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Moving house as a firearm owner: the SAPS 521(b)

It is a small form, and forgetting it causes disproportionate trouble — starting with SAPS correspondence about your renewal going to a house you no longer live in.

You must tell SAPS when you move

A firearm owner's address is not just contact information. It determines which SAPS station holds your file, which Designated Firearm Officer deals with you, and where your safe is supposed to be. When you move, all three change, and SAPS has to be told on the SAPS 521(b) — change of address.

Why it matters more than it looks

• Correspondence goes to the old address. Including anything about a pending application or a renewal. This is a common route into an expired licence.
• Your file is at the wrong station. When you go to lodge a renewal at your new local station, your history is somewhere else.
• Your safe is registered at an address you have left. If an inspection happens, the firearm is not where SAPS's records say it is.
• Your motivation no longer matches reality. A Section 13 motivation built around the conditions in one suburb does not describe your circumstances in another.

When to lodge it

As soon as you have moved — do not wait for the next renewal to mention it. Take it to the SAPS station serving your new address, and ask them to confirm your file is transferred.

Find the SAPS office for your new address →

What you need

• The completed SAPS 521(b).
• Certified copy of your ID.
• Proof of your new residential address.
• Certified copies of the licences affected.
• Details of the safe at the new address — it must be installed and properly fixed there. Safe storage requirements →

The SAPS 521(c) — change of circumstances

The 521(b)'s sibling. Where the 521(b) handles a move, the SAPS 521(c) notifies SAPS of a change in your circumstances — the kind of change that is relevant to whether you should hold a firearm, or that affects the basis on which a licence was granted.

If something material has changed since your licence was issued, notifying it on a 521(c) is far better than SAPS discovering it at your next renewal.

Get a receipt

As with everything else at a SAPS firearm office: get an acknowledgement, photograph it, and keep it. If the change never gets captured, that receipt is your proof you notified them.

This is general information about South African firearm law and SAPS procedure, not legal advice, and we are not SAPS. Where your situation is unusual — a past conviction, a pending case, a firearm inherited from a deceased estate — speak to a firearms attorney.

Frequently asked questions