Sweden’s unemployment fund payment system down after software update

Sweden’s unemployment insurance funds have been inaccessible since Monday following a system failure caused by a major software update last week, SVT Nyheter reports. Payments to claimants risk being delayed as a result.

All of Sweden’s unemployment funds, known as a-kassor, share the same technical system and are therefore all affected by the outage. As of now, members have been unable to submit claims for benefits.

Annika Stenberg, head of communications at Akademikernas a-kassa, one of the country’s unemployment funds, said there is currently no forecast for when the problem will be resolved. However, she sought to reassure members that they would not have to wait a full month for payment.

“Most of the funds have the ability to bring forward the payment to the coming Thursday,” she said.

Approximately four million people in Sweden are members of an unemployment fund, according to Sveriges a-kassor, the national organisation representing the funds.