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Sweden’s government snubs Migration Agency request for six-month rule exemption

Sweden's government has ignored a request from the Migration Agency to be exempted from a rule allowing people who have waited six months for an application to be decided to apply for it to be expedited.

Published: 25 July 2024 09:57 CEST
Sweden's government snubs Migration Agency request for six-month rule exemption
Migration Agency offices in Sundsvall. Photo: Fredrik Sandberg/TT

An official wrote on the Migration Agency’s Facebook page on July 23rd that the government has not responded to the request, which was made through a letter to the government in April 2023, and that no new guidelines have been issued, something that a Migration Agency press officer then confirmed to The Local. 

“I can confirm that we have not received feedback that this would be something the government would proceed with – in other words it has not led to a legislative initiative,” Didzis Melbiksis worte in an email. 

The Migration Agency, Courts Agency, and three administrative courts in April 2023 requested a temporary exemption from the new mechanism, brought in in 2018, which allows people facing long delays for administrative and court decisions to file a so-called dröjsmålstalan, or expedition demand, calling for their request to be decided rapidly. 

The Migration Agency argued in its request that the mechanism was increasing waiting times for work permit, residency permit, asylum and citizenship cases by preventing it from allocating resources in the most efficient way. 

“The fact that many individuals are requesting that their cases be decided is taking a lot of resources and leading to processing times generally becoming longer, not least as many delay cases are appealed to the court,” Mikael Ribbenvik, the then Director General of the agency, wrote in a press release. 

Adam Reuben, a press spokesperson at the Migration Ministry, said that the government had decided to increase funding to the Migration Agency to help it reduce the backlog in applications rather than excuse it or the courts from the regulation. 

“It is important that the Agency and courts abide with the processing time set out in regulations and that every case is assessed based on its merits and to a high level of quality,” he wrote in an email.

“For that reason, the Government has allocated additional resources. We have also taken other measures, such as tasking the Agency to introduce a fast-track procedure for highly skilled labour migration, which reduced the processing time from 101 days to 17 days. The Governmental Office has an ongoing dialogue with the agency regarding processing times and measures taken.”

The fact that the government has not so far granted the agency’s request means that foreigners who have waited a long time for a decision can still now make an expedition demand after six months, requiring that their case be concluded, using the form here. 

Citizens of non-EU countries who have applied for work or residency permits can send the request if more than six months have passed since their application. If you have permanent residency in another EU country, you can sent it in after four months, and if you are applying for an EU Blue Card, you can send it in after 90 days. 
 

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EXPLAINED: How a ‘request to conclude’ can speed up Swedish Migration Agency decisions

If you've been waiting six months or more for a ruling from a Swedish agency you can according to law submit a "request to conclude", forcing the agency to take a decision. Is this worth doing in work permit, residency permit and citizenship cases?

Published: 26 July 2024 11:21 CEST
Updated: 26 July 2024 14:13 CEST
EXPLAINED: How a 'request to conclude' can speed up Swedish Migration Agency decisions

What is a ‘request to conclude’? 

According to Sweden’s Administrative Procedure Act, which came into force in 2018, if an application you have made has not been decided “in the first instance” within six months at the latest, you can request in writing that the agency decide the case, using a process called a dröjsmålstalan, or “request for a case to be expedited”. 

The agency then has four weeks to either take a decision or reject the request to conclude in a separate decision. You can then appeal this rejection to the relevant court or administrative authority. 

You can only use the request to conclude mechanism once in each case. 

READ ALSO: Sweden’s government snubs Migration Agency request for six-month rule exemption

How do you apply for a ‘request to conclude’ a Migration Agency case? 

It’s very easy to fill in the form on the Migration Agency website, which only asks you to give your personal details, say whether your case concerns a work permit, residency permit, right of residency case, or ‘other’, and list any other people applying along with you. You then send the application by post to the Migration Agency address on the form. 

Does it work? 

A lot of people do seem to have success using the mechanism. The Migration Agency in section 9.1 of its annual report says that it is forced to to prioritise those who do this trick after a six month wait ahead of those who have spent longer in the queue. This is particularly the case for the ‘easy’ applications. 

More or less everyone, though, has their initial request to conclude refused, seemingly automatically without the request ever being seen by a case officer. 

Most them are then successful when they then appeal this refusal to the Migration court, with the Migration Agency stating on page 91 of its annual report that it lost 96 percent of such cases in 2021, 80 percent of such cases in 2022 and 77 percent of such cases in 2023.

As the Administrative Procedure Act states clearly that a decision should come within six months, the Migration Agency has in most cases a weak legal position.  

Once your request is rejected you only a short time to appeal, so it is important to act quickly, even if the agency fails to inform you that your request has been rejected. It you have heard nothing and the four weeks are up, it’s important to chase your request so you can appeal before the deadline expires. 

Even those who are rejected and don’t appeal sometimes get results, finding they are asked to submit their passport shortly afterwards. 

However, this is not always the case, so it is essential to go ahead with the appeal anyway, even if your passport is requested. 

What do people say? 

The mechanism appears to be particularly popular among British people, with one member of the Brits in Sweden Facebook page saying that “pretty much everyone has used it”, but it is also used by other groups, such as Indians in Sweden. 

One British woman said she had been informed about the rule by her case officer, and, although she was worried it might make a negative decision more likely, is glad she did so. 

“I used it as it was offered and I didn’t want to wait any longer. I thought there was nothing to lose and it didn’t cost anything, only a bit of time!” she said. 

She had her request for decision accepted, with the officer in four weeks getting back to her requesting that she send in two more forms, one documenting her relationship with an EU citizen, and another on her ability to support herself and pay for her accomodation. 

“It’s a shame they didn’t advertise it more widely and I didn’t hear about it before. as I could have got a decision earlier on my residency application and then could have applied for permanent residency much sooner,” she said. 

Another British woman said that she had decided to send in a request for a decision after she had been waiting for seven months for a decision on citizenship and her case officer told her to expect to wait as long as 36 months, despite being a simple case given that she had lived in Sweden lawfuly for five years, working throughout. 

“I knew of the request to conclude option and used it. They waited the full month before responding and rejecting it, as was expected. But the next day also assigned me a case officer and asked for my passport,” she remembers. “I believe they did this so I wouldn’t appeal their rejection and get the courts support for them to hurry up and process it.” 

Two months later, her citizenship was approved. 

An Indian man said he had used the mechanism no fewer than three times, firstly when extending a work permit, then when applying for permanent residency for a dependent, and thirdly, when applying for citizenship.

In the first case, he said, the request had been accepted on a first attempt and his work permit extension — for which he had been waiting for more than a year — was granted 28 days later.

The second request, which he made after discovering his dependent had no case officer after seven months, was rejected. They appealed, the court ruled in their favour and their case officer gave a positive decision a month later. 

Finally, in the citizenship case, the court ruled in his favour after the request was rejected, but 40 days later he is still waiting for a decision on the initial application.

Does sending in a request increase your chance of having an application rejected? 

Anecdotally, it doesn’t appear to. 

“It was a concern, yes,” the first British woman said, saying she had been told that sending in the form was “no reason to reject my application.” 

“But this is Sweden and in my opinion, even simple or clear-cut things can be a gamble,” she added. 

How does the mechanism affect handling times overall? 

While the request-to-conclude mechanism might help applicants in individual cases, the Migration Agency complains that it has been making the problem of long processing times worse by creating an addition set of processes case officers need to handle, and also by affecting the agency’s ability to prioritise. 

“The fact that many individuals request that their cases be decided is taking up a lot of resources and leading to processing times generally becoming longer, not least as many delay cases are appealed to the court,” Mikael Ribbenvik, the Migration Agency’s former Director General said when asking for the agency to be exempted from the system in April 2023. 

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