FAQ: you are a worker or a self-employed person under EU law

You may be granted equal status and receive SU as a worker based on multiple jobs where you work a total of at least 10–12 hours a week.

If you have more than one job, you must attach all your employment contracts when applying for SU.

We always make a specific and individual assessment of your employment when deciding whether you can receive SU as a worker.

If you get a new job after being granted equal status, you must upload your new employment contract. We will then assess whether you can still be considered a worker. If we cannot approve your new employment, we will discontinue your SU and if you have received too much SU, you must pay back this amount.

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You get a new job: Click here to submit documentation about your new job

Yes. However, as a general rule you must work at least 10–12 hours per week from the day you are hired to receive SU because you can be considered a worker.

We always make an individual assessment when deciding if you can receive SU as a worker.

We monitor on an ongoing basis if you continue to meet the conditions for having the status of a worker. The monitoring is, among other things, based on the information your employer reports to the Danish Tax Agency (Skattestyrelsen) about your income and working hours.

If you are not able to document that you still meet the conditions, we will discontinue your SU and if you have received too much SU, you must pay back this amount.

We always make a specific assessment of all the information regarding your employment when deciding whether you can be considered a worker.

Working 40 hours a month does not correspond to 10–12 hours of work per week, as most months have more than four weeks. Therefore, 40 hours per month is, as a general rule, not sufficient.

As a general rule, we expect you to work a minimum of 10–12 hours each week, regardless of how your pay periods are.

When you receive SU as a worker, we receive your income information electronically from the Danish Tax Agency (Skattestyrelsen). If we assess that you – based on this information - do not meet the conditions to be considered a worker, we will ask you to provide documentation proving that you have worked during the period in question. Documentation of how many hours you worked each month may include your duty rosters or timesheets confirmed or signed by your employer. Therefore, we encourage you to keep your work schedules or timesheets, so you can submit them if requested.

If you receive SU because you are considered a worker, you must, as a general rule, work a minimum of 10–12 hours every week while you study and receive SU.

An average of 10–12 hours per week is, as a general rule, not sufficient to maintain your status as a worker.
Therefore, you cannot work more than 10–12 hours per week in one month to make up for fewer working hours in another – for example, you cannot work 60 hours one month and 30 hours in another month to compensate for the missing hours.

To maintain your status as a worker during holiday periods, you must have status as a worker in the period leading up to the holiday. This means that we as a rule expect that you as a minimum have been working for 10-12 hours every week for a consecutive period of 10 weeks before your holiday.

You cannot compensate for fewer hours in one period by working more in another.

When you have planned your holiday with your employer, you must send a statement of truth from your employer, which specifies the exact holiday period.

We always make a specific assessment of whether you will be able to maintain your status as a worker during holiday periods.

As a rule, we can include six weeks of holiday per holiday year in our assessment. You must document your holiday. If you spend more than six weeks of holiday in a holiday year, we can only consider the first six weeks.

If you have questions about your holiday, you must contact your employer.

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You are on holiday: Click here to submit documentation about your holiday

If you take an unpaid internship or unpaid project-oriented placement, regardless of whether it is in Denmark or abroad, you may only continue to receive SU as an EU worker if you continue to work to the same extent as before during your unpaid internship or project-oriented placement.

You can read more about unpaid internships here (in danish).

If you are granted equal status in Denmark as a worker under EU law, we will automatically receive information from the CPR system once you have had continuous residence in Denmark for at least five years.

You will be granted equal status under this rule starting from the month you reach five years of residence. From that month, you are no longer required to work alongside your studies to receive SU.

When you meet the condition of five years’ continuous residence, we will send you a letter confirming the approval.

You may reapply for SU and equal status, even if your complaint about our previous decision is still being processed.

When reapplying, you must:

• Submit a new application for SU
• Complete the application for equal status for foreign citizens in minSU

We will then assess whether you meet one of the conditions for equal status with Danish citizens starting from the month of the new application.

You can read more about how to apply for SU and equal status here.

You can check the status of our complaint processing here.