An interpreter at the doctor: when it is free and when a bill arrives

Not from your residence permit and not from your arrival. The law says it plainly: you count as resident here from your first registration in the CPR.

And it is the total time of registration that counts. If you left and came back, the periods are added up — the clock does not start over.

arrived in spring 2022 and got a CPR straight away? then the three years passed in spring 2025

You are billed for each separate occasion an interpreter was used: every consultation at a doctor, every outpatient visit to a hospital and every admission.

The price depends on two things: whether it is a doctor’s visit or an admission, and whether the interpreter was on video or came in person.

the gap between video and in person is almost double. Ask for video if it makes no difference to you

The exemptions are listed in the law and there are not many. If one of them covers you, no fee is charged — however long you have lived here.

• Your state of healththe person has lost the ability to learn or use Danish because of a physical or mental condition — temporarily or permanently
• A child on their ownthe child came to the appointment without their parents
• Parents with a childthe parents need an interpreter in connection with their child’s treatment
• LanguagesGreenlandic, Faroese, and German for the German minority in Denmark

for the first exemption the region may ask for a doctor’s certificate

This is the part almost nobody knows, and it decides whether anything can be done at all.

The doctor decides whether an interpreter is needed. That is not a decision in the legal sense — it cannot be appealed as one, and the authorities do not review the medical judgement itself.

The region decides to send the bill. That one is a full administrative decision. So the ordinary rights apply: you must be heard, the decision must be reasoned, and you must be told where to complain.

The Ombudsman examined exactly such a case and confirmed the split. What has to be established before a fee can be charged is that a specific medical assessment of the need for an interpreter was actually made.

arguing “I did not need an interpreter” gets you nowhere — asking for proof that an assessment was made does not

First look at the date of the visit and work out whether three years really had passed since your first CPR registration. A miscount is the most common reason for a bill that should not have been sent.

Then check whether an exemption covers you. If it is about your health, get a certificate from your doctor: the law expressly lets the region ask for one, so it must also accept one.

If the decision looks unfounded, write to the region that issued the bill and ask for written reasons citing the rules. This is nothing to do with the hospital or the doctor — they do not issue bills.

The simplest thing is to ask for video interpreting. It costs 191 kr. instead of 334 kr. for the same visit, and for most conversations it makes no difference.

Second: if the appointment is for your child and you as the parent are the one who needs the interpreter, that is a separate exemption and there is no fee. Say so at reception, not afterwards.

And third: the fee is charged per occasion. If several questions can be dealt with in one visit, that is cheaper than three visits in a row.

asking for an interpreter is your right; you may turn one down to save money, but then you risk not understanding your doctor