After about 2 weeks of unemployment, you can apply for earnings-related daily allowance from the Unemployment Fund with an electronic form through the Fund’s E-service or by sending an application form by mail. Fill in the application with care beginning with your first day of unemployment and add the necessary attachments. You can send your application to the Fund even if you do not have all the necessary attachments yet. You can always send us the missing attachments afterward once you receive them.
If your unemployment continues, apply for daily allowance with a follow-up application of either one month or 4 calendar weeks (Monday through Sunday). Apply for daily allowance retroactively on the last day of your application period at the earliest. Make sure you apply for daily allowance within 3 months of the period you are applying for. Applications that are more than 3 months old will be considered late and they will be rejected.
The fulfillment of the 26 weeks needed is examined within a 28-month period prior to unemployment. The employment requirement does not need to be continuous, meaning it can consist of numerous jobs and there can be gaps between jobs. The 28-month long examination period can be lengthened for an acceptable reason (full-time studies, sick leave, parental leave, mandatory military service, etc.) for up to 7 years. Despite this, the employment requirement must still be fulfilled in total within your membership period. If you belong to an unemployment fund while you study, you can accumulate your employment requirement from work done alongside your studies.
The Fund will determine your eligibility for daily allowance while processing your daily allowance application. You can find further information regarding the employment requirement here.
Please note! From 2.9.2024 onwards the employment requirement and membership requirement will be 12 months, so roughly 52 weeks and the employment requirement will be accumulated based on paid wage income.
The amount of your daily allowance is calculated during the processing of your daily allowance application. You can use the daily allowance calculator to get an estimate of your daily allowance.
The income used to calculate your daily allowance is calculated by dividing your income after the Tel-deduction by the number of weekdays (Monday to Friday, meaning 130 days in an exactly 26-week period) included in your minimum 26-week employment requirement period from which your income has accumulated. This sum multiplied by 21,5 results in the monthly income used for the calculation of your daily allowance.
| An example of how the monthly income used to calculate your daily allowance is calculated |
| The taxable income from 1.8.2022–31.1.2023 (132 weekdays) on your pay certificate is 18 206 €. This income includes a 436 € holiday bonus and 620 € of holiday compensation.
The holiday bonus of 436 € and holiday compensation of 620 € are subtracted from the total income of 18 206 € leaving us with 17 150 €. The Tel-deduction (4,40 % in 2023) is then calculated from this amount: 17 150 € / 100 * 4,40 = 754,60 €, after which we subtract the Tel-deduction from the same amount: 17 150 € – 754,60 € = 16 395,40 €. The amount left after the Tel-deduction 16 395,40 € is then divided by the number of weekdays in the period 1.8.2022–31.1.2023 (132 weekdays) to get the daily income used for the daily allowance calculation 124,21 €. When the daily income used for the daily allowance calculation is multiplied by 21,5, we are left with the monthly income used to calculate your daily allowance 2 670,52 €. |
If you get a tax card for benefit income, send the tax card to the Unemployment Fund. After this, we can withhold the tax from the benefit using the withholding rate stated on the tax card without increasing it.
You can find more information on the taxation of benefits on the Finnish Tax Administration’s website.
If a longer sick leave is in question, please also inform the TE Office of your sick leave.
You can apply for earnings-related daily allowance during your suspension period even if you are not dissatisfied with the suspension period set by the TE Office. This speeds up the processing of your first application after the suspension period because it means all of the information from before your suspension period is already in our system. If you did not apply for earnings-related daily allowance during your suspension period, inform the Fund of your employment situation during this period when you apply for daily allowance for the first time after your suspension period has ended.
If you apply for daily allowance for the first time after your suspension period has ended, inform the Fund of your employment situation (employed/unemployed/ill, etc.) during your suspension period in the additional information field of the application form. If you have been employed during your suspension period, send the Fund a copy of your employment contract and pay slips as well as a list of your weekly working hours in case you were employed part-time, and your hours varied.
If you have received extra compensation from your employer related to the termination of your employment, the periodisation of the extra compensation can be at the same time as your suspension period. You should apply for earnings-related daily allowance after 2 weeks of unemployment especially if you have received extra compensation related to the termination of your employment so that the Fund can give you a decision regarding how long the periodisation will last.
If you have worked in addition to participating in the employment-promoting service, mark “employed”, and the daily hours worked on your application. Please also attach a copy of your employment contract (if you have not already done so) as well as a copy of your pay slip regarding wages paid during the application period.
The waiting period is set no more than once a year. Despite fulfilling the 26-week employment requirement again, a waiting period will not be set if the first day you would be paid daily allowance is within a year of the previous first day that daily allowance was paid, you have been paid at least one day of daily allowance after your previous waiting period and the waiting period has been set when the previous maximum payment period started.
The waiting period is always related to fulfilling the employment requirement. If you have already received daily allowance after your waiting period and you have not yet fulfilled the employment requirement again, you will not be set a waiting period.
Sending your pay slips to the Fund along with your application can speed up the processing of your application. If the information in the Incomes Register is not sufficient, the Fund will ask that you send copies of your pay slips, which causes a delay in the processing of your application.
If you or your spouse have applied for or are receiving child home care allowance, fill in the form notification of child home care allowance (only in Finnish) and attach it to your application. If you have worked during your parental leave, please attach your employment contract to your application. If your job was part-time and your working hours varied, please also attach copies of your pay slips and a list of your weekly working hours.
For example, child home care allowance generally reduces the amount of daily allowance the applicant receives regardless of which parent is paid child home care allowance. However, child home care allowance paid to the applicant’s spouse does not reduce the amount of daily allowance paid to the applicant if the spouse takes care of the child full-time at home and is not eligible for earnings-related daily allowance for this reason. If the spouse is also unemployed and child home care allowance is paid to the spouse, the child home care allowance reduces only the amount of the spouse’s daily allowance. If you or your spouse have applied for or have been granted child home care allowance, send the form notification of child home care allowance (only in Finnish) to the Fund attached to your application for the first period during which you receive child home care allowance.
General housing allowance does not affect your earnings-related daily allowance.
The Fund can pay you earnings-related daily allowance even after your maximum payment period with so-called additional allowance days until the end of the calendar month during which you turn 65 years old. This is possible if you have worked at a job that accumulates your pension for at least 5 years within the last 20 years and
- you were born in the years 1957-1960 and you have turned 61 years old before your maximum payment period ends.
- you were in the years 1961-1962 and you have turned 62 years old before your maximum payment period ends.
- you were born in 1963 and you have turned 63 years old before your maximum payment period ends.
- you were born in 1964 and you have turned 64 years old before your maximum payment period ends.
People born in the year 1965 and after are not eligible for additional allowance days. The payment of additional allowance days will cease entirely in 2030 due to changes in legislation.
Once you have applied for old-age pension, continue to apply for earnings-related daily allowance from the Fund according to your normal application period up until the end of the month before your pension will begin. Inform the Fund of the first day you have applied for pension on your last earnings-related daily allowance application. Also inform the TE Office about your retirement.
After you have retired, you do not need to keep your membership with the Fund. Your membership will not be terminated automatically, rather you must inform the Fund in writing that you are ending your membership due to retirement. If you belong to a professional organization, please also inform them about your retirement and the termination of your membership with the Fund.
Please contact your pension provider for further information and instructions about applying for pension.
Applicants that are applying for earnings-related allowance for the first time (first applications) and adjusted daily allowance applications are processed in the order they arrive at the Fund. The statutory time frame to begin processing these applications is 30 days from the date the application arrived at the Fund. Within this time, we will either give you a decision regarding your application or we will send you a request for additional information if we notice that we are missing relevant information while processing your application. The final processing time depends quite a lot on the number of incoming applications at any given time and if the necessary attachments are included with the application. You can follow the processing times for first applications and adjusted daily allowance applications from the box “currently processing” on our front page.
Once a decision regarding the amount of your personal earnings-related daily allowance has been given, applications from applicants that are entirely unemployed or laid off and that have no changes to report on their application are processed so that the applicant receives their daily allowance by Friday of the following week. In most cases, applications like these are automatically paid and the applicant receives their daily allowance 2 bank days after sending their electronic application.
If changes have occurred during the application period (for example there are new payment details in the Incomes Register or the TE Office’s statement is missing) or the application is filled in inadequately or the application period is incorrect, the application is transferred for processing by hand. Applications are also processed by hand if there are working days during the application period or if it concerns part-time layoffs. In these cases, the processing time is not only dependent on how many applications have arrived, but also on how quickly the necessary additional information and corrections are sent to the Fund.
Applicants applying for earnings-related daily allowance for the first time (first applications) and adjusted daily allowance applications begin processing in order of the date the application arrived at the Fund. The statutory time frame to begin processing for these applications is 30 days from the date the application arrived at the Fund. You can follow the current processing times on our front page.
Follow-up applications for applicants that are entirely unemployed or laid off and that have no changes to report during their application period are processed so that the applicant receives their daily allowance by Friday of the following week. In most cases, applications like these are automatically paid and the applicant receives their daily allowance 2 bank days after sending their electronic application.
If changes have occurred during the application period or the application concerns a part-time layoff it will be transferred for processing by hand. In these cases, the processing time depends on the number of applications waiting to be processed in addition to how well the application has been filled in and if all the necessary attachments are included.