Here is a topic that is often raising questions and also confusing to the unsuspecting. The idiom "not to take something at face value" is another way to describe it.

After quitting your work, whatever the reason may be, you can demand from your employer a certificate. To be precise, there are two types of certificates from which you can choose. This is a little known fact among employees but enshrined in law, that is § 109 GewO.

http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/gewo/__109.html

The simple certificate merely states your personal details, how long you worked for your employer and contains a listing of your tasks as an employee. This simple certificate, therefore, does not display any evaluation or assessment of your performance or conduct. Then there is the qualified certificate. It reflects the evaluation absent in the simple one. Although notorious for its so called "secret code" it is still the prevalent one. Here employers use, seemingly, well meant positive sounding words or whole phrases masking the fact that they really are meant to denote something less flattering, if not the opposite. This code, however, has lost its expressiveness as it can be quite easily "decoded", thus having lost its "secrecy" over time. A search in the internet will reveal all phrases and their connotations. So it is not necessary to give examples here. Which kind of certificate you get depends upon your choice. Would it be wise, then, to ask for a simple one leaving out this code talk? Here the prospective employer could infer that you deliberately opted for the slim version with the intention to hide unsavoury facts. The employer, to be sure, cannot issue an arbitrary qualified certificate. Although he has discretion, the employee has the right to demand that his performance and conduct be truthfully reflected. If the employer describes the performance of the employee as average, it is the burden of the employee to show facts justifying a more favourable evaluation. It is of no surprise that this whole subject can give rise to bitter disputes between the employer and the employee, especially in cases where the parting is not done by mutual consent. In fact, this whole complex is subject to many court decisions, one of which I would like to make you familiar with:

What if you read the following sentence in your certificate?

„Gerne stehen wir jedem zukünftigen Arbeitgeber von xy hinsichtlich Nachfragen über die Qualität der von ihr für uns geleisteten Arbeit zur Verfügung.“

It may sound innocuous on first reading but it is not if you take into account that there is a "secret code". The labour court of Herford (Az.: 2 Ca 1502/08), therefore, rejected that clause finding that it infringed § 109 II 2 GewO, arguing that an impassioned reader would infer from the offer to contact the employer about the quality of the past performance as a veiled hint to take the actual evaluation of performance in the certificate with pinch of salt. The employer was therefore ordered to redraft the certificate and leave out that sentence.

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