This case before the 's-Hertogenbosch Court of Appeal involved the following. A manager of a greenhouse company was summarily dismissed for tampering with clocking in and out times.
Within the company, employees have to clock in and out for their shifts themselves. The manager was able to manually adjust his timesheets himself. The employer suspected that the time records were being tampered with because the manager had made an excessive number of manual corrections to his time records, and therefore placed three hidden cameras in the cafeteria, the smoking room, and the work area. These showed that the employee was clocking in before he even worked, because he would get questions from colleagues right away. He also had to work a lot of overtime in the evenings, the employee said. He could not prove this and the camera footage showed that he often went to smoke and drink coffee first.
Precisely as a manager he had an exemplary role and much trust from the employer. He tried to get out of it by stating that the employer was rather loose with the time registration, but he could not prove this either. The employee requested the court to award him a ton of severance pay, but was proven wrong and had to pay the employer over €8,000 in litigation costs.
This blog was written by Mr. Stijn Blom, employment lawyer at Arbeidsadvocaat.nl B.V. Stijn has extensive experience in employment law and assists entrepreneurs daily with a wide range of employment-related matters. From dismissal cases to drafting watertight contracts and policies – with his practical and personal approach, he helps employers and employees move forward. Want to know more?Visit Stijn's page.
Arbeidsadvocaat.nl is happy to think with you if you have questions about dismissal law. Please feel free to contact us.
June 2024
