Are you a citizen of Ukraine and staying in Finland without a visa? Remember to apply for temporary protection

If you hold a biometric Ukrainian passport, you can stay in Finland and elsewhere in the Schengen area visa-free for a period of three months. After three months, your legal residence in Finland ends without a visa or residence permit. This means that you may, for example, be fined by the police if you have not submitted a residence permit application and you do not have a valid residence permit in Finland.

You will benefit from applying for temporary protection 

Temporary protection is a form of protection meant for people fleeing the war in Ukraine or for people who are unable to return to Ukraine because of the war. The purpose of temporary protection is to offer you provisional protection without a long wait.

• The Finnish Immigration Service is able to decide an application for temporary protection in a considerably shorter time than it would take to decide an asylum application.  The estimated processing time for a temporary protection application is one week, if no additional information is needed for the application.
  • As for asylum applications, the estimated processing time is six months. The processing of an asylum application may take even longer than that, because the Finnish Immigration Service does not have enough information for deciding the application due to the uncertainty caused by the war in Ukraine. For this reason, the European Union has activated temporary protection.
• If you want to apply for temporary protection, visit the police or the border control authorities in person and tell them that you wish to apply for temporary protection. 
• You have the right to receive the necessary reception services from your own reception centre.  
  • When you apply for temporary protection, you can apply for reception allowance or spending money from your own reception centre. The sum is the same as for asylum seekers. If you are granted temporary protection, the same reception allowance can be paid to you for as long as your residence permit based on temporary protection is valid.
  • After you have been granted a residence permit based on temporary protection, you can use healthcare services to the same extent as permanent residents in Finland. 
• You obtain the right to work and study as soon as you register your application for temporary protection with the police or a border control authority.  
  • During registration, the police or border control authority will provide you with a printed certificate of pending application, with which you can prove your right to work. Your right to work is unrestricted, meaning that you can find employment in any field of your choice. Keep the copy of the certificate you receive for yourself.
• You can also apply for asylum later even if you already have applied for or received temporary protection.
  • You can also apply for asylum after your residence permit based on temporary protection expires. 
  • If you apply for both asylum and temporary protection, the Finnish Immigration Service will suspend the processing of your asylum application for as long as your residence permit issued on the basis of temporary protection is valid.
• If other grounds exist for applying for a residence permit in your case, such as family ties to Finland or employment, you can also apply for a residence permit on these grounds. In that case, the residence permit application is subject to a fee. More information on applications and requirements is available on the Finnish Immigration Service website. 

More information:

Temporary protection
Services for those who apply for temporary protection
Frequently asked questions about Russia's attack on Ukraine