Jobcenter demanded 2,355 euros back — the court cancelled the claim because nobody had explained the rule
A man in Lower Saxony gets to keep 2,355.39 euros that the Jobcenter paid him and then tried to reclaim. The Landessozialgericht Niedersachsen-Bremen struck down both recovery notices in a judgment of 27 January 2026, case reference L 11 AS 56/24, and refused to allow a further appeal. It matters to anyone on Grundsicherung facing a demand to repay money already spent.
The rule is strict. Registering for a full-time course of a type eligible for BAfoeG funding ends your SGB II entitlement from the day you enrol, under section 7 paragraph 5 SGB II, whether or not you ever attend a lecture. He enrolled for a maths bachelor from 1 October to 21 December 2018 only to test whether his health would let him study, never went to a class, and lost his entitlement anyway. The Jobcenter, which had been paying 796.25 euros a month, spotted the tuition fee on his bank statements and demanded back 2,123.33 euros in benefits plus 232.06 euros in health and care insurance contributions.
Losing entitlement and having to repay are separate questions, and that is where the Jobcenter's case fell apart. To cancel an award retroactively the authority must show you acted deliberately or with gross negligence; ordinary carelessness is not enough. The court accepted he had not realised that enrolling alone ended his claim. He had mentioned his study plans to Jobcenter staff and nobody corrected him, the forms never asked about student status, the written guidance referred only to training in general terms, and the Jobcenter's own caseworkers had to consult their legal supervisors to work out what the enrolment meant.
If a cancellation and repayment notice arrives, you normally have one month to object. Check which legal provision the Jobcenter is relying on, which period it covers and how it argues you were at fault, not only whether the arithmetic is right. If that month has already run out, a review request under section 44 SGB X may still be open to you. Where the sum is large, a social advice centre or a lawyer specialising in social law is worth involving.
This is not a licence to stay quiet. Anyone who deliberately hides a job, income, savings, a move or a course must still expect to repay in full, and a clearly worded question on a form makes it far easier for the authority to establish gross negligence.