Finland's employed person residence permit: availability consideration and the two authority chain

Under chapter 5 of the Aliens Act 301/2004, an employed person residence permit is decided in two stages. The labour authority issues a partial decision covering availability consideration and the terms of employment. The Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) then issues the permit decision itself. The employer acts in both stages, and the worker may not start before the decision.

Two authorities, one permit

Finland splits the chain cleanly. The labour authority owns the labour market half: whether workers for the vacancy are available within a reasonable time from the Finnish or wider EU and EEA labour market, whether pay and conditions match the applicable collective agreement, and whether the employer can meet its obligations as an employer. That half is availability consideration, and it is where an application either moves or stops.

Only after the partial decision does Migri rule on the permit as a whole. Migri examines the applicant, the travel document, means of support and public order conditions. Migri's employer guidance at migri.fi/en/working-in-finland (2026) lists five work based routes: the employed person residence permit, the specialist permit, the EU Blue Card, seasonal work permits and the certified employer route. Of those, the employed person permit is the one where availability consideration is the rule for manual and operational roles.

Some routes are built outside availability consideration by design. The specialist permit and the EU Blue Card are assessed on salary level and qualification, without a labour authority partial decision in the same form. The certified employer route does not remove availability consideration, but it changes how the employer's documents are handled and shortens the chain; its conditions are set out in the certified employer route in Finland. Work tied to a season falls under separate seasonal legislation, and its tiers are described in seasonal work in Finland.

The practical consequence is that two separate authorities can halt the same application for different reasons. The labour authority stops it on pay or the collective agreement; Migri stops it on a personal document. The employer's timeline follows the slower of the two, not the first one to finish. The same two level structure appears elsewhere in the EU as regional versions of the single permit, and the logic is set out in the single permit directive explained.

What the employer does, and in which order

Migri's employer pages (migri.fi/en/for-employers, 2026) define the employer's role precisely. The employer fills in the terms of employment in the Enter Finland for Employers service only after Migri has sent a message asking for them. The order matters: the worker files first, and the employer's entry attaches to that application. An employer who fills in terms early against the wrong application, or not at all, leaves the file queued with neither authority able to proceed.

Migri states that using the electronic service produces a faster decision than the paper route. The employer advice line is 0295 790 601, and that is the right number when an application is stalled on the employer's own entry.

The sequence from the employer's side runs as follows.

Timeline, fees and where the file breaks

Migri (migri.fi/en/working-in-finland, 2026) directs applicants to the processing time test for an expected duration, because the time depends on the permit type, the volume of applications and whether the file was complete on arrival. On Migri's fast track the target is a decision within two weeks. An employed person permit normally runs considerably longer, because the partial decision is a separate stage of its own. The application fee is lower for an electronic application than for a paper one, and the current figure should be read from Migri's price list on the day of filing. Migri also states at migri.fi/en/processing-fees-and-payment-methods that it does not begin processing an application until the fee has been paid, so processing runs from the payment date rather than the submission date. The fee is not refunded on a negative decision, so a faulty application costs both the money and the calendar.

The most common reason a start date slips is not the applicant's background but a gap between the stated terms of employment and the collective agreement. If the monthly salary falls below the sector level, or if working hours and pay do not match each other, the labour authority asks for clarification or issues a negative partial decision. A corrected salary means a new contract, a new employer entry and a fresh assessment. The whole file moves by weeks even when Migri's own work was ready.

A second recurring point is the link between means of support and the job description. A job title written in general terms tells the labour authority nothing about which occupational field the availability consideration should address. A precise description shortens processing because it removes one round of clarification.

For an employer, the choice is made before the vacancy is advertised, not after. The content of the role, the pay level and the duration of the work decide the route, and the route decides how many authorities touch the file. With those three facts settled before the first application, the chain runs as a single queue rather than two parallel enquiries.