You can be granted a residence permit as a seasonal worker to work in seasonal activities or to replace an employee in connection with ordinary holidays. Examples of seasonal work include work in agriculture and forestry.
Who can be granted a residence permit as a seasonal worker?
- You must have turned 18.
- You must have received a concrete offer of employment. The offer of employment is concrete if it contains a description of your position, the number of hours you will be working per week and your hourly wage in NOK, as well as the duration of the offer.
- It must also be probable that you will return to your home country at the end of your stay, and circumstances in your home country must indicate that you will be able to return.
There are no requirements for formal qualifications.
Working relationship requirements
- As a rule, the work concerned must be continuous full-time employment, but it can be divided between several employment offers from the same or different employers.
- The pay and working conditions must comply with the current collective agreement or pay scale for the industry. If no such collective wage agreement or pay scale exists, the pay and working conditions must not be poorer than is normal for the occupation and place concerned. You must be guaranteed a minimum hourly wage.
- The Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV) must consent to a permit being granted. NAV assesses, among other things, whether the position can be filled by domestic labour or labour from the EEA area, and whether the pay and working conditions are adequate.
- You must be guaranteed accommodation during the period that the application covers.
What are seasonal activities?
Seasonal activities are work that can only be carried out during a limited part of the year. Such work includes harvesting in agriculture or work in forestry, fish processing industry, nurseries, and the restaurant and tourism industries.
Odd jobs such as carpentry, painting and other maintenance and restoration work is not considered seasonal work.
What are ordinary holidays?
In most enterprises, the employees take most of their ordinary holidays within a main holiday period between 1 June and 30 September. However, a seasonal worker’s residence permit is not limited to this period. The decisive factor is that the employer actually needs to replace an employee during the holidays, and that this is made clear in the application.
How to apply
As a rule, you submit the application form to the Norwegian embassy or consulate in your home country or in the country where you have held a residence permit for the past six months. The form used is both an application and an employment offer form. You will receive an answer to your application from the embassy or consulate or through the person you have authorised in Norway, if applicable.
You can also apply for a seasonal worker permit from Norway if you have legal residence here. You have legal residence if you are not subject to a visa requirement to enter Norway or if you hold a tourist visa or a permit in Norway or another Schengen country.
You cannot apply for a permit from Norway if you are staying in the country in connection with an application for asylum or are awaiting return to your home country following the rejection of your asylum application.
Your employer can apply on your behalf
Your employer can apply for a residence permit on your behalf if you authorise him/her in writing to do so. You must complete the authorisation section of the application form or submit the authorisation form. Your employer submits the application to the police in the place where the employer has his or her registered business address.
The form used for this application is both an application and an employment offer form.
Special rules for applications for work in agriculture and forestry
Special simplified rules apply to those who apply for short-term seasonal work in agriculture or forestry. However, these rules do not apply if you are staying abroad and need a visa to enter Norway.
As an employee, you must be covered by the quota for seasonal work in agriculture and forestry. If the quota has been filled, if there is no set quota of if you apply for work in other seasonal industries, then the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV) must assess whether the position can be filled by Norwegian labour or labour from the EEA area before a seasonal worker permit can be granted.
What must be enclosed with the application?
You must enclose the following with your application form:
If you are seeking work in agriculture or forestry, you must enclose
- a copy of a valid travel document (usually a passport)
- the form application and offer for short-term seasonal work in agriculture and forestry
- documentation that you have accommodation during the period covered by the application
- a translation of the documents into Norwegian or English
- documentation that you have paid the application fee
If you enclose copies of documents with your application, you must present the original documents when you hand in your application.
How long will it take to process the application?
See the list of the UDI’s expected case processing times at www.udi.no/caseprocessingtime.
Residence permits during application processing
You may not start working until you have received your permit. However,the police may issue a residence permit during case processing if they expect your application to be granted. This will not be done automatically; you must ask the police for such a permit.
The content of the permit
You can be granted a residence permit for seasonal work for up to six months. The six months can be divided between several permits for one and the same or several different employers. If you want to change employers after your permit has been granted, you have to apply again.
The permit does not form the basis for a permanent residence permit or family immigration.
Can you renew the permit?
Seasonal work permits are not renewable. However, if you have been granted a permit for less than six months, you can apply to extend the permit to cover a total of six months. You must apply for an extension before your current permit expires. Use the same application form as for first-time application and submit the application to your local police district. Renewal applications are subject to an application fee.
If you are repeatedly granted new permits for periods shorter than six months, the total period of residence cannot exceed six months during a twelve-month period beginning on the date when the first seasonal worker permit came into force.
If you have had a residence permit as a seasonal worker for six months, you cannot be granted a new permit of this type until you have stayed outside Norway for six months.
You can appeal a rejection
Read more about how to appeal a decision on www.udi.no/appeals.
Further information
If you have further questions about this topic, contact your nearest Norwegian embassy or consulate, the nearest police district or UDI's Information Service.
