Before extending your business to Finland
When you plan to expand your company's operations to Finland, know your mandatory obligations and related financial costs.
Before your company's operations start in Finland:
- name a representative for your company in Finland or start a new company in Finland
- learn about Finnish taxation
- notify the Finnish Occupational Safety and Health Authority of your posted employees in Finland
- if your company acts as a subcontractor of another company or leases its employees to another company, submit reports to the other party in the agreement in accordance with the Contractor's Liability Act
Before your employees start work in Finland:
- make sure that all your employees have the right to work in Finland
- know the tax obligations of your business
- find out the country or countries where you should pay your employees’ social insurance premiums
- make an employment contract with your posted employees
- ensure yours employees' occupational safety and arrange their health care.
Posting employees to Finland
Name a representative for your company in Finland. The representative must be available to your posted employees and the authorities throughout the period posting to Finland. The representative will also ensure that the information related to your company and your employees is available to the authorities. You must give the representative the authority to act on behalf of your company.
You must notify the Finnish Occupational Safety and Health Authority when you post employees to Finland. Notify the authority as soon as you have signed the posting agreement with your employees. You must take the notification before your employees begin to work in Finland as stated in their employment contracts.
Setting up a company in Finland
If you want to set up a new company in Finland, read the following instructions:
Do not send your employees to work in Finland before you know the answers to the following:
- Is your enterprise treated as having a permanent establishment in Finland?
- Will your enterprise need to have a Finnish prepayment registration, or is it enough to just have a tax-at-source card?
- Is it necessary for your enterprise to be on the register of employers or the VAT register in Finland?
- What reporting method will you use when sending your payroll reporting to Finland’s Incomes Register?
- What kind of e-file service will you handle your taxes with?
If people from your enterprise arrive in Finland to perform work under a contract, see the Foreign business in Finland pages (the Tax Administration)Opens in a new window..
If you conduct business in the construction sector, you must submit a request to the Tax Administration for tax numbers for every individual you send to Finland as a “posted employee”. Construction workers cannot carry out work on any Finnish site unless they have been issued a tax number. Read more about tax numbers (the Tax Administration).Opens in a new window.
Citizens of the Nordic countries, the Member States of the European Union, Liechtenstein or Switzerland will never have to apply for a separate residence permit in Finland if they come to the country for work. They can work in Finland for three months without official permits or registration. However, they must have a valid identity card or passport.
If your employees are in Finland for more than three months, they must register their right of residence in Finland.
- Your employees need a residence permit if they are a citizen of a country other than a Nordic country, an EU country, Liechtenstein or Switzerland. In few special cases, the employee may start working before the residence permit has been issued. Read more about working as a foreigner in Finland (Finnish Immigration Service).Opens in a new window.
- Your employee can apply for a permit in the Finnish Immigration Service's online service. Make sure that each employee applies for a residence permit personally before entering Finland.
- As an employer, you can monitor the status of your employee's residence permit application in the Finnish Immigration Service's online service. You can also submit documents and pay processing fees on behalf of your employee. Ask your employee to show their residence permit card. The residence permit card also shows what kind of work your employee can do and how many hours a week.
Go to the Finnish Immigration online service.Opens in a new window.
Please note that if your employee does not have the right to work in Finland, you as an employer may be guilty of an offence or a crime.
Make sure that your employee has the required insurance in place from their first day of work.
You must pay the following statutory social insurance contributions for your employee working in Finland:
- earnings-related pension contributions
- workers’ compensation insurance contributions
- unemployment insurance contributions
- social and health insurance contributions
As a rule, you must pay the social insurance contributions to the country of work, that is, to Finland. Check which social security contributions you have to pay for your employee using the calculator.Opens in a new window.
My company is located in the EU
If you post your employee to work in Finland for a maximum of two years, apply for an A1 certificate for your employee from the social insurance authority of the country of origin (the country from which the employee is posted).
The certificate indicates which country's social security laws apply to your employee. If the authority in the country of origin grants your employee an A1 certificate, you must pay the employee's social insurance contributions to the country of origin and not to Finland.
If your employee doesn’t have an A1 certificate, pay their social insurance contributions to Finland.
My company is located outside the EU
If you post your employee to Finland to work for a maximum of two years, you don’t have to pay earnings-related pension insurance contributions to Finland.
However, note that you must pay other insurance contributions from the first day of work of your employee.
Make sure that the work conditions of the posted worker in Finland comply with the minimum requirements.
The minimum conditions come from:
- legislation of the country of origin
- Finnish legislation
- generally binding collective agreements between Finnish employee and employer associations.
The terms and conditions of work must comply at least with the minimum terms of Finnish law and collective agreements.
You must know the provisions of the Act on the Contractor's Obligations and Liability if
- your company is a subcontractor of another company, or
- hires their employees to another company.
In this case, your contracting partner must ask your company for clarifications and certificates in accordance with the Act on the Contractor's Obligations and Liability when concluding the contract. They help your contractor to ensure that your company has fulfilled its statutory obligations, such as tax payments and employees’ pension insurance.
When the customer requests it, you must provide the following information about your company:
- information on whether your company has been entered in the prepayment register, the employer register and the VAT register
- an extract from the trade register
- report on tax payments
- certificate of taking out an employee's pension insurance and payment of pension insurance contributions, or proof that a payment plan for overdue pension insurance contributions has been prepared
- report on the applicable collective agreement or central terms and conditions of employment
- report on how occupational health care is provided
- certificate of taking out insurance under the Employment Accidents and Occupational Diseases Act.