Report concern to child welfare services

Here you can send a digital report of concern both as a non-professional and as an employee with an obligation to report.

Call if it is urgent

If you send a digital report of concern from this page, it may take a few days before child welfare services read it. Contact the police or child welfare services directly if the matter is urgent.

Send report of concern

Reports of concern must be sent to the municipality in which the child resides.

Where does the child you are concerned about live?

If you do not know where the child lives, you can select the municipality the child was in when you saw or heard about the matter that gave rise to your concern.

Select county Optional

Select municipality

Important information to know before you submit a report of concern

There are differences between reporting a concern as a non-professional and as an employee in terms of duties, content of the report, and follow-up of the report

Submit a report of concern to child welfare services as a non-professional

If you are unsure whether a child is receiving adequate care, you should report this to child welfare services

Are you are unsure whether a child is receiving adequate care?

If you have concerns about a child’s care situation, you should report your concern to child welfare services. You do not have to be certain that something is wrong.

It is the responsibility of child welfare services to determine whether the child and their family need help. Your responsibility is to make sure that child welfare services hear about children and youths who may be having problems.

Most children and families who get help from child welfare services, get this help at home. Care orders are only issued in the most severe cases.

If you are not sure if submitting a report is the right thing to do and you need some advice, you can call the local child welfare service to anonymously discuss your concerns. You can find contact information for your local child welfare service on the website barnevernvakten.no.

Do you wish to remain anonymous?

You cannot remain anonymous when you submit a report of concern using the digital solution. Child welfare services will be able to know your name.

In most cases, child welfare services will tell the family who has reported the concern, even if you prefer to remain anonymous. It is easier for child welfare services to do a good job when they can talk to the family about who is concerned and why

If you want to learn more about what not being anonymous means for you, please call your local child welfare service.

If you would like to report a concern anonymously, you can call or send a letter without revealing who you are. If you would like to send a letter, you can download and fill out a hardcopy form for submitting a report of concern as a non-professional.

Would you like to be informed about the continued process when you submit a report of concern?

Child welfare services in the municipality where the child lives will follow up on your report of concern.

Child welfare services will decide what happens after you submit your report
When you have submitted your report of concern, child welfare services will consider it and decide either to follow up with an investigation, or to drop it. Child welfare services must decide this within one week of receiving your report of concern. Most reports of concern lead to an investigation.
You will receive a confirmation that your report has been received
If you include your address in the report, you will receive a confirmation from child welfare services that they have received your report within three weeks.
Child welfare services may contact you
Child welfare services may contact you for more information.
Help for the family
By investigating, child welfare services determine whether the child and their family need help, and if so, which kind of help the child and their family need. Child welfare services are bound by confidentiality, so you will not receive any information about how child welfare services follow up on the child and their family.

What should you write in a report of concern?

In your report of concern, you should describe what you have seen or heard to make you concerned.

Write something about

what happened
when it happened
where it happened
who was involved

Please also specify other matters that give rise to concern.

Please be aware that the family will often see the report. Do not provide more information than what you wish to disclose.

Report a concern as an employee

Public sector employees and other professionals bound by confidentiality may have an obligation to report their concerns to the local child welfare services.

Who has an obligation to report their concerns?

The obligation to report applies to

employees of public bodies and services
employees of organizations or private businesses performing services on behalf of the public sector
occupational groups such as psychologists, nurses, dentists, midwives, physical therapists, employees of family counselling offices and marriage counsellors

When does the obligation to report apply?

All public sector employees and a wide range of professionals are bound by profession-specific confidentiality obligations. The obligation to report overrides these confidentiality obligations when one or more of the conditions of the Child Welfare Act have been met.

The obligation to report applies when you have reason to believe

that a child is or is at risk of being abused or subjected to serious deficiencies in everyday care or other severe neglect
that a child is suffering from a life-threatening or other serious illness or injury and is not receiving medical examination or treatment
that a child with a disability or special need of help is not receiving the treatment and training required
reason to believe that a child is being or will be exploited for human trafficking
when a child is demonstrating severe behavioural problems in the form of severe or repeated crime, abuse of drugs or alcohol or other forms of distinct normless behaviour

You can read more about the obligation to report in the Child Welfare Act and circular on guidelines for administrative processing .

You have a personal responsibility to uphold your obligations in terms of both confidentiality and reporting your concerns. Your place of work may have procedures in place, where your closest superior or someone else is the one who will formally submit the report. Even so, you have a personal obligation to make sure child welfare services are informed

If the parents grant their consent, you can send the report of concern even if the conditions for an obligation to report are not satisfied.

Does your report of concern involve circumstances of a very serious nature?

If the concern pertains to very serious matters, such as violence or sexual abuse, you should contact child welfare services to discuss how to proceed.

Call child welfare services before potentially informing the child's guardian(s) that you have sent a report of concern.

How do I know that the report of concern has been received?

The child welfare services will send a response within three weeks. We encourage you to contact the child welfare services if you do not receive a response by this deadline.

When submitting your report of concern from this website, you will receive a receipt with a reference number that you can use when in contact with child welfare services.

Telephone number when the matter is urgent

Call the police emergency number if you require immediate help. If you are unsure, you can call the police switchboard or barnevernsvakten (emergency child welfare duty service).

Call the police

Switchboard: 02800
Emergency number: 112

Call barnevernsvakt (emergency child welfare duty service)

The number of your local barnevernsvakt (emergency child welfare duty service) can be found at Barnevernsvakten.

You can also call Alarmtelefonen (emergency telephone number) for children and youths på 116 111.