Charge check for preschool and leisure-time center

It is the responsibility of custodians to give us correct information about their income and family situation so that every household pays the correct charge for preschool­/leisure-time centre.

The charge is based on the household´s total income, irrespective of whether the custodians have joint children or not. By doing the check, we ensure that everyone pays the correct charge. It is a matter of both fairness and security that all families are treated equally and pay the proper charge according to the prevailing rate. For us, it is just as important to pay back money as to demand more money.

We retrieve information from the Swedish tax office, Skatteverket, on the annual incomes of 2016. Then we divide your annual income by 12, thereby calculating a monthly income. That is then compared with the income you declared to the municipality. If these amounts are not the same, that means the charge has either been too high or too low. Then we recalculate the charge and work out the amount that you should have paid. Amounts lower than SEK 600 for the whole of 2016 will not be invoiced nor paid back.

The decision to introduce a charge check was taken at the Children and Education Board´s meeting on 20 November 2013.

This is the most recent information that the Swedish tax office, Skatteverket, can provide. Their information is based on what you declared in May 2016 and then it takes time for Skatteverket to work out people´s final tax assessment. Moreover, we need time to check our own information. Some families had their charges adjusted in 2016 or in early 2017, after consultation with their placement case officer. That information is in our finance system and it must be processed with the charge check. 

No, it is the responsibility of the custodians to provide correct information on income and family situation so that the household pays the correct charge for preschool/­leisure-time centre.

Unfortunately, for technical reasons we cannot link the amount from the charge check with the ordinary charge for preschool/leisure-time centre. Moreover, the situation of the family in question may not be the same as it was in 2016.

We will send out the invoices in batches. The check has been conducted on the basis of the bill-payer´s month of birth (not the child´s). The bill-payers who were born in January and February will be the first to receive their bills.

The bill must be paid within 60 days.

Contact Customer Service (Kundcenter) at avgiftskontroll@ostersund.se or 063-14 30 00.

If you cannot pay the whole bill at once, you can apply for deferment. Payment can be deferred for maximum one year from the date of payment. The deferment period may vary depending on how large the amount is.

You can choose whether you want to make a payment every month during the period of deferment or whether you pay the entire amount all in one go before the date of payment.

If the bill is not paid within the stated time, after one reminder the matter will be sent to the debt collectors Inkasso.

If you want to contest a bill, you must submit a written contestation within a month from the date of the bill. State clearly what it is you are contesting.
Contact us by email to avgiftskontroll@ostersund.se or by letter to Östersunds kommun, Barn-och utbildningsförvaltningen, 831 82 Östersund.

Our municipality has chosen not to apply any suspension rule in conjunction with the charge check. However, any unpaid bill will be sent to the debt collectors Inkasso after one reminder.

Yes, there will be the normal additional interest charges and administration fees.

The most common error is that you have not submitted an up-to-date income to the placement case officers.

Another common cause of error is that people do not include all their taxable incomes in their monthly income. Many bill-payers have not declared their family situation in the way our rules require. The income of a cohabiting adult is included when calculating the childcare charge, even if that person is not the parent of your child.

By income we mean all received money that is taxed, for instance, income from employment (including overtime and extra pay for inconvenient hours), parental allowance, sickness allowance etc.

The following are examples of received money that is not counted as income: study allowance, social allowance, other types of allowances, introduction allowance for refugees, allowances under the Assistance to Asylumseekers Act, etc.

If you lived together during the year in question, you are both responsible for ensuring the bill is paid. This means it is not necessarily the person who has received the bill who has to pay the entire amount himself/herself.

We have a very heavy workload during the period when the bills are sent out. The processing time may be up to four weeks. We deal with the cases in the order we receive them. It may also be difficult to reach us on the phone during this period.

When you contact us via email, you will receive an automatic reply as a receipt that your email has been received. If you have not received an automatic reply by the following day, please send your email again.