worked, according to a judgment by the Lower Saxony State Labor Court (LAG) (Az.: 8 Sa 1148/20).
The specific case reported by haufe.de concerned an employee who, after being warned, received a notice of termination from his employer due to fraud in working hours. According to the article, the decisive factor for the termination was, among other things, the evaluation of video recordings in front of the factory premises. They should show incorrect clocking in at the card reader there for colleagues and leaving work earlier.
The employee appealed against the dismissal and was right. Like the previous instance, the LAG decided that the termination was ineffective. According to the verdict, fraudulent working hours – for example through the intentional misuse of a time clock – can in principle justify termination without notice. According to the court, the video recordings submitted by the employer were not suitable as evidence in this case. The LAG argued, among other things, that the first access to video recordings dating back more than a year was not appropriate to uncover alleged working time fraud.
In addition, the employer had already committed itself in an operating concept to only storing the data from the video surveillance system for 96 hours. The employer was also unable to provide a personal evaluation of the data from a card reader at the entrance as proof. The evaluation was excluded in a works agreement.
