Rights and obligations , format: Article, area: Integration

This content is also available in

Rights

You have the right in general terms to freely choose a course provider in your area. If however the Federal Office allocates you to a specific integration course because of an exising obligation to attend a course, this allocation is binding. Even if you are entitled to attend an integration course but not obliged to do so, the Federal Office may refer you to a specific integration course and instruct you to attend it.

Tip

If you pass the final examination within two years of receiving the attendance certificate, you can have half the money that you paid for the course refunded.

If you register for a course, the course provider is obliged to confirm the likely commencement date of the course. The course should start at the latest within six weeks of you registering for the course. The course provider is obliged to inform you if there is no course starting within this six-week period.

If there is no course starting within six weeks of registration or allocation, the Federal Office is to allocate individuals who are obliged to attend a course to a different course provider with an apppropriate course. The Federal Office may refer individuals who are entitled to attend a course to another course provider with an apppropriate course.

During the course, you are entitled to:

  • regular instruction,
  • well-trained teachers, and
  • well-equipped classrooms.

You also have the right to receive a certificate if you attend lessons regularly.

Obligations

Important information

Your entitlement to attend an integration course will expire if you do not start an integration course at the latest one year after registering with the course provider, or if you interrupt your attendance at the course for more than one year, and you are responsible for these delays.

If you are required to attend a course and the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees has assigned you to a course provider, you are obliged to comply with this instruction to attend the course.

Your obligations also include properly attending the lessons. "Properly" means that you come to the lessons on a regular basis and also sit the final examination.

It is important for you to not delay registering for an integration course. You must also pay a contribution towards the costs before the each stage of the course starts, unless you are exempt from paying the costs. If you do not come to classes, you are nevertheless obliged to pay for the current stage of the course as a rule.

It is also important to apply for the exemption in good time before the course starts. Exemption is only retrospectively possible for the first course module. In higher modules, the cost exemption is only granted from the course section following the time of application.

Contacts

You can obtain further information in your area from:

  • the Youth Migration Services and Migration Advice Service for Adult Immigrants,
  • the Office for Integration or the municipality's intercultural office,
  • cultural centres,
  • language schools and Universities, and
  • the Employment Agency and Job Centres.