Parental leave as a job seeker
This guide covers you when you're between jobs as parental leave starts, or you lose your job during leave. The number of days isn't the question here, all 480 are still yours, but the rate they're paid at is.
What sets the rate is whether your SGI is protected. When your employment ends, SGI is automatically protected for three months (provided you worked at least six months before). To keep the protection after that, you need to be registered with Arbetsförmedlingen and actively job-seeking. The safest path is to register the same day the job ends, so you never sit in a gap. If protection lapses you drop to grundnivå, often hundreds of kronor lower per day.
SGI protection starts at Arbetsförmedlingen
When your employment ends, SGI is automatically protected for three months, provided you worked at least six months before. To keep protection after those three months you need to be registered with Arbetsförmedlingen and actively job-seeking under their plan. The safest path is to register the same day the job ends, so you never sit in a gap. While protection is in place, your SGI is treated as if you still had the salary from your last job, and parental benefit is the same as for an employee at that salary.
Sjukpenningnivå or grundnivå
With SGI protected you get 77.6 % of SGI per claim day, the same as if employed. Without SGI you fall to grundnivå, 250 SEK/day. This is not the same as lägstanivå (180 SEK/day) that everyone gets for the final 90 days. Grundnivå applies when the SGI basis is gone entirely, for example because you didn't register in time or don't meet the 240-day rule for the first 180 days.
Parental benefit and a-kassa
You can't claim a-kassa and parental benefit for the same day, but you can switch between them across different days or periods. Parental-benefit days don't count toward a-kassa's 300-day cap, which sometimes makes parental leave a way to preserve a-kassa ahead of a longer stretch of unemployment. Run the numbers for your specific situation, the rules around which days count are detailed.
Frequently asked questions
When your employment ends, SGI is automatically protected for three months if you worked at least six months before. Within that window you need to be registered with Arbetsförmedlingen and actively job-seeking for protection to continue afterwards. Safest path: register the same day or the day after the job ends, so you never sit in a gap.
Grundnivå is 250 SEK/day and applies when the SGI basis is missing, for example if you don't meet the 240-day rule or have lost SGI protection. Lägstanivå is 180 SEK/day and applies to the final 90 of the 480 days regardless of income. Two different rules covering different parts of the leave, and easy to mix up.
Yes. Days you claim are consumed from your 480 parental-benefit days per child as normal. Being a job seeker only affects the rate at which they're paid, not how many remain.
Not for the same day. Days you claim parental benefit don't count toward a-kassa's 300-day cap, and time on parental benefit also counts as överhoppningsbar tid, which extends a-kassa's qualifying window (ramtid). That sometimes lets parental benefit push the a-kassa exhaustion date further out. Check with Försäkringskassan and your a-kassa before planning your leave, so no days collide.
If you've been registered with Arbetsförmedlingen and actively job-seeking the whole time, SGI protection may still be intact even after a long stretch without income. If you've had gaps without protective activity (sickness, CSN-funded studies, and earlier parental leave all count as protective), there's a real risk SGI has dropped to zero, leaving grundnivå. Contact Försäkringskassan to get your current SGI calculated.