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Permits and citizenship

For employers

If your employee is not a citizen of an EU or EEA country, he or she must apply for a residence permit. Citizens of EU and EEA countries may work without restrictions, but they must register their right of residence.

On these pages, you will find information about employing workers from outside Finland and instructions related to the process.

Using Enter Finland for Employers to submit the terms of employment will speed up the processing of your employee's application

Instruct your employee to submit a residence permit application in Enter Finland. Your employee should first submit a residence permit application from their own Enter Finland account. After that, you should log in to Enter Finland for Employers and fill in the terms of employment for your employee’s application. When you fill in the terms of employment online, you can also pay the processing fee for the application on behalf of the employee.

Watch our instruction video on how to fill in terms of employment in Enter Finland for Employers (YouTube.com).

There are many benefits to using the online service Enter Finland. If your employee uses Enter Finland to submit an application, automation can be used to streamline and expedite the processing of the application Submitting an application in Enter Finland is often less expensive than submitting a paper application. 

Your employee can find information about Enter Finland on the following pages:

Useful links

Guide for employed person

Is your employee applying for a residence permit for an employed person? They can find help in our guide for employed persons.

Instruction package for employers

The Finnish Immigration Service and Work in Finland’s instruction package for employers. The instructions provide item-by-item information on the path for moving to Finland for foreign workers from the employer’s perspective.

Processing situation: residence permit for an employed person

The work permit services that were previously provided by the TE Offices were transferred to the Finnish Immigration Service on 1 January 2025. Because of the transfer, the decision-making on residence permits for an employed person was paused from 1 to 8 January 2025 to allow the Finnish Immigration Service to update its systems. After the transfer, partial decisions are no longer needed. The TE Offices stopped processing new applications already in December 2024 to enable the transfer of responsibilities. Because of these changes, there are backlogs in the processing of applications.

This page contains current information about the processing situation of residence permits for employed persons. The data on this page will be updated every Tuesday until the backlogs are cleared. The updates show the status of the queue up until the previous Sunday.

On 16 February 2025, there are 4,078 applications for a residence permit for an employed person that are being processed or waiting for processing. The processing of the application and the processing time will start when the applicant proves his or her identity.

First residence permits

Currently, 30.4% of the decisions on first residence permits for employed persons have been issued within 14 days, 28.0% within 15–30 days and 15.2% within 31–60 days after the applicant has proved his or her identity. Positive decisions are issued within 32 days on average.

Since the beginning of 2025, a total of 699 applications for a first residence permit for an employed person have been submitted.

So far in 2025, we have made a decision on 346 applications for a first residence permit for an employed person. There have been 216 positive decisions.

Extended permits

Currently, 20.8% of the decisions on extended permits for employed persons have been issued within 14 days, 17.9% within 15–30 days and 32.6% within 31–60 days after the applicant has proved his or her identity. Positive decisions are issued within 46 days on average.

Since the beginning of 2025, a total of 1,563 applications for an extended permit for an employed person have been submitted. 

So far in 2025, we have made a decision on 1,070 applications for an extended permit for an employed person. There have been 913 positive decisions.

We aim to decide all applications as quickly as possible. Requests to expedite will not speed up the processing of an application. Our goal is to process each application within one month.