The Constitutional Court (TC) charges against absenteeism and guarantees dismissal for objective reasons to employees who repeatedly miss work, even if they have a justification. Thus, the TC ruling guarantees that the company can terminate the contract if absences reach 20 percent of the working days in two consecutive months, provided that the total number of absences in the previous twelve months reaches 5 percent of the working days or 25 percent in four discontinuous months within a 12-month period.

Lawyer Alfredo Aspra, partner in the Employment area of Andersen Tax & Legal, explains that the Constitutional Court concludes in favour of article 52 d) ET because it does not regulate a dismissal linked to the mere situation of illness or temporary incapacity of the worker, but to the intermittent reiteration of a number of absences that, regardless of their possible justification, reach thresholds that the labour legislator considers sufficient to justify the absenteeism.

"It should be remembered that dismissal due to absenteeism from work is not new. This cause of contractual extinction has been contemplated in the Workers' Statute since its original version in 1980. It is true that it has changed since then, but the cause itself has been incorporated into our legal system for a long time," explains Alfredo Aspra. For this lawyer is not an effective figure, which is hardly used by companies and "because absenteeism remains one of the main obstacles to overcome by the productivity ratios of companies.”

You can read the full article in El Economista Buen Gobierno y RSC.