Sick leave in Denmark: understand the letters and reply

A sickness letter may ask you to check reported information, apply for payment or complete a form. Here is how to find each task and deadline in Mit Sygefravær, understand who pays and write a clear Danish reply.

Recognise the letter and its next step

A letter can contain more than one task. For example, you may need to correct a reported date and complete an information form. Save the receipt for each submission rather than assuming one reply completes everything.

Who pays: wages and sickness benefit are different

If you are employed, report sick using your workplace’s procedure as soon as possible. The statutory default is no later than two hours after your working time begins, unless the workplace has set a different rule. Your contract, collective agreement or employment legislation may give you wages during sickness; those wages do not automatically stop on day 30.

If you do not receive full wages, the employer normally pays sickness benefit for the first 30 calendar days when you meet the employment condition: eight continuous weeks with that employer and at least 74 hours of work. There is also a rule for qualifying repeated employment with the same employer. Municipal benefit has its own eligibility conditions. One common route is at least 240 hours over the previous six completed calendar months, with at least 40 hours in five of those months. Other routes include entitlement to unemployment benefit. The sickness-benefit law, sections 30–33, distinguishes these situations.

A letter can arrive while your wages continue: the employer may be seeking reimbursement from the municipality. Read and complete the tasks addressed to you even though payroll still pays you. Reimbursement to the employer and payment directly to you are different things.

If you are fully unemployed and entitled to dagpenge, your a-kasse continues paying unemployment benefit during the first 14 days of sickness. Register sick on Jobnet on your first sick day. If those conditions do not apply, contact the municipality about your position from the start; do not assume that an a-kasse will pay. Borger.dk explains the unemployed route.

The 2026 sickness-benefit ceiling is DKK 5,085 a week or DKK 137.43 an hour. A ceiling is the maximum, not everyone’s award or take-home payment. See Borger.dk’s employee guide for the current rates and process.

Complete the tasks in Mit Sygefravær

Mit Sygefravær is the digital self-service for your municipal sickness case. Start from the service linked on Borger.dk and sign in with MitID. Read the notification and open the tasks it identifies. You may need to:

1. Check the report. Compare the dates, hours and wage information with your own records. For an employer’s or a-kasse’s notification, the correction deadline is eight days after the municipality sends the notification.
2. Apply for payment. If you need municipal sickness benefit, complete the application. The usual application deadline following a notification is also eight days after dispatch.
3. Complete the oplysningsskema. Describe how illness affects your ability to work and your expected absence. If you do not know when you can return, explain that uncertainty instead of inventing a recovery date.

These deadlines come from section 11 and sections 38, 40 and 40 a. For the information form, another deadline can be agreed with the municipality. Asking for more time does not by itself change the deadline, and an extension for that form does not automatically extend a separate application deadline.

A worked example: correct the first sick day

In this fictional example, Anna’s notification is sent on 1 October 2026 and gives 9 October as the reply deadline. It lists 10 September as her first sick day, but she worked on 10 and 11 September and first reported sick on 14 September. She submits this correction through Mit Sygefravær on 5 October:

English meaning: Anna identifies the notification, gives the wrong and correct dates, explains the sequence and attaches the records supporting the correction. She still completes any separate application and information-form tasks. Use your own dates and only name attachments you actually send.

If illness prevents you from finishing the form

Contact the municipality before the deadline, explain the obstacle and ask for a specific arrangement. Here is a different fictional case: Omar is in hospital and cannot finish an information form due on 9 October.

English meaning: Omar explains why he cannot meet the form deadline, proposes 13 October and asks for written confirmation and instructions about other tasks. If the deadline has already passed, submit what you can and explain the delay immediately. Late applications and missing forms have different rules; give the municipality the facts and any supporting documentation.

If you cannot use Mit Sygefravær, contact the municipality for help or exemption from digital self-service. If no notification arrives after your wages or employer sickness benefit stop, do not wait indefinitely: Borger.dk advises contacting the municipality if ten days have passed. A separate three-week application deadline can apply when no notification was sent. Section 38 sets out the starting points and exceptions.

Two kinds of sickness meeting

With your employer: the ordinary sickness-absence conversation should generally take place within four weeks of the first sick day. It concerns how and when you may return. A request for a mulighedserklæring is a separate medical-certificate process: you and the employer complete the first part, and the doctor completes the medical assessment. The employer pays for that certificate. See section 7 a and section 36 a.

With the municipality: the general first follow-up deadline is the end of the eighth week, not the fourth. Since 1 July 2026, employees expected to return by the end of week 26 normally do not need return-to-work follow-up unless they or their employer request it, or the municipality decides it is needed after an individual assessment. The municipality still assesses benefit entitlement. The rules are in sections 13 b and 13 f, read with the July amendments.

For an invitation you actually receive, check the meeting format and explain any health-related difficulty before the appointment. Ask whether a phone or video conversation is possible if travel is the obstacle; if you cannot participate at all, say that instead. A request is not confirmation of a changed appointment.

If the letter is about stopping payment

A partshøring invites your comments before the decision it concerns. Identify the reason: missing information, an absence or an assessment of your ability to work need different replies. Give the relevant facts, dates and supporting records by the hearing deadline.

An afgørelse is a decision. For a municipal sickness-benefit appeal, the normal deadline is four weeks from receipt. Send it to the municipality first for reconsideration; if it maintains the decision, it forwards the appeal to Ankestyrelsen. An appeal does not automatically continue payment. See sections 66–67 and 72 of retssikkerhedsloven. Our English municipal-letter guide explains hearing replies, Digital Post receipt and appeals in more detail.

Frequently asked questions