An accountant asks when outstanding papers will arrive. A CBS reminder follows. A manager, recently assessed as performing well, suddenly looks less reliable to the employer. Someone opens the system logs, compares login times with contracted hours and finds what appears to be a clean answer.
That sequence ended badly at a technology company with 20 employees. The District Court of The Hague declared the summary dismissal of its finance and IT manager legally invalid. The employer had secretly examined his login and logout records from 20 January to 20 February 2026, then dismissed him on 23 February.
The court found that the covert investigation breached the AVG in these circumstances. Login records also offered too narrow a basis for concluding that the employee had structurally worked substantially fewer hours than agreed.
The seduction of the timestamp
Digital records feel reliable because they are precise. A system says 08:47, not “somewhere around nine”. That precision can make an uncertain management conclusion feel settled.
A system records the event it was built to capture. A login record shows access. Work may have begun earlier, continued after logout, or taken place in a meeting, on the telephone, in a planning document or while making a decision away from the screen.
That distinction matters in finance, IT and management roles. Work moves between screens, conversations, documents and thought. The more autonomous the role, the less useful it becomes to treat visible system activity as the whole working day.
In this case, the employer first alleged at least 29 unworked hours. A later forensic review calculated 27 hours. Both calculations covered about four and a half weeks and relied on login and logout records. The court considered that measurement too limited for the conclusion the employer drew.
A concern can still be entirely legitimate. Papers may arrive late. A customer may be waiting. A manager may be difficult to reach. The management error begins when one technical signal is asked to answer every question at once: whether there is a problem, who caused it, what happened and whether dismissal fits.
Conversation is part of control
The court pointed to a more disciplined route. Before investigating the employee’s system records, the employer should have spoken with him. The audit email and CBS reminder had created concern, but they had not yet established a missed deadline or a stopped essential process.
Some founders see that conversation as the soft route. It is better understood as fact-finding. It tests whether expectations were clear, workloads had shifted or another system was used. It also gives management a chance to identify the work that must be completed and the standard that applies.
That is not leniency. It is management.
Risk rises when the person who suspects a problem also selects the data, interprets it and decides the sanction. In a 20-person company, those decisions may sit around one table. Speed can feel efficient while nobody stops to ask whether the record measures the work management actually wants to assess.
Employee data needs boundaries before a dispute begins. Rijksoverheid states that organisations must handle personal data carefully and explain which data they hold and what they do with it.
Where an employer has a works council, Article 27 of the Works Councils Act gives that council a consent role in arrangements concerning employee-data processing, personnel assessment and systems that can monitor presence, behaviour or performance. A company normally needs a works council when it employs at least 50 people.
Smaller employers may have fewer formal layers. They still benefit from plain answers: which data is collected, why it exists, who can see it and whether it can be used in a performance or disciplinary decision.
The cash consequence of a poor decision
The court ordered the employer to pay €11,544.34 for irregular termination, €12,066.95 as a transition payment and €60,000 in fair compensation. The three principal awards total €83,611.29.
For a company with 20 employees, that is more than an employment-law footnote. Cash leaves the business while the original work problem remains unresolved. Management time goes into the dispute. Payroll processes the exit. Knowledge leaves without a proper handover, and the company may still need to restore capacity.
That last point matters in the Dutch labour market. CBS reported 375,000 open vacancies in the second quarter of 2026, equal to 95 vacancies for every 100 unemployed people. Recruitment pressure has eased from its peak, but employers still compete for people who can take responsibility quickly.
A rushed exit can therefore cost twice. The employer pays for the failed decision, then pays again to rebuild capacity.
Better questions before stronger action
The useful response is not a thicker monitoring policy or more surveillance. It is a clearer route from concern to decision.
When a deadline appears to slip, management can first establish what was promised, what was delivered and what effect the delay had. The next question is what evidence can meaningfully clarify the position. If system data matters, its purpose and limits need to be understood before anyone draws conclusions from it.
A second person should challenge a severe employment decision. That may be an external adviser, another director or a colleague responsible for payroll and HR. The point is not to slow every decision. It is to prevent suspicion, investigation and judgment from becoming one uninterrupted movement.
Back at the desk, the accountant’s reminder still needs an answer. The papers may still need to be completed. But the first management question is not, “How long was this person logged in?” It is, “What happened to the work, what can we establish fairly, and what response fits those facts?”
A timestamp can start that inquiry. It should not be allowed to finish it.
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The data, sourcing, and analysis behind this article were conducted by Linda Pavan. AI was not used to identify sources, build the factual basis, or produce the analytical judgment contained here. AI was used only as a drafting aid. The final English text was personally reviewed, edited, and approved by Linda Pavan before publication.
References
- Ontslag op staande voet na heimelijke controle inlogtijden strandt: werkgever handelde in strijd met AVG · Salaris Vanmorgen
- Rechtbank Den Haag / Rechtspraak - Verified court ruling on covert login monitoring and summary dismissal
- Wettenbank - Statutory threshold for dismissal for urgent cause
- Rijksoverheid - Employee-data processing and transparency
- Wettenbank - Employee representation and monitoring-policy governance
- CBS - Current labour-market pressure and the cost of a failed exit
- Wettenbank
