You have been dismissed: the twenty working days that decide everything

Almost everything that can be done wrong in a dismissal is done wrong in the first three weeks. Not through ignorance of the merits —whether the letter supports the ground, whether the compensation is correctly calculated— but through something far more basic: the deadline runs out while the employee is still deciding whether it is worth fighting.

Article 59.3 of the Workers’ Statute (Estatuto de los Trabajadores) leaves no room for interpretation: a claim against dismissal lapses after twenty days, adding that «the days shall be working days and the period one of lapse for all purposes». That last phrase, which looks like a technicality, is what makes this deadline behave differently from almost any other a person will come across in their life.

Lapse is not limitation, and the difference is brutal

A limitation period can be interrupted: any valid claim restarts it from zero. A lapse period cannot. It runs, it expires and it extinguishes the right to bring the claim, regardless of how just the grievance was or how obvious the unfairness. A plainly null and void dismissal, challenged on day twenty-one, is a dismissal that can no longer be challenged.

The courts also apply it without the safety valve that court practitioners are used to. The rule that causes most grief: in the lapse of a dismissal claim the «day of grace» does not apply —the margin under article 135 of the Civil Procedure Act that allows a document to be filed up to 3 p.m. on the day after expiry. The substantive deadline expires on the twentieth working day, and that is the end of it.

How it is really counted

Time starts running the day after the employee learns of the employer’s decision, whatever form that communication takes. It does not start on the day the letter is handed over if the effective termination was earlier and the employee knew it: what counts is the actual termination they were aware of. In verbal dismissals —more frequent than they should be— the starting day is the day they were told not to come back.

They are working days, so Sundays and public holidays do not count. Nor does the day of the dismissal itself.

The conciliation application: what it suspends, and until when

Before filing a court claim, administrative conciliation must be attempted. Filing that application —the papeleta— suspends the lapse period, under article 65.1 of the Employment Courts Act (Ley Reguladora de la Jurisdicción Social). It suspends; it does not restart: the days already used up are gone.

The same provision sets out when the clock restarts, and it is worth reading slowly:

The lapse period shall resume the day after conciliation or mediation has been attempted, or after fifteen working days have elapsed since filing, excluding Saturdays, without it having taken place.

Two practical consequences follow. First: if the conciliation hearing takes place promptly, the deadline resumes the following day, not when the record arrives by post. Second: even if nothing takes place, the clock starts running again after fifteen working days. Nobody warns you about that.

The three mistakes that leave an employee with no claim

1. Believing that sick leave freezes the deadline

It does not. Being on temporary sick leave, even with a serious condition, does not suspend the lapse period: only the express statutory grounds do. The courts’ reasoning is that someone on sick leave can grant authority to a lawyer or to a labour law practitioner, so nothing prevented them from acting. That is how it was decided, among others, in judgment 3477/2023 of the High Court of Justice of the Valencia Region, of 19 December 2023 (ECLI:ES:TSJCV:2023:6692).

2. Relying on a second conciliation application

If the conciliation produces no effect because the party who brought it does not attend, there is no effective suspension. And filing a second application does not revive a claim that has already lapsed: so held the Supreme Court in its judgment of 22 December 2008 (appeal 2880/2007). The application is not a reset button.

3. Waiting for the final settlement or the «good» letter to arrive

This is the most common trap, and the most understandable. The employer promises to review the calculation, says it will send another letter, hints that there may be a settlement. Meanwhile the days run. Unless there is a genuine remedying of the dismissal —a fresh act of termination meeting the statutory requirements— the starting date does not move.

What to do in the first week

Gather the dismissal letter if there is one, the last payslip, the contract and the applicable collective agreement; note the exact date of termination and who was present if it was verbal; and do not sign the final settlement without reading what you are signing —a «full and final settlement» accepted without reservation makes it harder to dispute amounts later, although in itself it does not prevent you from challenging the dismissal.

And above all, count the twenty days from the very first moment. Most matters that reach a law firm too late do not arrive late through the employee’s carelessness: they arrive late because nobody told them the clock had already started.