Can I receive sickness benefit if I get sick?

If you become ill and cannot take care of your child, you can pause your parental benefit and receive sickness benefit instead.

You may be entitled to sickness benefit if:

• you are sick and someone else is taking care of your child instead
• have a sickness benefit qualifying income (SGI).

During the first two weeks that you are sick, you can only receive sickness benefit on the days for which you applied for parental benefit. You must have applied for parental benefit before you became ill.

You can receive 25, 50, 75 or 100 percent sickness benefit.

What should I do if I get sick?

1. Report your sickness

Report your sickness the very first day you are sick.

2. Change your application for parental benefit

Log in to My pages (My pages) and remove the days for which you applied for parental benefit, starting from the day you reported your sickness.

3. Apply for sickness benefit

After reporting your sickness, log in to My pages (Mina sidor) to apply for sickness benefit. 

4. Submit a doctor's certificate

If you are sick for more than 7 days, you need to submit a doctor's certificate with information about your illness or injury. Ask your doctor to send the certificate directly to Försäkringskassan. It is done electronically. You can also find your certificate on 1177 Vårdguiden under Mina intyg.

Intyg (1177.se) External link, opens in new window.

If you prefer to post your certificate yourself, please send it to:

Försäkringskassans Inläsningscentral
839 88 Östersund.

5. Disbursement

The first sickness benefit disbursement will be made once we have processed your application. Normally that takes 30 days. If we need additional information it can take longer.

After the first disbursement, the following disbursements will be made on the same date each month. The date is determined by your date of birth.

• If you were born between the 1st and the 10th: the 25th of each month
• If you were born between the 11th and the 20th: the 26th of each month
• If you were born between the 21st and the 31st: the 27th of each month

You can see all of your disbursements on My pages (Mina sidor).

Special disbursement dates

Special disbursement dates and processing times

If you want to change any aspect of your sick leave

What should I do once I'm healthy again?

1. Report your recovery

If someone else needs to take care of your child while you are sick

If you become sick during your parental leave, someone else can receive compensation from Försäkringskassan if they take care of your child. The rules vary depending on how old the child is and whether you have sole custody or not.

If the child is older than 240 days

The other parent can apply for compensation for care of a child. To receive compensation for care of a child, the other parent must stay home from work or refrain from collecting the daily benefit from unemployment insurance.

Bear in mind that you cannot receive parental benefit for a day when someone else is taking care of the child instead of you. Do not forget to log in to My pages (Mina sidor) and remove the days that the other parent cared for the child from your application for parental benefit.

If the child is younger than 240 days

The other parent can take out parental benefit instead and stay at home to care for the child.

If you have sole custody

If you have sole custody and the child is younger than 3 years old, a friend or relative can take care of the child instead of you. This is called expanded temporary parental benefit. The friend or relative is only eligible to receive compensation if they lost income. Call the Customer Centre at 0771‑524 524 to request a form for the person who is caring for the child.