What a change! The government is proposing changes to the registration obligation – revolutionary
Which address is most important: residence, registered office or correspondence? Nobody knows that. The government wants to leave only one of them.
This is one of the regulations that best shows the spirit of Poles: everyone is obliged to register permanently or temporarily, but if they do not do so, they are not punished. Why? The provisions of the Code of Petty Offenses providing for sanctions were abolished in 2013.
What did Poles gain from this? Chaos. Although living without registration is inconsistent with the Population Registration Act, it is also legally tolerated. Moreover, the lack of registration does not constitute grounds for eviction or deprives the rights to the premises, but it is difficult to enroll a child in kindergarten, receive PLN 800 plus or settle personal income tax without registration.
It is also not known which address is valid and for whom: registration, residence, or maybe the one for correspondence? Offices often want all three, just to be on the safe side.
Offices are committed to registration. However, changes are coming
Although Donald Tusk has already announced the abolition of the report once. The government of the PO-PSL coalition recorded its abolition in the Population Registration Act of 2010, setting the deadline for 2014 and later moving it to January 1, 2016. The condition was to be the implementation of modern IT systems. Fears of paralysis of offices meant that in July 2015, the next government postponed the liquidation deadline again – this time to January 1, 2018.
Concerns were raised by courts, prosecutors’ offices, the police and the army, pointing to potential problems with the delivery of summonses and official letters. Local governments also faced a challenge, for which registration is the basis for verifying the number of inhabitants, planning places in schools and kindergartens, and organizing elections. Finally, the Ministry of the Interior and Administration recognized the report as a key element of state security and administrative order. And the matter died.
Years later, almost the same team of politicians wants new changes.
Residential address associated with the PESEL number. The end of the address fiction
This time, the Ministry of the Interior and Administration (MSWiA) is working on abandoning the registered address and delivery address in favor of a single, declared address of residence entered directly in the PESEL register.
According to the ministry’s announcement, reporting the address of residence will be possible via the mObywatel application. The data will automatically update in all official registers.
Thanks to this, local governments will learn the real number and age of their inhabitants, which will facilitate the construction of schools, kindergartens and public transport lines, and offices will no longer send official letters to old, outdated addresses.
