diff --git a/debian/ngcp-sems.dirs b/debian/ngcp-sems.dirs
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..c93bdb81
--- /dev/null
+++ b/debian/ngcp-sems.dirs
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+var/cache/sems
+var/cache/sems/audio_cache
+var/cache/sems/callingcard
diff --git a/debian/sems.default b/debian/sems.default
index 37cd0676..edec1c43 100644
--- a/debian/sems.default
+++ b/debian/sems.default
@@ -35,3 +35,5 @@ SEMS_CREATE_CORE="yes"
 SEMS_COREDIR="/var/cores"
 #DEBCONF-COREDIR-END
 
+SEMS_CACHEDIR="/var/cache/sems"
+SEMS_CACHEDIR_EXTRADIRS="audio_cache callingcard"
diff --git a/debian/sems.init b/debian/sems.init
index 1860a535..91058c8d 100644
--- a/debian/sems.init
+++ b/debian/sems.init
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@
 # Short-Description: Start/stop SEMS Application Server
 ### END INIT INFO
 
+SEMS_CACHEDIR="/var/cache/sems"
 
 # read configuration from /etc/default/sems file
 if test -f /etc/default/sems ; then
@@ -28,6 +29,21 @@ DESC=sems
 
 PARAMS=""
 
+if ! test -d $SEMS_CACHEDIR ; then
+	mkdir -p $SEMS_CACHEDIR
+fi
+
+for dir in $SEMS_CACHEDIR_EXTRADIRS ; do
+	if ! test -d ${SEMS_CACHEDIR}/${dir} ; then
+		mkdir -p ${SEMS_CACHEDIR}/${dir}
+	fi
+done
+
+if ! test -d $SEMS_RUNDIR ; then
+   mkdir -p $SEMS_RUNDIR
+fi
+chown -R $SEMS_USER:$SEMS_GROUP $SEMS_RUNDIR $SEMS_CACHEDIR
+
 if test "$SEMS_PIDFILE" ; then
   PARAMS="$PARAMS -P $SEMS_PIDFILE"
 fi