German time-tracking law in 2025: what small teams must do
Since the 2022 BAG ruling every German employer must record working time. Here’s the law in plain English plus a 5-step compliance checklist.
On 13 September 2022 Germany’s Federal Labour Court (BAG) ruled that every employer is obliged to systematically record the working time of every employee. The decision (case 1 ABR 22/21) applied a 2019 European Court of Justice ruling to German law overnight — with no transition period and no minimum company size.
For SMEs and startups this raised an immediate question: what does “systematically record” actually mean in practice? Below is the law in plain English and a 5-step plan you can implement this week.
What the law actually requires
- Record the start, end and breaks of every employee’s daily working time — not just totals.
- Maintain records that are objective, reliable and accessible (so labour inspectors can review them on demand).
- Keep the records for at least 2 years (§ 16 Abs. 2 ArbZG).
- Give employees access to their own time records.
- Respect the 11-hour daily rest between shifts and the 48-hour weekly cap.
A 5-step plan for small teams
- Pick a system — paper, spreadsheet or software. The court doesn’t mandate a specific tool, but tampered records carry legal risk.
- Document who clocks in / out and how. Web, mobile, kiosk — any combination is fine if it captures start/end/breaks.
- Audit the first 30 days to make sure the records actually match reality.
- Train managers to spot rest-time and overtime breaches before they snowball.
- Set a 2-year retention policy with quarterly archive exports.
A spreadsheet works — until you need to defend it in court. The day a former employee disputes overtime, you want timestamps you can’t edit after the fact.
— A German employment lawyer (anonymous, 2024)
Why Attendly
Attendly was built specifically for German SMEs that need legally-defensible time tracking without enterprise pricing. Start/end/breaks are captured automatically with tamper-proof audit logs, and DATEV-ready exports save your accountant hours every month — all for €3 per employee per month.
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Frequently asked questions
Is time tracking really mandatory for every German employer?
Yes. The Bundesarbeitsgericht (BAG) ruled on 13 September 2022 (1 ABR 22/21) that all employers must record the start, end and breaks of every employee’s working time. The ruling applies regardless of company size.
Does Excel count as a valid time-tracking system?
Excel is permitted in principle, but the file must be tamper-evident and reliably stored. Most labour-court decisions treat editable spreadsheets as weak evidence, so a dedicated tool with audit logs is strongly recommended.
How long must time-tracking records be kept in Germany?
Working-time records must be kept for at least 2 years under the Arbeitszeitgesetz (§ 16 Abs. 2 ArbZG). For payroll and social-security purposes a 6-year retention is common in practice.
Run lean people-ops without the burnout.
Attendly is the time-tracking, leave and payroll-export tool built for German SMEs. €3 per employee, no setup fees.
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