Changes to foreigners’ unemployment rules: new reporting obligation for employers

The new unemployment rule has come into effect.

The amendment that entered into force on 11 Jun. binds work-based residence permits more closely to work and strengthens the systematic nature of how they are monitored.

In addition, the Government has issued a decree on industries with labour shortages. In those industries, employee residence permit holders can look for a new job more flexibly in the future.

An employee will have three months to find a new job if they are in Finland with a work-based residence permit and they lose their job. If they cannot find a new job or there are no longer any other grounds for staying in the country, their residence permit will be revoked.

Losing a job has until now also meant the revocation of a resident permit. However, there has been no regulation regarding the length of unemployment that would lead to the permit being revoked, and monitoring has not been systematic.

Instead of three months, the following would have six months to find a new job:

• specialist experts (including EU Blue Card),
• everyone who has had a work-based residence permit in Finland for more than two years,
• top and middle management of companies and
• seconded experts and management moving within the company.

Notification obligation for employers

In future, the employer must notify the Finnish Immigration Service if the employment of someone living in Finland with a work-based residence permit ends prematurely.

“The employer’s new notification obligation increases their administrative burden. The notification is justified by the needs to monitor foreigners. However, an authority could also carry out monitoring using information from the Incomes Register, for example, without the employer getting yet another obligation,” says Albert Mäkelä, a leading specialist at Suomen Yrittäjät, the Finnish SME association.

“We criticized the notification obligation when the legislation was being drafted. The employer does not benefit in any way from failing to notify, but it is still heavily punished. Failing to notify can result in a fine,” Mäkelä continues.

The easiest way to notify is online, using the Enter Finland service, and it must be done within 14 days of the end of employment. The end of gig or additional work does not need to be reported if the employee is doing this work in addition to the job that their permit is based on.

More flexible search for industries with labour shortages

An employee’s right to work based on a residence permit will be expanded: in addition to the original professional field, the holder is permitted to work in the labour shortage sectors listed in the Decree issued pursuant to the Aliens Act.

Exercising this right to work does not require applying for a new residence permit, as long as the previous permit is still valid. The extended right to work applies to an employee’s residence permit, where the permit is granted for a specific professional field or for several fields.

The Decree is valid for one year. However, an interim review of areas with labour shortages will be carried out six months after the Decree entered into force, and changes may be made as necessary.

The professional fields that are currently considered to have labour availability problems throughout the country are:

• general practitioners,
• chief medical officers and specialists,
• audiologists and speech therapists,
• metal processing process operators,
• nurses, etc.,
• oral hygienists,
• funeral service workers,
• practical nurses and
• firefighters

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