Learn when an employer in Turkey can terminate an employment contract for just cause, what Article 25 covers, how notice and severance work, what deadlines apply, and what remedies employees may pursue under Turkish labor law.
Just Cause Termination by the Employer Under Turkish Labor Law
Just cause termination by the employer under Turkish labor law is one of the most powerful dismissal tools available to an employer, but it is also one of the most legally risky if used carelessly. The main legal framework is found in Article 25 of Labor Law No. 4857, which allows the employer to terminate an employment contract before the end of its term or without waiting for the ordinary notice periods in the situations listed in the statute. Those situations are grouped under health reasons, violations of morality and good faith and similar acts, compelling reasons, and detention or arrest leading to prolonged absence.
This matters because Turkish labor law draws a sharp distinction between an ordinary employer termination and a just-cause termination. An ordinary dismissal generally operates through the notice regime of Article 17 and, for eligible workers, the valid-reason and reinstatement system of Articles 18 to 21. By contrast, Article 25 is designed for situations the law considers serious enough to justify immediate termination. That difference affects notice pay, severance pay, procedure, and the employee’s ability to challenge the dismissal later.
A second reason the topic is important is that employers often assume that citing Article 25 is enough by itself. It is not. If the employer invokes Article 25 but the facts do not actually fit the statute, the dismissal may lose its “just cause” status. In that situation, the employee may challenge the termination and, if the worker is within the job-security regime, may seek reinstatement by applying to mediation within one month and, if mediation fails, filing suit within two weeks from the final mediation record.
The Legal Foundation of Employer Just Cause Termination
The direct statutory source is Article 25 of Labor Law No. 4857. The article states that, whether the contract is fixed-term or indefinite-term, the employer may terminate the employment contract before the expiry of the term or without waiting for the notice period in the listed situations. This is the legal basis for “immediate termination by the employer” in Turkish labor law.
The practical consequences of Article 25 must also be read together with other provisions. The Ministry of Labour’s official FAQ states that where the employer terminates the contract within the framework of Article 25, the employee is not entitled to notice compensation. The same official source also states that if the employer relies specifically on Article 25/II, which covers violations of morality and good faith and similar acts, the employee does not acquire a right to severance pay.
The severance point comes from the preserved severance regime. Article 120 of Labor Law No. 4857 states that Article 14 of former Labor Law No. 1475 remains in force. The preserved Article 14 then states that severance is payable when the employer terminates the contract except for the misconduct-type grounds listed in the old Article 17/II, which now corresponds to Article 25/II. In other words, Article 25 does not always produce the same severance result: the employee generally loses severance only when the dismissal falls within Article 25/II, not automatically in every Article 25 scenario.
The Difference Between Valid Reason and Just Cause
Turkish labor law distinguishes between valid reason and just cause. Article 18 states that, in workplaces employing at least 30 workers, an employer dismissing an employee with at least six months of seniority under an indefinite-term contract must rely on a valid reason connected to the employee’s competence, conduct, or the operational needs of the business. Article 25, by contrast, deals with more serious grounds that allow immediate dismissal without notice.
This distinction is critical because employers sometimes try to use Article 25 where the facts really fit only an ordinary performance or conduct problem. Turkish law does not allow every unsatisfactory situation to be reclassified as just cause. If the alleged misconduct is not serious enough to fall within Article 25, the employer may need to proceed under the ordinary dismissal framework instead, with notice obligations and, where applicable, job-security protections.
The law itself confirms that an employee may challenge the employer’s Article 25 dismissal if the asserted grounds do not fit the statute. The last part of Article 25 states that the worker may resort to judicial remedies under Articles 18, 20, and 21 if the dismissal is alleged not to comply with the grounds described in the preceding subparagraphs. That means Article 25 is not immune from review merely because the employer labels the dismissal “just cause.”
Health Reasons Under Article 25
The first category under Article 25 is health reasons. The first sub-ground applies where the worker suffers from an illness or becomes disabled because of the worker’s own intentional conduct, disorderly lifestyle, or alcohol addiction, and the resulting absence lasts more than three consecutive working days or more than five working days in one month. The second applies where a health board determines that the worker has an incurable illness and that working at the workplace is medically inappropriate.
Article 25 also contains a separate rule for illness, accident, birth, and pregnancy situations that do not arise from the worker’s own fault as described in subparagraph (a). In those situations, the employer’s immediate termination right arises only after the relevant absence exceeds the worker’s Article 17 notice period by six additional weeks. In cases of birth and pregnancy, the law says that this period begins after the protected periods under Article 74 end. The Ministry’s FAQ repeats the same rule and expressly adds that this kind of dismissal does not eliminate the employee’s severance entitlement.
This last point is one of the most important nuances in the whole topic. Employers sometimes assume that every “immediate termination” under Article 25 eliminates severance. That assumption is wrong. A health-based dismissal under Article 25/I may still leave severance intact, while a morality-and-good-faith dismissal under Article 25/II generally does not. Turkish law therefore requires employers to classify the ground correctly, not just choose the most severe label.
Violations of Morality and Good Faith Under Article 25/II
The most important and most litigated category is Article 25/II, which covers violations of morality and good faith and similar acts. The article lists multiple grounds. These include the worker misleading the employer at the time of hiring about essential qualifications or conditions, insulting the honor or dignity of the employer or the employer’s family, making false degrading accusations against the employer, sexually harassing another worker, assaulting the employer, the employer’s family, or another worker, coming to work drunk or under the influence of drugs, using those substances at work, breaching trust, stealing, disclosing trade secrets, committing a workplace crime punishable by more than seven days’ imprisonment without suspension, unauthorized absenteeism in the listed patterns, persistent refusal to perform assigned duties despite reminder, and endangering workplace safety or causing substantial damage.
This category is especially significant because it is the one that generally destroys the employee’s severance entitlement. The Ministry’s FAQ expressly states that if the employer terminates under Article 25/II, the employee does not gain a right to severance pay. The preserved severance text of Article 14 of former Law No. 1475 confirms the same result by excluding dismissal on the old misconduct provision, which now corresponds to Article 25/II.
In practice, Article 25/II is often the most disputed route because employers are tempted to use it in order to avoid both notice compensation and severance pay. Turkish law responds by expecting concrete proof. The Ministry’s FAQ itself gives useful examples: for persistent refusal to perform duties under subparagraph (h), the FAQ states that the worker’s non-compliance should be documented with at least two or more records showing that the worker was warned; for the damage ground under subparagraph (ı), the FAQ states that the amount of damage should be supported by an expert or appraisal report, otherwise the termination may not be viewed as a concrete just-cause dismissal.
Absenteeism is another classic Article 25/II issue. The statute allows immediate termination if the worker is absent without permission or a justified reason for two consecutive working days, or for two working days in one month following a holiday, or for three working days in one month. The Ministry’s FAQ adds that the “month” here should not be understood as a calendar month, but as a month counted from the first day of absenteeism. That clarification matters because employers sometimes calculate the period incorrectly.
Compelling Reasons Under Article 25/III
The third category is compelling reasons. Article 25 states that the employer may terminate immediately if a compelling reason prevents the worker from working at the workplace for more than one week. The Ministry’s FAQ repeats the same formulation. This is a narrower ground than Article 25/II, but it remains important in cases involving extraordinary events that make continued work objectively impossible for a legally significant period.
Again, the severance consequence is not the same as under Article 25/II. Since the preserved severance regime excludes only the old misconduct provision corresponding to Article 25/II, a dismissal under Article 25/III does not automatically eliminate severance entitlement. The legal effect is immediate dismissal without notice, but not necessarily dismissal without severance.
Detention or Arrest Under Article 25/IV
The fourth category is detention or arrest. Article 25 states that if the worker is taken into custody or detained and the resulting absence exceeds the relevant notice period under Article 17, the employer may terminate immediately. The Ministry’s FAQ confirms the same rule. This is another example of a just-cause dismissal route that is immediate in timing but not automatically identical to the misconduct category for severance purposes.
The Timing Rule in Article 26
A major legal limitation appears in Article 26. For morality-and-good-faith grounds under Articles 24 and 25, the right to terminate must be used within six working days from the date the other party learns of the conduct, and in any event within one year from the act. The one-year limit does not apply if the worker obtained material benefit from the event. The Ministry’s FAQ repeats the same timing rule.
This means that Article 25/II is not open-ended. Even where the employer can prove a listed act, the employer may still lose the right to use immediate just-cause termination if the power is exercised too late. That is one of the most common structural weaknesses in poorly managed misconduct dismissals. Employers that tolerate the conduct for too long and then later try to frame it as urgent just cause may face legal difficulty.
It is also important to note that Article 26 applies specifically to the morality-and-good-faith grounds, not automatically to every Article 25 category. Health-based dismissal, compelling reasons, and detention-based dismissal follow their own statutory structure, while Article 26 sets a strict deadline for the conduct-based grounds under Article 25/II.
Procedure: Written Notice, Reason, and the Defense Rule
Procedure still matters in just-cause dismissals. Article 19 states that the employer must make the termination notice in writing and must state the reason for dismissal clearly and definitely. The same article also says that an indefinite-term contract cannot be terminated for reasons related to the worker’s conduct or performance without first obtaining the worker’s defense. But Article 19 expressly preserves the employer’s right to dismiss under Article 25/II, meaning the ordinary defense-taking rule does not block a properly grounded misconduct dismissal under that provision.
This does not mean employers are free to dismiss informally. The Ministry’s FAQ again confirms that the employer must notify dismissal in writing and state the reason clearly, while also explaining that the employee may sue if the dismissal reason is not valid. In practice, employers who rely on Article 25 should still document the facts carefully, identify the exact statutory sub-ground, and avoid vague accusations. A label such as “loss of trust” is rarely enough by itself if the underlying conduct is not concretely tied to the statute.
Notice Pay and Severance Consequences
Notice pay and severance are often confused in Article 25 cases, but Turkish law treats them differently. The Ministry’s official FAQ states that where the employer terminates within the framework of Article 25, the employee is not entitled to notice compensation. That is the basic effect of immediate dismissal: the ordinary notice regime is bypassed.
Severance is more nuanced. If the employer dismisses under Article 25/II, the worker generally loses severance entitlement. The Ministry’s FAQ states this openly, and the preserved severance rule in Article 14 of former Law No. 1475 supports it. But if the employer dismisses under Article 25/I, 25/III, or 25/IV, severance is not excluded in the same way. The Ministry’s FAQ specifically says that health-based dismissal due to prolonged medically relevant absence does not eliminate severance.
This is one of the most important practical distinctions in Turkish dismissal law. Two immediate dismissals under the same article may both remove notice pay, but only one of them may eliminate severance. Employers that collapse all Article 25 grounds into one category risk underpaying lawful severance. Employees who assume every immediate dismissal destroys severance may also give up rights they still have.
Challenging the Dismissal
If the employer invokes Article 25 but the worker believes the ground does not fit the statute, Turkish law allows judicial challenge. Article 25 itself states that the worker may resort to the judicial route under Articles 18, 20, and 21 if the employer’s immediate-dismissal grounds are not satisfied. For workers covered by the job-security regime, Article 20 requires application to mediation within one month from the service of the dismissal notice in order to seek reinstatement, and if mediation fails, suit must be filed within two weeks from the date of the final mediation record.
Article 20 is also important because it places the burden of proving that the dismissal was based on a valid reason on the employer in reinstatement disputes. So if the employer labels the dismissal as Article 25 just cause but cannot prove the factual and legal basis, the worker may, where eligible, challenge the dismissal through the reinstatement framework.
Mandatory Mediation for Monetary Claims
Where the dispute concerns severance, notice-related sums, or other receivables and compensation arising from the employment relationship, mandatory mediation also applies. Article 3 of Labor Courts Law No. 7036 states that, in lawsuits for employee or employer receivables and compensation based on law or individual or collective employment contracts, and in reinstatement claims, applying to a mediator is a condition of action. If mediation is skipped, the case is procedurally dismissed.
This means an employee dismissed under Article 25 who wants to claim unpaid severance, unpaid wage items, or other labor receivables usually cannot go straight to court. Likewise, an employer claiming compensation from a worker in a related employment dispute must also follow the same gateway rule. In Turkish labor practice, mediation is therefore the front door to most dismissal-related monetary litigation.
Limitation Periods
The current limitation rule is found in Additional Article 3 of Labor Law No. 4857. It states that the limitation period is five years for severance pay, compensation arising from dismissal without compliance with notice conditions, bad-faith compensation, and compensation arising from breach of the equal-treatment principle, as well as annual leave pay. This matters in Article 25 disputes because the worker may simultaneously question the legal basis of the dismissal and pursue related monetary claims subject to this five-year period.
Conclusion
Just cause termination by the employer under Turkish labor law is a serious and tightly structured mechanism. Article 25 allows immediate dismissal for health reasons, morality-and-good-faith violations, compelling reasons, and detention-related absence, but each category has its own legal consequences. The most important practical distinction is that Article 25/II generally removes both notice pay and severance, while other Article 25 grounds may still leave severance intact even though notice does not apply. The timing rule in Article 26 further limits conduct-based dismissals by requiring action within six working days from learning of the event and, in principle, within one year from the act.
For employers, the safest approach is to avoid treating Article 25 as a shortcut. Immediate dismissal should be based on a correctly identified statutory ground, supported by concrete evidence, exercised within the legal time limits where applicable, and documented clearly in writing. For employees, the key lesson is that a dismissal called “just cause” is not automatically lawful. If the ground does not fit the statute, important remedies may still exist, including severance in some Article 25 categories, reinstatement for eligible workers, and employment-related monetary claims pursued through mandatory mediation. In Turkish labor law, the decisive issue is rarely the label alone. It is whether the facts truly match the law.
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