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Hartz IV: Observation and home visits from the job center - what is legal and what is not

2022-06-19T04:18:04.406Z


Hartz IV: Observation and home visits from the job center - what is legal and what is not Created: 06/19/2022, 06:09 By: Patricia Huber If the job center suspects abuse of benefits, it can pay the Hartz IV recipient a home visit. But even here there are limits. Berlin/Munich – Whoever submits a Hartz IV application will be overwhelmed with a lot of bureaucracy. The applicant must prove that th


Hartz IV: Observation and home visits from the job center - what is legal and what is not

Created: 06/19/2022, 06:09

By: Patricia Huber

If the job center suspects abuse of benefits, it can pay the Hartz IV recipient a home visit.

But even here there are limits.

Berlin/Munich – Whoever submits a Hartz IV application will be overwhelmed with a lot of bureaucracy.

The applicant must prove that the entitlement to benefits actually exists.

Even if social assistance is already being received, the job center can check again whether everything is legal.

Then it can happen that a job center employee pays the Hartz IV recipient a home visit to check whether there has been a misuse of benefits.

There are a variety of tactics, and some are even illegal.

Hartz IV: Observation by the job center not permitted

The Federal Employment Agency deleted a corresponding passage in the instructions for job center employees years ago.

The paragraph at that time was about observations of Hartz IV recipients by the job center - these should no longer take place since then.

In the meantime, the technical instruction according to the second social code (SGB II 6.10) says: "The implementation of observations is not permitted.

Observations are targeted surveillance of people or property, regardless of the duration of the surveillance.

There is no legal basis in SGB II for conducting observations and collecting the corresponding investigation results to avoid abuse of benefits.”

Hartz IV: Recipients can determine the disclosure of data themselves

However, as various court decisions show, not all job centers follow these professional instructions.

As reported

by gegen-hartz.de

, the Higher Administrative Court in Thuringia ruled in 2010 that investigations by a sales representative were illegal.

This was justified by the general right of personality, which entitles the individual to determine the disclosure and use of personal data.

But what are job center employees allowed to do if benefit fraud is suspected?

The technical instruction states: "The facts must be clarified [...] by inspecting evidence, for example by home visits or examination of business documents."

So if an employee of the job center shows up unannounced at the door, this is legal.

Without a judicial search warrant, however, he does not have to be allowed into the apartment, as this is a protected room.

In addition, the home visit may not be arbitrarily converted into a house search.

Only the recipient decides which rooms are made accessible to the employee and which cupboards are opened.

Participation and cooperation is, however, recommended.

(ph)

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2022-06-19

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