BAG 2025: 12 Key Decisions

Anyone who looks at the decisions of the judges at the Federal Labor Court (BAG) in Erfurt also looks at the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg with at least one eye. The BAG is avowedly pro-European and gives colleagues there space to express their European legal perspective on the law through their submissions. Particularly exciting this year were the proceedings regarding mass layoffs, Brillen Rottler’s compensation under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the termination of a Caritas employee after she left the church. The verdicts in both cases are pending. How the ECJ will decide is foreseeable, as the court usually follows the opinion, and then the BAG also follows the ECJ. This was also the case in the Egenberger case, which the BAG will have to deal with again. Because the Federal Constitutional Court (BVerfG) had a say and overturned the BAG decision – as had happened in the chief physician case.

The BVerfG also had a say on overtime bonuses for part-time workers at the end of 2024. This year, however, the BAG has found a fine way, again based on European law, to accept the case law from Karlsruhe without giving up its own point of view.

In the future, however, the Erfurt judges will have to make their decisions with one less judge: Over the course of the year, four positions at the BAG became vacant and only three will be filled. With Dr. Rüdiger Linck, Dr. Josef Biebl and Prof. Dr. Ulrich Koch, three judges retired. The fourth vacancy arose due to the change of Professor Dr. Günter Spinner, Chairman of the Eighth Senate since 2023, as a judge at the Federal Constitutional Court.

1/12 evidentiary value of the AU from abroad

The BAG decided on the topic of the year right at the beginning of the year: the evidentiary value of the yellow certificate, the certificate of incapacity for work (AU). A health certificate issued abroad has the same probative value as an AU issued in this country. This means: Even if you get sick while on vacation, you can still be entitled to continued payment of wages in the event of illness. However, according to the BAG, it depends on the overall view of the circumstances – this can undermine the evidentiary value (judgment of January 15, 2025, no. 5 AZR 284/24).

The specific case involved an employee who, despite being on sick leave, started the journey back from Tunisia by car. According to his doctor, he was unable to travel due to severe sciatica and was supposed to maintain strict home rest. The yellow certificate counts, but the employer can present circumstances that cast doubt on its evidentiary value in the overall picture. According to the BAG, the LAG had not sufficiently assessed these doubts and referred the case back to the Munich LAG. The process will continue there next March.