If you are going to work temporarily in Norway, you need to bring two documents with you from your home country: form A1 and certificate S1 (formerly form E106).
Illustration: Morten Rakke / Helfo
You need to bring two documents with you from your home country.
If you are from an EU/EEA country or Switzerland and have an employer in your home country, but are going to work temporarily in Norway, you need to bring two documents with you from your home country: form A1 and certificate S1 (formerly form E106).
Lech is Polish and is employed by a firm in Poland. He is going to work in Norway for a period. He makes sure he has form A1 and certificate S1 before he travels.
When you arrive in Norway, you need to send the right documentation to the right place.
You must send form A1 to the Norwegian National Insurance Scheme's international membership and contributions section: NAV Medlemskap og avgift (web page in Norwegian).
You must send form E106/S1 to Helfo, Postboks 2415, 3104 Tønsberg.
Form A1 documents your national insurance membership in your home country, and certificate S1 (formerly form E106) documents your right to healthcare services in Norway while you are working here.
Lech sends form A1 to NAV and certificate S1 to Helfo once he arrives in Norway.
If you fall ill, you are entitled to healthcare no matter how long you have been in Norway.
If you are recorded in the National Registry as resident in a Norwegian municipality, you are entitled to have a regular doctor, your GP. If you do not yet have a GP, you can find a list of them at helsenorge.no. Find out more about the GP scheme here.
If you have a D number, you are only temporarily resident and do not have a right to a GP. You are, however, entitled to necessary healthcare, but you yourself have to find a surgery with spare capacity. The municipalities are responsible for ensuring that you receive the healthcare you need. Some municipalities have a list of doctors who accept patients who are not entitled to a regular GP. Check your municipality's website.
Contact the out-of-hours primary care service for urgent help in the evening or at weekends.
You will have to pay a user fee for treatment. The amount of the user fee will depend on which healthcare services you need. You pay user fees up to a certain amount over the year, after which you are entitled to an exemption card.
Lech needs to visit a doctor. Since he is not registered in Norway's National Registry, he is not entitled to a regular GP. Lech therefore has to find a doctor who has spare capacity. He checks the municipality's website and finds a list of doctors who accept patients who are not entitled to have a GP. After calling a couple of them, he finds a doctor who can see him. He pays this doctor a user fee, just as Norwegian citizens do. He is careful to keep the itemised receipt, so he can apply for an exemption card if he reaches the user fee threshold during the course of the year.