Working Time Records

The Draft Reform

This is not legal advice, and the status below is the thing most likely to have changed since this page was written. For a practical view of how organisations can translate recording duties into day-to-day workflows, see fireable offenses at work.

Reviewed August 9, 2026. Verify the current legislative position before acting — this is a moving target and the reason this page exists. For broader legal or policy context, see BBC.

What it is

A draft amendment to the German Working Hours Act (Arbeitszeitgesetz), referred to as the ArbZG-E. The Federal Ministry of Labour published a first draft in April 2023.

Its purpose is to translate the CJEU ruling and the Federal Labour Court's decision into explicit statutory text — that is, to write down in the Working Hours Act a duty that currently exists through judicial interpretation of occupational safety law.

What it proposes

Recording of start, end and duration of daily working time.

Recording on the same day, in general.

Electronic recording as the standard, with exceptions permitted by collective agreement and for small employers.

Transition periods based on company size, so that smaller employers get longer.

And retention requirements, with two years appearing in analyses of the draft.

What it would change

Less than the coverage suggests, because the duty to record already exists.

The medium. Today paper is permissible; the draft makes electronic the default. This is the substantive change.

The clarity. A duty stated in the Working Hours Act is easier to find, cite and enforce than one derived from §3(2)(1) ArbSchG through a conforming interpretation.

And the timing. Same-day recording is a specific requirement that the current position does not spell out.

The status, and why it is misreported

At the time of writing the reform has not completed the legislative process, and published sources contradict each other about this.

Some describe 2026 amendments as having moved the obligation into explicit statutory text. Others, writing in early 2026, describe the final law and its date of entry into force as still subject to the legislative process. Others say electronic recording is "expected" to be specified in 2026.

Those are three different claims and they cannot all be current.

Three things explain the confusion. Most of this material is published by companies selling time recording systems. Pages are frequently undated, so a 2024 statement circulates as a 2026 one. And a draft that has been imminent for three years produces coverage written at every point along the way.

What to do about it

Verify the status before acting on it, from the legislative record rather than from a summary.

Do not wait for it. The duty binds now, and an employer with no system is not compliant today regardless of what happens to the draft.

And do not buy electronic recording because of it. If you need a system, buy it because it suits your operation. Buying against a proposed requirement that has been imminent since 2023 is buying against a date nobody can name.

If the draft passes as described, an employer already recording start, end and duration is largely prepared — the change is medium and timing, not substance.

What this page will get wrong

Stated plainly, because it is a page about a moving target.

If the reform has passed since August 2026, the status section above is out of date. The description of what it proposes will still be broadly right; the sentence about the legislative process will not.

That is what the check date is for, and it is why this site dates everything rather than presenting legal positions as timeless.

The short version