Burnout, long COVID and dismissal: high bar for fair compensation

In a ruling dated 14 January 2026, the subdistrict court judge was presented with a considerable number of complaints from an employee about her employer. An employee of a local authority suffered from burnout, later contracted Covid-19 and developed long Covid. The Employee Insurance Agency (UWV) awarded her a WIA benefit (80–100%) and the local authority ultimately terminated her employment contract after two years due to long-term incapacity for work. The employee felt that the local authority had played a significant role in the cause of her incapacity for work and that the local authority had acted in a seriously culpable manner before, during and after the reintegration process. Her request included fair compensation of € 130,000 and various wage and cost items.

The subdistrict court judge immediately set the tone: the bar for fair compensation in situations like this is high. Very high. Not only must there be seriously culpable acts or omissions, but also a causal link between those acts and the termination. In other words, “it wasn't perfect” is not the same as “this is so serious that it justifies fair compensation.

Before the absence, the main issue was work pressure. According to the subdistrict court, this was plausibly high, but that does not automatically constitute grounds for “serious culpability”. It is relevant that, following a memo in which the work pressure was raised, the municipality immediately scheduled a meeting, engaged an external absenteeism counsellor and arranged extra support for the team. The employee claimed that this was all insufficient, but according to the subdistrict court, it was not made sufficiently clear that the employee subsequently indicated that the measures were inadequate or that she had requested more help. Without the employer knowing (or having to know) that things were really going wrong, it is difficult to say afterwards: ‘you knowingly did nothing’.

In addition, the subdistrict court also looks at what was going on outside of work. The documents show that the burnout is not only linked to work factors; non-work-related causes are also mentioned. There was also a second opinion from a company doctor who felt that a report to the Dutch Centre for Occupational Diseases was justified, and ultimately that report was made. However, the magistrate emphasises that this second opinion is based on information provided by the employee, which the municipality disputed, and therefore does not accept this opinion “without further ado”. The result: it cannot be established that the burnout was caused by seriously culpable conduct on the part of the municipality. The judge therefore does not address the question of whether the burnout made the employee more susceptible to long COVID.

The magistrate is critical of the reintegration process, and to be fair, the municipality deserves some criticism in this regard. Responses were not always prompt, agreements were not always honoured, and contact was not constant (there was even a period of five months without contact, which the municipality did not dispute). It also took a long time for the medical file to be transferred when the company doctor changed. That does not sound like a tightly organised reintegration process, but rather like “where is that file again?”. But even this does not reach the threshold of serious culpability. Moreover, according to the subdistrict court, the necessary causal link with the dismissal is missing, because the medical assessments repeatedly showed that there were no usable options. The UWV stated that no reintegration opportunities had been missed and that the municipality had made sufficient efforts.

The employee also invoked incapacity for work "in and through the service" (an article in the Municipalities Collective Labour Agreement that, among other things, entitles the employee to a supplement to the WIA), but this also failed. According to the subdistrict court, there was insufficient evidence that the working conditions were objectively excessive; high work pressure alone is not sufficient for this.

The council is largely correct in terms of content, but there are a few issues with wages where things go wrong and the magistrate is less lenient. In May 2024, the employee was underpaid due to an error in the settlement with the WIA benefit. This was later rectified with a net additional payment of € 1,658.58. Because this was done too late, the municipality also has to pay a (moderate) statutory increase of € 340.01 net and statutory interest on € 1,658.58 for the period from 17 May 2024 to 20 June 2024.

The subdistrict court also ruled that the municipality had wrongfully deducted amounts from the IKB in November and December 2024. The municipality must therefore pay € 1,366.98 gross in back pay, plus a statutory increase (moderate to 25%) and statutory interest.

Not everything is awarded. The pension contributions withheld do not have to be refunded and the costs of the mindfulness training are not reimbursed, because this was not prescribed by the company doctor and was not agreed in advance with the local authority.

This ruling shows that the threshold for seriously culpable conduct in the event of dismissal after long-term incapacity for work remains high, even if the reintegration process does not run smoothly. At the same time, it shows how quickly an error in payroll accounting or an incorrect deduction can lead to additional costs (statutory increase and interest). So, even if the legal course of action is perfectly in order, if the payslip goes haywire, you will still have to pay. 

Do you have any questions about long-term absenteeism and reintegration files? Please contact Dennis Oud, Tessa Sipkema or Elke Hofman-Bijvank.

You can read the ruling here.