Granada woman fired after visiting the Caribbean while on sick leave

The ruling concluded that the dismissal was fair, meaning that the woman was not entitled to compensation. Dissatisfied with that ruling, handed down in June 2025, the employee referred the case to the High Court of Justice of Andalucía (TSJA), but the appeal was also unsuccessful. The labour division based in Granada has confirmed that travelling to the Caribbean while on temporary sick leave is a valid reason to justify the company’s decision to terminate the employee’s contract.

The TSJA’s stated that an employee on sick leave must refrain from carrying out "any activities that may hinder or prolong the recovery process". The TSJA bases its ruling on its own case law and that of the Supreme Court, which, in several judgements, has ruled in the same terms. ‘(...) If the employee is prevented from performing the work for which they are contractually obliged, they are prohibited from engaging in any kind of activity, whether for the benefit of others or themselves, particularly when their enforced inactivity is financially compensated by the company and by the Social Security system, which they are thereby prejudicing, thereby constituting a breach of good faith in the performance of the contract, which amounts to a serious and culpable breach of contract justifying its termination (...) by way of dismissal’, the TSJA quotes the Supreme Court’s doctrine.

In line with these arguments, the court confirms that travelling "to a destination as far away as the Dominican Republic" is incompatible with an adequate recovery process. “She was on temporary sick leave due to a common illness, yet proceeded to go on holiday without the company’s knowledge (...) for a period of fifteen days during which she failed to observe her requirement to rest at home (...)."

The ruling went on to say, "The nature of the activities she undertook during that period is unknown, but it is clear that during that time she was not in a position to receive any medical treatment to facilitate her recovery or cure, the company having attempted to contact her by telephone without success."

The woman argued in her defence that the law does not authorise company managers to monitor what an employee does while their employment contract is suspended. In such circumstances, the woman concerned argued, the "employee would also no longer be subject to the company’s supervision, control or organisational authority and would not be required to report to the company during sick leave, nor to seek the company’s authorisation, nor to account to it for her private activities". While the TSJA has rejected this approach to the problem, the ruling could still be appealed to the Supreme Court.

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