Now she has to pay Teacher receives CHF 30,000 salary - for a job she no longer had
For 20 months, a former teacher in Dübendorf ZH received a salary even though she was no longer employed. When the town demanded the money back, she went through all instances - unsuccessfully.
No time? blue News summarizes for you
- A former teacher wrongly received wages from the town of Dübendorf for 20 months.
- The woman refused to repay the money and appealed to the Federal Supreme Court.
- It is now clear that she must pay over 30,000 francs as well as court costs.
Over CHF 30,000 in salary - even though she no longer worked for the town of Dübendorf ZH: a former primary school teacher received salary payments by mistake for a year and a half.
When the mistake came to light, the school demanded the money back. But the woman fought back - all the way to the Federal Supreme Court.
As reported by the regional newspaper "Zürcher Oberländer ", the teacher was initially employed in Dübendorf for two years, most recently with a smaller workload as a teacher of German as a second language (DaZ). When she took up a 100% position at cantonal level, her contract with the town ended - actually.
Wages continued to flow - unnoticed?
Despite the termination of the employment relationship, the school continued to pay CHF 1472 per month plus a share of the 13th month's salary. In total, around 36,000 francs were collected over 20 months - initially unnoticed.
The school only noticed the error when the woman requested an interim reference.
After an internal adjustment, the city finally claimed back 32,162 francs. The woman appealed to the district council, which reduced the amount slightly to 30,272 francs.
However, she did not want to pay anything back - and took the case to the administrative court and finally to the Federal Supreme Court.
Federal judges show no understanding
The Federal Supreme Court has now dismissed the claim. In their ruling, the judges stated that the woman should have noticed the incorrect payments - if only because of the regular increase in her account balance of around CHF 1,500.
The court did not accept the teacher's argument that she had only skimmed through the bank transactions on her smartphone and had not opened any letters: "The fact that she did not open the letters sent by post does not seem very credible," the ruling states.
In addition, she had included the salary statement from the city of Dübendorf in her tax return - she was therefore aware of the payments.
The consequences are clear: the teacher must repay the amount of 30,272 francs. She will also have to pay court costs of CHF 2,000. The ruling is legally binding.
