New case law – regarding limitation period (AD 2026 nr 2)

New case law – Regarding limitation period (AD 2026 nr 2)

The dispute concerned whether the Swedish Social Insurance Agency had legal grounds to dismiss an employee who was on full-time leave to perform duties as a trade union representative.

The state claimed that the employee incorrectly reported his absence and working hours to the Swedish Social Insurance Agency, abused the agency’s flexitime system and thereby neglected his obligations to the agency in a way that seriously damaged the agency’s trust in the employee.

The Labour Court found that, on several occasions during a relatively short period of time, the employee incorrectly reported his working hours and absences in a way that affected the employee’s right to salary and the Social Insurance Agency’s ability to check the reported working hours. The employee’s actions caused such serious damage to trust that the employee thereby grossly neglected their obligations to the Swedish Social Insurance Agency. The Swedish Social Insurance Agency therefore had legal grounds to dismiss the employee.

One issue in the case was whether a union representative could report their working hours on a flat-rate basis, instead of recording the actual hours worked on a daily basis in the same way as other employees of the Social Insurance Agency and in accordance with the Social Insurance Agency’s flexitime agreement. The Labour Court has found that a union representative, in the same way as other employees of the Social Insurance Agency, is obliged to comply with the provisions of the Social Insurance Agency’s flexitime agreement and report their actual working hours.

Read more (Swedish) here.