Adopter

Leave before the expected reception of the child must be notified to the immediate manager as early as possible. 

If the child is received in Denmark, you are entitled to paid leave for up to 1 week before reception (in certain cases, the period can be extended to 2 weeks by the municipality). However, this does not apply if the child is already staying in your home or you are staying at the place where the child is. The day on which the child is brought home is included in the period before reception.

If the child is received abroad, you are entitled to paid leave for up to 4 weeks before reception (in certain cases, the period can be extended by up to 4 weeks if the reception of the child is delayed and the extension is not due to the adopters’ circumstances). The leave is calculated from the day you leave Denmark to pick up the child and lasts until the day when the formal conditions for taking the child home to Denmark are met. After this, the ordinary adoption leave begins, regardless of whether you travel to Denmark immediately after reception or whether you stay abroad for a while thereafter. 

Families where the parents live together upon receipt of the child are each generally entitled to 24 weeks of leave with maternity benefit after receipt of the child. The leave is structured as follows:

• The first 6 weeks of leave must be taken within the first 10 weeks after receipt of the child (the period of maternity leave). You are only allowed to take 2 of the weeks at the same time as the other parent. The 2 weeks cannot be transferred to the other parent. The 4 weeks can be transferred to the other parent.
• Each parent then has 18 weeks of parental leave to be taken within the first year of receiving the child. 9 of the weeks cannot be transferred when you are an employee. They are therefore earmarked for each parent. The other 9 weeks can be transferred to the other parent. Please note that there is a right to parental leave of up to 32 weeks, but only 18 weeks with maternity benefits. 

You can only transfer leave to the other parent once your child has been received. In addition, both of you must be registered as parents before you can transfer leave to each other.

Leave of absence if you are living together at the time of receipt of the child:

• 2 weeks of leave upon receipt – non-transferable.
• 4 weeks of leave – transferable.
• 18 weeks of leave – of which 9 weeks can be transferred when you are an employee.

As a rule, the transferred leave must be taken within 1 year after the birth of the child. The leave can be extended or postponed until the child’s ninth birthday.

The transfer of leave takes place via the website borger.dk, and a copy of the transfer must be sent to Vivi Madsen at SDU Human Resource Services, the Staff Office. 

If you as parents do not live together at the time of receiving the child, the leave is distributed differently.

The leave of the parent with whom the child lives:

• 24 weeks of leave, of which the first 6 weeks must be held within the first 10 weeks after receipt of the child, and 18 weeks to be held within the first year after receipt of the child.
• In addition, 13 additional weeks of leave are granted, which must be held within the first year after receipt of the child. The parent can choose to transfer up to 13 weeks of leave to the other parent, as well as postpone or extend the weeks until 9 years after receipt of the child, provided the necessary conditions are met. 
• If the parent the child lives with also has sole custody or gets sole custody of the child within 1 year of receipt, the parent can apply to Udbetaling Danmark for an additional 9 weeks of leave with maternity/paternity benefit. You can apply for the extra 9 weeks of leave with maternity/paternity benefit at the earliest 5 weeks after receiving the child. 

The leave of the parent with whom the child does not live:

• 6 weeks of leave, which must be taken within the first 10 weeks after receiving the child.
• 9 weeks of leave, which must be held before the child’s first birthday. The 9 weeks of leave cannot be transferred to the other parent when you are an employee. 

The adopters’ right to pay is distributed as follows: 

1. Adopters are collectively entitled to pay during leave for the first 10 weeks after receipt of the child. 
2. In addition, adopters are entitled to pay for 23 weeks, which are distributed as follows:

• 6 weeks with pay for the one adopter 
• 7 weeks with pay for the other adopter (if the adopters do not have the same sex, the right to the 7 weeks belongs to the male adopter) 
• 10 weeks with pay that you can divide between yourselves as you see fit

Please note that it is your own duty to apply for maternity/paternity benefits. SDU does not handle this for you. However, SDU reports to Udbetaling Danmark when your leave ends, after which Udbetaling Danmark will send you a ‘request for maternity benefit’ via your e-Boks account. Please note that any paid weeks from SDU are deducted from your weeks with maternity pay.

You are entitled to full pay during the periods mentioned above if you are also entitled to maternity/paternity benefits. The right to pay under the maternity/paternity agreement is conditional on the employer being able to receive the full maternity/paternity benefits reimbursement.  

Although the right to maternity/paternity benefit during the period of parental leave does not exceed 18 weeks, there is, as previously stated, a right to 32 weeks of parental leave. You can choose to extend your parental leave from 32 weeks to 40 or 46 weeks. 

If you make use of the opportunity to extend your leave, the entire leave must be taken consecutively. 

 As an adopter, you can postpone up to 5 weeks of your leave.

Even if you are entitled to more leave or been granted leave from the other parent, you cannot postpone more than 5 weeks of leave without agreement with your manager. 

The postponed leave must be taken after 1 year after the child has been received. The leave must be taken coherently and before the child’s 9th birthday. Postponed leave can be taken with a notice period of 8 weeks.

However, it is also possible to make an agreement locally with your manager on postponing a different number of weeks of leave (maximum 13 weeks). In this case, too, the postponed leave must be taken before the child’s 9th birthday, and as per agreement or with a notice period of 16 weeks. An agreement-based postponement of leave can only be used at SDU.