Complaint brought against the Swedish Public Employment Service for requiring an individual to provide their personal identity number in order to be sent public documents

Summary of the decision: After an individual requested copies of public documents to be sent to him, the Swedish Public Employment Service informed the individual that he needed to provide his personal identity number for the authority to be able to charge him for the copies and then send them to him.

The Parliamentary Ombudsman notes that an authority that is to charge for copies of public documents normally needs particular information, for example a personal identity number, in order to be able to administer the charge and send the copies to the individual. This means that an individual who would like copies of the public documents to be sent to them must understand that this usually means they will need to provide information which will lead to a waiver of anonymity. However, there must be no ambiguity that could make the individual think, wrongly, that providing the requested information is a condition for them having access to the documents. It must be made clear that the requirement is solely as a result of the individual’s request to have the documents sent to them and to enable the authority to invoice the fee. If the individual chooses not to waive their anonymity, he or she needs to visit the authority to pay for the requested copies there. The Parliamentary Ombudsman emphasises that the authority must inform the individual of the situation and why the information is needed and requested, and that there are alternatives in the event that he or she does not wish to provide the information. The authority must provide the information about alternative ways of paying at the same time as informing the individual that they will be charged a fee for copies.