A letter ends up in the mailbox – or not. Anyone who has to prove this has had a problem in German labor court proceedings for years. And anyone who thought that Deutsche Post’s registered mail was the pragmatic solution to this has now received a clear answer from the Federal Labor Court (BAG): It is not.
Yesterday, Thursday, the BAG rejected the appeal of a Hamburg employer (ref. 2 AZR 184/25), thereby ending years of legal uncertainty to the detriment of the employers.
The specific case: The employer in question invited an employee who was often absent due to illness to a company integration management (BEM) via registered letter. The employee does not respond and the employer then terminates him. In court, the employee denied ever having received the invitation. However, a BEM invitation is mandatory for termination due to illness.
Registered mail: Three instances agree
As proof that the invitation had actually been delivered, the company presented receipts and delivery receipts and had the deliverer questioned as a witness, but without success: he could not remember anything. In the subsequent legal dispute as to whether the letter had actually arrived, the Hamburg Labor Court initially agreed with the employee (July 3, 2024, Ref. 13 Ca 225/23), and the Hamburg LAG confirmed on July 14, 2025: the termination is ineffective. By rejecting the subsequent appeal, the BAG has now finally established facts. The BAG’s reasons for its decision are not yet available. According to several lawyers, the rejection of the employer’s appeal should not be understood differently than the result described here,
The Cologne labor lawyer Bettina Steinberg comments on the decision result on Linkedin: “As of today we know that, according to the BAG, even the presentation of receipts and delivery receipts cannot constitute prima facie evidence.” Alexander Bissels, labor lawyer and partner at CMS Hasche Sigle in Cologne, shares this assessment: “The registered mail is no longer a secure form of access. Employers should no longer rely on prima facie evidence, especially when making important declarations such as a termination or an invitation to a BEM, that they can rely on prima facie evidence – even if the delivery receipt and a reproduction of the delivery receipt are presented.”
The delivery receipt is no longer sufficient
The question of whether proof of entry and delivery of a registered letter constitutes so-called prima facie evidence of access has been a concern for labor courts for years. In a ruling that is now almost ten years old, the Federal Court of Justice had affirmed such prima facie evidence for the analogous peel-off procedure:
The delivery person pulled a peel-off label from the shipment immediately before it was thrown in, stuck it on the delivery receipt and confirmed delivery with a signature and date. This was proof that the letter had actually ended up in the right mailbox.
This procedure no longer exists. Deutsche Post has switched to a digital scanning process: the delivery person scans the barcode, signs on the display of his scanner – and then puts the letter in the mailbox. Address and time are not documented.
Last year, in a ruling on another case – an employer from Baden-Württemberg had sent a notice of termination by registered mail, but was only able to provide proof of posting and shipment status – the BAG stated: proof of posting plus shipment status from the Internet are not sufficient to provide prima facie evidence. At the time, the court expressly left open the further question of whether reproducing the digital delivery receipt would change anything.
Shortly afterwards, the LAG Hamburg closed this gap with the aforementioned decision on the BEM procedure: Even with proof of delivery, the judges ruled that there was no legally secure proof that the letter had actually reached the recipient. The modern scanning process is more error-prone than the previous peel-off process, and the delivery receipt lacks the recipient’s address and time, which leaves the supposed recipient with virtually no rights.
Handover in the company or delivery by courier
The decision is already being actively discussed and evaluated on Linkedin. Patrick Nordhoff, Legal Counsel Labor Relations at the Interhyp Group, draws a clear conclusion with regard to the rejected revision: “Previously, I internally recommended registered mail with a request for proof of delivery as a cost-effective option. From now on, no longer. We will switch to personal delivery with witnesses and messengers.” Of course, that doesn’t solve all the problems: “How do you reach employees who don’t open the door?”
There are tried and tested answers from practice. Thomas Adler, HR Director EMEA at Techtronic Industries, describes his approach as follows: “We only deliver personally in the company or by messenger with witnesses. Important: Both the messenger and the witness must know the letter – attention: confidentiality obligation! If the person to be terminated cannot be found, additional photos are taken of the letter being put in the mailbox. There are never any problems with proof here,” Adler writes on Linkedin.
The process that Byrte Pusch, freelance HR director, describes from her own experience goes one step further: “I know companies where the dismissal is delivered by the HR department with two people and video evidence including a time log with the two signatures of the deliverers. Time-consuming, but there have been no successful challenges yet.”
Bettina Steinberg has another tip in her post: “There are also courier services that deliver using specially developed forms – it’s not exactly cheap, but cheaper than another month’s notice.”
Info
BAG, judgment of May 7, 2026, Ref. 2 AZR 184/25.
Lower court: LAG Hamburg, judgment of July 14, 2025, case number 4 SLa 26/24.
Sven Frost is responsible for HR tech, which includes the areas of digitalization, HR software, time and access, SAP and outsourcing. He also writes about recruiting and employer branding. He continues to be responsible for the editorial planning of various special human resources publications.
