If you have been self-employed, you may be eligible for unemployment benefit:

• if you have completely ceased working with your own business, or
  
  
• if you have temporarily ceased working with your own business.

In order to assess whether your business has been completely closed down or if it has merely been temporarily suspended, we will perform a comprehensive assessment of your overall situation and no business activity may be carried out during this time.

A business does not need to be completely closed down for you, as an entrepreneur, to be eligible to receive unemployment benefits, but it is essential that no activities are carried out in the company. Normally, you can suspend activity in your company as many times as you wish, but the condition is that at least five years have passed since you last resumed operations in the company. The most important thing is that you are available to the employment market without restrictions.

According to a temporary rule that applies from the 13th April 2020 you can suspend activity in your company several times in the years 2020 and 2021 without this having any effect on the benefit.

From the 1st of June 2021, you can also market your business to a certain extent without it affecting the right to benefits. The government wants to make it easier for entrepreneurs to start up their businesses more quickly now when society is reopening again.

Unemployment benefits are not intended as financial support for the start of a new company and are not to be seen as a way of supplementing income in struggling companies. 

The daily allowance (unemployment benefit) is based on the income stated on your most recent tax declaration or, if more favorable, on the average income earned for the two years immediately preceding the latest tax year. The income you have received before you became a member of an unemployment insurance fund, or began subscribing to Alfa-kassan, may not be taken into account in the calculation of your unemployment benefits. 

For more information on how to apply for unemployment benefits read here.