Anyone who has been legally living and working in Norway for at least twelve months is normally a member of the National Insurance Scheme. National insurance contributions are deducted from your salary/pension and entitle you to social security and health treatment under Norwegian law.

If your stay in Norway is temporary, between 3-12 months, you may apply for voluntary membership by sending an application to your local social security office. Special conditions apply to members of countries that have entered into reciprocal social security agreements with Norway, for example EEA countries. Contact your local NAV social security office for more information about National Insurance membership and contributions.

Children under the age of 12 do not pay any medical fees, and anyone under the age of 18 who requires psychological help does not have to pay any treatment fees. Fees required for children under the age of 16 may be added to the fees of a parent. If the total amount of fees exceeds the annual upper limit, the child and parent are entitled to a fee exemption card (frikort). Contact your local social security office for more information about health fees and national insurance matters.

Frikort (Exemption card)

When you have paid the patient’s charge up to a certain amount, you can obtain an exemption card. You will then be exempted from paying the patient’s charge for the rest of the calendar year. The Storting (Norwegian parliament) fixes the amount each year.

There are two kinds of exemption card. They apply to different types of service. If you have an exemption card under one scheme, you cannot use it under the other scheme.

If you are entitled to and apply for an exemption card, you will receive this directly to your home by post. NAV changed the routines in 2007, and all exemption cards under the ceiling 1 scheme are sent out by NAV centrally via A-post (first class mail). Your NAV local services office will continue to accept and process your receipts.

Patient’s charge ceiling 1

The scheme applies to patient’s charges for:
Examination and treatment by your doctor, psychologist, in an outpatient clinic and in an x-ray department
Traveling in connection with investigation and treatment
Essential medications and special medical equipment on blue prescription (prescriptions for people with chronic diseases)

Patient’s charge ceiling 2

The scheme applies to patient’s charges for:
Examination and treatment at physiotherapist
Simple kinds of dental treatment
As inpatient at publicly approved training facility
Traveling abroad for treatment under auspices of Rikshospitalet (The National Hospital of Norway)

Some expenses are not covered by the exemption card scheme, for example, bandaging expenses at the doctor’s surgery. This is called own charge. You must pay these expenses yourself even if you have an exemption card, or are exempted from paying patient’s charges. Own charges cannot be entered onto the receipt card for patient’s charges.

How do you apply for exemption cards?

When you have paid patient’s charges up to the amount limit, you can apply to NAV local services for an exemption card. Send or hand in receipts together with the receipt card for patient’s charges and the application form to your NAV local services office. For patient’s charges ceiling 1, you use the patient’s charge card when you collect patient’s charges. For patient’s charges ceiling 2, you must carefully retain the receipts.

Use patient’s charge card first

If you need the exemption card quickly, it is important that you use the patient’s charge card. This is a receipt card where the person providing treatment fills in how much patient’s charge you have paid. You obtain the card at the place of treatment. If you do not have a patient’s charge card, you must carefully retain each receipt.

It is much quicker for them to assess patient’s charges that are entered onto the card and stamped by a pharmacist or doctor than to deal with cases where there are loose bills and receipts. This often results in the case officer having to ring the pharmacist or doctor to verify whether the receipts relate to approved patient’s charges. You will therefore get your exemption card quicker if you use the patient’s charge card when you go for treatment.

You don’t need to go in

You can send in your patient’s charge card or receipts by post. You can print out the application form (05-03.06) or get it at your NAV local services office. It is important that you provide full details on the application form. The exemption card will be sent to you by A-post (first class mail) from NAV centrally the day after your application has been processed at your NAV local services office. The more accurately the form is filled in, the quicker it will be processed. If it is granted, the exemption card will arrive in the post.

Hand in receipts on time

It is important that you do not wait too long before contacting your NAV local services office to obtain the exemption card. Once you have reached the patient’s charges ceiling, you have a time limit of six months to submit a claim for a refund. The time limit is taken from the date the treatment or service that gave rise to the patient’s charges was provided.

You will get back the money you have paid

If you have paid patient’s charges over and above the charges ceiling, the excess amount will be refunded to your account. At the same time, NAV will post your exemption card to you at home. NAV local services cannot pay sums under NOK 50. If you have several amounts under NOK 50 to be refunded, you can add them together and have them paid.

Remember your exemption card when you go for treatment! You must always have your exemption card with you if you want to avoid paying the patient’s charge. If you haven’t got your exemption card with you, you will have to pay the patient’s charge in the normal way and then have it refunded. You then use the same application form that you used when you first applied for the exemption card (NAV 05-03.06), but then put an X in the box, “Outlay after I applied for exemption card.”