AGG (Germany)

What AGG covers in hiring

The law prohibits discrimination on:

• Race or ethnic origin
• Gender
• Religion or belief
• Disability
• Age
• Sexual orientation

In hiring, this affects what can appear in job postings, what can be asked in interviews, and what can be used in screening or final decisions. A rejection that references any protected characteristic (even casually, even in internal notes) is exposure.

Practical implications for SMBs hiring in Germany

Three things to do:

• Use gender-neutral job titles. The widely accepted pattern is “m/w/d” (männlich/weiblich/divers) after the role title. Without this, postings have been successfully challenged.
• Don’t ask protected questions in interviews. No “are you planning to have children,” no age-relevant questions outside explicit job requirements, no “is this a problem for your religion.”
• Document rejection reasons in role-relevant language. “Less strong on go-to-market experience than the hired candidate” is fine. “Closer to retirement age than the other finalists” is a lawsuit.

The 2-month deadline

A candidate who suspects AGG violation has 2 months from the rejection to bring a claim. After that, the claim is barred. This is short — most employment-law deadlines are longer — but the practical effect is that internal hiring records need to be defensible within that window.

Where Join fits

Rejection emails and internal notes in Join keep the reasoning in role-relevant language by default; the audit trail is preserved for the AGG window and beyond. See the features page.