The High Court of Justice of Castilla-La Mancha confirms that repeatedly refusing to clock in is grounds for fair dismissal

A court in Ciudad Real declared the disciplinary dismissal of a construction foreman fair after months of accumulated absences, lateness and refusals to clock in. The worker appealed and, along the way, asked for his contract to be terminated with compensation. The High Court of Justice of Castilla-La Mancha (TSJ) has dismissed that appeal and upheld the dismissal in judgment 1220/2026, of 19 June 2026 (ECLI:ES:TSJCLM:2026:1653, reporting judge Serrano Nieto).

What usually happens in these disputes is that the company cannot prove its workforce’s working day. Here it was the worker who refused to record it, and even so he ended up dismissed with the full backing of the law. The outcome hinged on how the company reconstructed those hours and on the court accepting that reconstruction as evidence.

Where the case comes from

The worker had provided services since 2019 as a foreman at a metal structure assembly company, with sites spread mainly across the Community of Madrid. His disciplinary record over the previous two years was extensive: written warnings for failing to keep to his hours, unjustified absences, a suspension of employment and pay, and disrespect toward management. Several of those sanctions were challenged and most were upheld by the courts.

The dismissal letter, dated April 2025, brought together several fronts at once. Full-day absences on two days, with medical certificates that, according to the company, did not cover the eight hours. Lateness of between ten and forty-eight minutes on five days in April. Disobedience of management’s instructions. Disrespect. And the refusal to clock in. Weighing over all of it was the recidivism.

Three clocking-in systems and none of them used

The striking part of the account of the facts is the company’s insistence on giving him the means to record his working day. There were paper sheets. There was a WhatsApp channel through which the administration received the timesheets. And from January 2025 a clocking-in software application was installed. The worker used none of them, despite the requests and the earlier sanctions for that very reason.

His refusal went beyond clocking in. According to the proven facts, he systematically refused to sign almost any document the company handed him: time records, payslips, occupational risk prevention documentation. The administrative clerk sent them to him by email so that, at the very least, it would be on record that he was aware of them.

Geolocation stepped in to fill what the worker was not recording

Faced with that refusal, the company reconstructed the working day, the allowances and the rest of the accrued items by combining the WhatsApp conversations with the geolocation installed in the vehicles. That device was tied to the organization of the work and to the safety of the fleet, and it served to establish where and when the service was provided on the days the worker left no record of anything.

The worker tried to turn that point around. Since he had not signed the documents informing him of the geolocation, he argued that it had not been properly communicated to him and that, therefore, that evidence was unlawful and could not sustain the dismissal.

Why the court accepted the geolocation as evidence

Article 90 of Organic Law 3/2018 on data protection allows the company to process geolocation data for the workplace monitoring authorized by article 20.3 of the Workers’ Statute, subject to one prior requirement: informing the workforce in an express, clear and unequivocal manner about the existence and features of such devices.

The court considers that requirement met. The company had drawn up and delivered two documents informing of the geolocation of the vehicles, and the fact that the worker refused to sign them does not erase the fact that he was aware of them. The TSJ also assesses that the device was on the vehicle, a work tool, and not on the person; that it did not capture personal circumstances of the driver; and that the measure was proportionate for verifying compliance with employment obligations. With no intrusion into the private sphere and with prior information, the evidence is lawful.

The ruling does not turn geolocation into a direct route to dismissal. It was not the only evidence of the breaches: the absences and lateness were also on record through other channels, and the decisive weight came from the recidivism, with a string of earlier sanctions upheld by the courts. What it does establish is that a proportionate and disclosed monitoring measure holds up in court and reinforces the rest of the evidence. Had the company not informed of those devices, the debate over its validity would have taken a different path.

What the worker was also claiming

The appeal did not stop at contesting the dismissal. The worker also sought the compensated termination of his contract through three routes under article 50 of the Statute: delays in the payment of wages, an alleged geographical relocation that undermined his dignity, and the geolocation itself as a breach of fundamental rights. The court rejects all three. On wages, because no non-payment or significant delay was established, with a debt of EUR 53.56 out of a total of almost 18,000. On the relocation, because he had known from the outset the itinerant nature of the sites. And on the geolocation, for the reasons already explained.

What stands as final

The TSJ dismisses the appeal and upholds the first-instance judgment, with the dismissal declared fair. It imposes no costs, because the worker had been granted legal aid and the Chamber finds no bad faith or recklessness in his appeal. The ruling is still open to an appeal in cassation for the unification of doctrine before the Supreme Court, so the criterion is not yet settled case law.

How Cleverfy solves it

The case leaves a takeaway any company can use. A reliable working time record protects against claims from the worker and, at the same time, documents the relationship when it is the worker himself who fails to cooperate. Here the company had to rely on WhatsApp and on the geolocation of the vehicles because it had no record that the worker would keep up to date.

With Cleverfy that record exists from day one and leaves a trail:

• Each clock-in is stamped with a timestamp and is immutable, with traceability of any subsequent change.
• A missing clock-in is detected, because the gaps stand out in the reports instead of being lost.
• The data is exported to PDF and Excel, ready to be submitted in a disciplinary file or before the Labor Inspectorate.

For clocking in on site or on the road, which is the scenario in this case, Cleverfy lets employees clock in from their phone with geolocation at the moment of clocking in, capturing the location only when clocking in and with the prior information required by article 90 of the Data Protection Act. The same record that serves to defend the company in an overtime claim is the one that leaves proof when a worker refuses to clock in. You can see it in a 15-minute demo.

Frequently asked questions

Can refusing to clock in be grounds for dismissal? Yes. Recording working time is a legitimate instruction from the employer within its managerial authority (article 20.3 of the Workers’ Statute, Estatuto de los Trabajadores), and repeatedly refusing to do so amounts to disobedience that can be sanctioned under article 54.2 b) ET. In judgment 1220/2026, the High Court of Justice of Castilla-La Mancha (TSJ) upholds a disciplinary dismissal in which the refusal to clock in, despite three systems being in place, formed part of the pattern of breaches alongside absences, lateness and recidivism.

Can the company use geolocation to prove working time? It can, subject to conditions. Article 90 of Organic Law 3/2018 allows geolocation data to be processed for the workplace monitoring set out in article 20.3 ET, provided the workforce is informed beforehand in an express, clear and unequivocal manner. The court accepted the geolocation of the vehicles because it met that prior information requirement, applied to the work tool rather than the person, did not capture the driver’s personal data and was proportionate.

Is geolocation alone enough to justify dismissal? No. In this case the absences and lateness were also established through other means, and the decisive weight came from the recidivism, with several prior sanctions upheld by the courts. The geolocation, lawful and duly disclosed, held up in court and reinforced the rest of the evidence, but it did not operate as the sole grounds for the dismissal.

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Sources: judgment STSJ CLM 1653/2026, of 19 June 2026 (ECLI:ES:TSJCLM:2026:1653, appeal 578/2026), available through CENDOJ. It upholds the judgment of the Court of First Instance of Ciudad Real of 13 February 2026 (case 237/2025). Articles 20.3 and 50 of the Workers’ Statute (Estatuto de los Trabajadores) and article 90 of Organic Law 3/2018 on Data Protection.

Legal note: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.