‘A gaping chasm’: Computer monitoring software reveals worker’s secrets

An IT manager was terminated for falsifying timesheets after his employer tracked his keystrokes and logins to find that a 7.5-hour timesheet was submitted for a 10-minute workday.

After Hansen Corporation accessed the keystrokes and computer activity of its IT manager Neeraj Kumar over four days, the employee was found to have on only two occasions to have logged-in to his work computer for more than 10 minutes in the whole day.

Kumar was summarily dismissed on 16 May 2025 for falsifying timesheets.

In his 20 February 2026 decision, Fair Work commissioner Trevor Clarke upheld the dismissal, finding his explanations for one timesheet “wholly unconvincing”.

Kumar commenced at Hansen Corporation, a global provider of software and services, as a database manager in August 2019 after a career in IT services and payroll applications for the Victorian government.

During a performance review in February or August 2022, Kumar was criticised by his employer for not completing his timesheets on time.

Kumar submitted that when these concerns arose, he received “little or no work”, and this remained unchanged over the last two years of his employment.

Following his annual leave in April 2025, Kumar returned to work on 22 April 2025.

After his employer obtained data relating to his computer activity on 23 April, Hansen Corporation found that Kumar had not logged in to his work computer at all that day.

Kumar submitted that this occurred because he spent three days reading a long work-related report, with 23 April being the second day of reading.

The commission found that this report was 72 pages long and contained many hyperlinks.

His employer submitted that the output that followed the reading of the document would require connectivity to the work computer to perform work for clients.

On 29 April 2025, his employer found that Kumar had logged onto his laptop for only 10 minutes from 7:46am, despite lodging a timesheet for 7.5 hours of work.

Further, Hansen Corporation viewed Kumar’s work computer activity for 30 April 2025, finding that Kumar had logged in to his work computer at 10:59am and had not engaged for several hours until between 4:11pm and 5:07pm.

A few days later, on 6 May 2025, his employer found that he had logged into his work computer at 9:55am, only to last log in again at 2:34pm.

On 15 May 2025, Kumar received a letter of allegation setting out his “falsification or misrepresentation of working hours” and “failure to fulfil contractual working hours”, scheduling a meeting for 16 May 2025.

Kumar responded to this letter on 16 May 2025 at 10:29am with a message to the effect that he did not want to contest any of the issues raised.

Within the letter, Kumar wrote “I have barely been keeping up with the minimum” and “I have lost my motivation”, later saying in a cross-examination that he “just did what he could to ‘cobble together’ a timesheet”.

Despite responding as such, Kumar gave evidence that these statements did not constitute an admission.

At the meeting that took place on the same day, Kumar was issued a termination letter by his employers and dismissed effective immediately.

The Fair Work Commission said Kumar’s explanation for the “gaping chasm” between the 10 minutes of activity and the 7.5 hours that he logged for his 29 April workday was “wholly unconvincing”.

Clarke determined that the termination was valid on the grounds of falsifying timesheets, which constituted misconduct, quashing Kumar’s unfair dismissal claim, and upholding his termination.

The case citation: Mr Neeraj Kumar v Hansen Corporation Pty. Ltd. (U2025/9610).