Being registered at the correct address is important – both for you and everyone else
The details contained in the population register influence both large and small decisions taken in society, and inaccurate information can affect everyone.
Here are a few of the situations that can arise when the details registered for you are incorrect:
- Firemen responding to an alarm don’t know whether they are on their way to an empty holiday home, or to rescue a family with children.
- Health service planners don’t know whether they need to recruit more paediatricians or more orthopaedic surgeons in your area.
- The municipality works out the wrong number of classrooms when building a new school.
- Public transport planners can’t determine whether to prioritise additional school-bus or night-bus routes.
- The library doesn’t know if it’s building a sufficiently large reading corner or enough study spaces.
- You cannot vote, or engage politically, in the municipality where you live.
- Ambulance staff don’t know which flat they need to get into to help an injured person.
For these reasons, it is your duty to report your change of address when you move. It is now illegal to deliberately omit to report a change of address or to submit incorrect information to the Swedish Tax Agency. Anyone who does so can be charged with a criminal offence.
By ensuring that your details are correctly maintained in the population register, you can help the Swedish Tax Agency to make the best use of its resources. We aim to prioritise checks and controls to reduce serious errors that can affect the welfare system, for example, and to prevent people from deliberately cheating to receive benefits to which they are not entitled.