Frequently asked questions about the Incomes Register

The information that is reported to the Incomes Register includes wages and salaries, fringe benefits, bonuses, work compensation and other earnings. Tax-free and taxable reimbursements of expenses must also be reported. There is no monetary (euro) minimum or age minimum for information reported to the Incomes Register, but rather all earnings information must be reported regardless of amount or the age of the income earner. The information must be reported for all earnings paid after 1 January 2019.

The employer or other payer reports the paid wages and other income earned with a separate earnings payment report for each income earner. Each report will provide the data of a single payment made to a single income earner. However, several different income types, such as monetary wages, fringe benefits and kilometre allowances, can be reported for the same income earner on the same report.

Reports can be made to the Incomes Register in three ways:

1. Via a technical interface -> Automated reporting from the employer’s own payroll system:
   
   
   • The payroll system must be compatible with the Incomes Register, which means that all data must be in XML format and the income type codes must be compatible.
   • No separate log-in process is required for the submission of payroll information. The connection to the Incomes Register is generated by means of a certificate that is applied for in advance from the Incomes Register.

      

2. Through the e-service
   
   
   • Log in through the Incomes Register website (https://www.vero.fi/en/incomes-register/) and authenticate with your personal online banking codes, a mobile certificate, or a FINeID certificate for organisations or private citizens.
   • Logging in requires an authorisation provided through either the Suomi.fi service.
   • Reports can be submitted:
     1. Using an upload service in which the information is transferred as an XML formatted file.
     2. Using an online form in which the necessary information is entered manually.

         

3. By paper form (under special circumstances only)

• Special circumstances can be regarded as situations in which the electronic submission of the information could not reasonably be required, such as when a natural person, a decedent’s estate, or a temporary or foreign employer does not have the possibility to submit information electronically.
• The form is available online at Vero.fi >: https://www.vero.fi/en/incomes-register/.

It is also possible to use the Palkka.fi payroll calculation service, whereby the information will automatically be transferred to the Incomes Register.

Log into the Incomes Register’s e-service and go to ‘Submitted Reports” or to ‘Subscriptions’. All the submitted reports can be found there.

If you have a currently valid TyEL pension insurance policy (that is, if you are not a temporary employer), fill in as follows under earnings-related pension insurance:

• Earnings-related pension insurance information: “1 - Employee's earnings-related pension insurance”.
•  Earnings-related pension provider code: “54 - Elo Mutual Pension Insurance Company”.
• Pension policy number: “54-XXXXXXXX” (TyEL insurance policy number)

A report refers to the earnings payment report submitted for a single income earner and a single payment date.

 

The material (or, ‘record’) submitted to the Incomes Register may contain earnings payments reports for multiple income earners.

Here are some practical tips on reporting fringe benefits:

1. The reimbursements collected by the employer for any fringe benefits must be reported on the same earnings payment report as the fringe benefit in question, even if the actual reimbursement would be collected in advance or later.
2. Even if the actual reimbursement collected by the employer for the fringe benefit exceeds the taxation value of the fringe benefit, you should report no more than the amount that corresponds to the taxation value.
3. If the reimbursement collected for the meal benefit is equal to the taxation value, the reimbursement shall not be reported under income type “407 Reimbursement collected for other fringe benefits”, but instead, you should only include in the report the item “The reimbursement collected for the meal benefit corresponds to the taxation value: Yes”.

The reporting of fringe benefits may appear as being successfully done since no error message is returned by the Incomes Register. Any incorrectly submitted reports are forwarded to Elo, but they may result in inaccurate TyEL contributions.

 

It is recommended that you read carefully the instructions of the Incomes Register underReporting data to the Incomes Register: fringe benefits and reimbursements of expenses >  

 

 The amount of the fringe benefit that remains after deducting the reimbursement collected from the employee is earned income that shall be insured under TyEL. For example, if the amount of the fringe benefit is 120 euro and the reimbursement collected from the employee for the benefit is 20 euro, the remaining 100 euro is income that is subject to TyEL insurance.

In other words, when the value of the fringe benefit exceeds the reimbursement collected, the difference constitutes earned income subject to TyEL. In contrast, if the reimbursement collected for the fringe benefit corresponds, i.e., is equal to the taxation value of the fringe benefit, none of the fringe benefit falls under the scope of TyEL.

Example 1: Housing benefit and reimbursement collected

Housing benefit (income type 301): 900 euro
Reimbursement collected for other fringe benefits (income type 407): 750 euro

The difference is 150 euro. This represents the taxable amount of the housing benefit, so the amount of income falling under the scope of TyEL is 150 euro.

Example 2: Meal benefit and reimbursement collected

Meal benefit (income type 334): 120 euro
The reimbursement collected for the meal benefit corresponds to the taxation value: Yes (True)

The difference is 0 euro. As this is the taxable amount of the meal benefit, the amount of income falling under TyEL is 0 euro.

Example 3: Meal benefit and reimbursement collected

Meal benefit (income type 334): 120 euro
Reimbursement collected for other fringe benefits (income type 407): 80 euro

The difference is 40 euro. This represents the taxable amount of the meal benefit, so the amount of income falling under TyEL is 40 euro.

When the bicycle benefit has been provided as a wage component (deducted from the employee's monetary wages), the benefit is considered to be remuneration for work and is included in TyEL earnings regardless of whether the benefit is entirely or partially tax-exempt. This means that the amount of the TyEL earnings will be higher than the taxable earnings. In these cases, the report for the Incomes Register is made for income types 341 (Employer-subsidised commuter ticket, tax-exempt share) and 363 (Bicycle benefit, tax-exempt share), so that in the Type of insurance information, they are marked as falling under pension, unemployment and occupational accident and disease insurance contributions.

The information reported to the Incomes Register with the earnings payment report can be mandatory data that is required on each report, or complementary data.

Mandatory data includes:

• Identifying information, such as the pay period and payment date, and the details of the payers and recipients of each payment;
• Separately reported income types if paid (e.g. fringe benefits and reimbursements of expenses);
• At least the total sum of monetary wages/salaries (reporting method 1 = lower detail level of monetary payroll reporting).

Complementary data includes:

• Complementary income types, in other words, the more specific reporting of monetary wages/salaries (reporting method 2 = greater level of detail);
• Other additional information, such as certain information concerning the employment relationship, absence information and the earnings periods for the relevant income types.

Employers who submit the necessary complementary data in connection with the mandatory payroll data will need to deliver fewer additional reports.  This complementary data is required by, for example, earnings-related pension providers.

If information is not reported, the data users may have to request the information separately from the payer at a later date.

Reporting method 1
Reporting method 1 refers to the reporting of the total sum of monetary wages/salaries as the minimum requirement (lower detail level of payroll reporting).

Reporting method 2
Reporting method 2 refers to the reporting of monetary wages/salaries with more specific information including complementary income types (greater detail level of payroll reporting). This is the recommended reporting method.

All earnings are entered as different income types in the earnings payment report for the Incomes Register. Income types refer to the specific types of earnings reported to the Incomes Register. The income type may be, for example, time-rate pay, contract pay or work compensation.
The income types have been divided into 4 groups (100-, 200-, 300-, and 400-series income types).

• 100-series income types are applicable to reporting method 1, for the purpose of reporting monetary wages/salaries as a total sum.
• 200-series income types are applicable to reporting method 2, for the purpose of reporting monetary wages with specific income types (recommended reporting method).
• 300-series income types are reported separately, and are used for, e.g., fringe benefits and reimbursements of expenses. This is mandatory data whenever the income type in question was paid.
• 400-series income types are used when reporting deductions from one's wages, such as, e.g., tax withholdings and employee contributions. This is mandatory data if the amount in question was deducted from the wages.

The pay period is the period of time for which an income is paid. When an employment relationship ends, this also marks the end of the relevant pay period. The income must be paid on the last day of the pay period, unless otherwise agreed. The submitted report can only contain one pay period.

An earnings period (the period in which the income is earned/accrued) can be different than the pay period. The earnings period is the period of time during which the income was accrued. The earnings period can be longer or shorter than the pay period, for example, one year or longer. The earnings period is income type-specific data, and it can be a different length for each reported income type.

What if a company has both employees who are paid hourly wages every two weeks and employees who receive a monthly salary once a month? Can the earnings paid to the employees be included in the same report if the payment date is the same?

No, the earnings cannot be reported together if the hourly wages and monthly salaries have different pay periods. A single report may only cover one payment date and include the notifications for one pay period. If the pay period is different for hourly wages and monthly salaries, the relevant information must be provided in separate reports even if the payment date is the same.

In 2023 individuals aged under 17 or over 68 are excluded from the scope of TyEL insurance.

Elo has the right to receive information required for the purposes of providing earnings-related pension insurance services, and accordingly, only such information is forwarded from the Incomes Register to Elo.
If all details reported to the Incomes Register are not correctly forwarded to Elo, we recommend that you check, via the e-service of the Incomes Register, if any of the reported information are preventing the transfer of the report (or any part thereof) to Elo. Such information include, for example:

• Type of exception to insurance: “No obligation to provide insurance (earnings-related pension insurance)”
  • This data will prevent the transfer of the entire report to Elo.
• For a particular income type, the Insurance type given as: “Subject to earnings-related pension insurance contribution: No”
  • This data will prevent the income type in question from being transferred to Elo.
• An income type that is not subject to the earnings-related pension insurance contribution
  • Link to the Incomes Register’s list of income type codes > (pdf).

• Elo’s pension provider code, which is 54
• The technical pension policy number, which, at Elo, is 54-0000000U.

If an occasional employer uses an online form provided by the e-service of the Incomes Register or the Palkka.fi service for payroll calculations, Elo’s pension provider code or technical pension policy number is not required; it is sufficient for the employer to name Elo as its pension provider. 

You are an occasional employer if you do not have a valid TyEL insurance policy, you hire an employee only occasionally or temporarily and the estimated total 6-month payroll for your employees is a maximum of 9,348 euros.

When you submit an occasional employer’s earnings payment report using the e-service of the Incomes Register, please select the following under Earnings-related pension insurance: 

• Earnings-related pension insurance information: “1 - Employee's earnings-related pension insurance”.
• Select "Temporary employer (no TyEL insurance policy)"
• Earnings-related pension provider code: “54 - Elo Mutual Pension Insurance Company”.

If the earnings payment report submitted to the Incomes Register contains incorrect information ‘Type of exception to insurance’: No obligation to insure (accident and occupational disease insurance)’ or if the insurance policy numbers of distributed insurance policies (the company has multiple accident insurance policies) are missing, you must cancel the earlier report and submit a new report.

If information about the occupational classification is missing or differs from the information provided earlier to the accident insurance company, this information should be corrected by a replacement report, in which case the earlier report will not need to be cancelled.

If any Incomes Register reports are cancelled due to an error or lack of information, please note that the cancellation information will also be sent to all data users and, thus, may affect, for example, employer’s contributions and interest calculations as well as the decision-making processes of those relying on the information.

In order to minimise the impacts of the cancellation, Elo recommends that the cancellation and submission of a new report be carried out the same day prior to 2 p.m.

Any data in the Incomes Register can be corrected using the replacement method. This means that a replacement report will be submitted that contains any new and changed information as well as all the information that was correct in the original report. The replacement report is submitted for the same payment date as the original report.

The material (‘record’) sent by the payer can contain earnings payment reports for multiple income earners.

• Each report includes the data of a single payment made to a single income earner.
• If there are inaccurate reports included in the material, the entire record will not be submitted again, but only the inaccurate reports must be corrected. There is no need to resubmit those reports that are accurate.

The income earner may have several earnings payment reports from the same payer that were submitted with the same pay period and payment date. If the payer chooses the procedure type ‘New report’, the report will not replace a report submitted earlier, even if the pay period and payment date are the same. The individual making the correction should select ‘Replacement report’ in order to make a correction to a report that has already been submitted. For correction purposes, each report is assigned a report reference that ensures that a replacement report or cancellation is applied to the appropriate original report.

You should cancel the earlier report and submit a new report in order to correct inaccuracies in the following types of information:

• Payment date correction
• Pay period correction
• Correction of the customer identifiers of the payer and the income earner
• Correction of the type of additional income earner information when changing the additional “Athlete” or “Organisation” data
• Correction of the payer type when changing the “Temporary employer” data
• Correction of the customer identifier of the actual employer in the “Substitute payer” data group
• Correction of the “Acts as substitute payer” data
• Correction of the birth date of the income earner
• Correction of  a pension policy number
• Correction of the occupational accident insurance company identifier or policy number
• The “Type of exception to insurance” data:
  o Retroactive changes to the “No obligation to insure” data and 
  o Retroactive changes to the “Not subject to Finnish social security” data.
  o Retroactive changes to the “Voluntary insurance in Finland (earnings-related pension insurance)” data.

If an error is only in the report itself and the employee has been paid the correct amount of income, simply submit a replacement report to correct the information. If the employee has been paid too much as wages/salary or another type of income, the payer should replace the earlier report by marking the overpayment as an unjust enrichment. Recovery data is reported in the report for the pay period in which the recovered amount is paid back to the employer. The original pay period, when the overpayment was paid to the employee, must also be stated in the report.

In a situation in which the lower limit for TyEL insurance is not reached during the first pay period of the month, but the limit is exceeded during the second pay period, the information is reported and corrected in the Incomes Register as follows:

•   The ‘Type of exception to insurance’ field in the report must be corrected by cancelling the previous report and creating a new report with the correct information.

•   A new report must be submitted also for the first pay period, because the circumstances have changed and the original information given for the type of exception to insurance is no longer correct.

•   The data in the Incomes Register must correspond to the reality, so the earnings payment reports must be made in accordance with the actual payment dates. If the employee’s share of the pension contribution for the first pay period is invoiced during the second pay period, the report shall concern the second pay period. The report for the first pay period must then be cancelled and a new report drawn up with the changed insurance information (information about the pension insurance, pension provider code and pension policy number). If the employee’s share of the contribution was not collected from the income earner, there is no need to report it. In the earnings payment report for the second pay period, the entire insurance pension contribution collected (and possible unemployment insurance contribution) will be reported as realised. One report is sufficient.

If any Incomes Register reports are cancelled due to an error or lack of information, please note that the cancellation information will also be sent to all data users and, thus, may affect, for example, employer’s contributions and interest calculations as well as the decision-making processes of those relying on the information.

In order to minimise the impacts of the cancellation, Elo recommends that the cancellation and submission of a new report be carried out the same day prior to 2 p.m.

If the payment date for wages/salary has been reported incorrectly to the Incomes Register, you must cancel the earnings payment report in question. Then, you must submit a new report with the correct/new payment date.

If any Incomes Register reports are cancelled due to an error or lack of information, please note that the cancellation information will also be sent to all data users and, thus, may affect, for example, employer’s contributions and interest calculations as well as the decision-making processes of those relying on the information.

In order to minimise the impacts of the cancellation, Elo recommends that the cancellation and submission of a new report be carried out the same day prior to 2 p.m.

If an incorrect TyEL insurance policy number (pension policy number) has been reported to the Incomes Register, you must cancel the earnings payment report in question. Then, you must submit a new report with the correct TyEL insurance policy number.

If any Incomes Register reports are cancelled due to an error or lack of information, please note that the cancellation information will also be sent to all data users and, thus, may affect, for example, employer’s contributions and interest calculations as well as the decision-making processes of those relying on the information.

In order to minimise the impacts of the cancellation, Elo recommends that the cancellation and submission of a new report be carried out the same day prior to 2 p.m.

If you have mistakenly paid excess wages or salary to an employee and the report submitted to the Incomes Register is incorrect, you should submit a replacement report (for the wage payment date during which the excess salary has been paid to the employee) to the Incomes Register. In the replacement report, enter the amount of the excess payment as “unjust enrichment”. The corrected information will be forwarded to Elo, and the amount of wages/salary subject to an earnings-related pension insurance contribution will be reduced by the amount of the unjust enrichment.

It is not enough that you simply report the recovery of the payment (without correcting the previously reported excess payment as an unjust enrichment) because the recovery of a payment data will not be forwarded to Elo.

• An authorisation concerns the information about a specific company or individual.
• The change of an authorised party will not restrict the access rights; a new accounting firm can view all earnings payment reports related to the assignor, in other words, all reports submitted by the previous accounting firm.
• When the authorisation is terminated, the authorised party will no longer be able to access information about the company or reports submitted on behalf of the company.
• The new accounting firm can maintain and edit all of the assignor’s earnings payment reports, also those which were created by the previous accounting firm.
  −Information provided by the company will be retained in the Incomes Register for 10 years. The information can be corrected at any time during this storage period.

 For more information please go to Incomes Register.

When you issue a payroll report to the Incomes Register in time, the due date of the TyEL contribution will be the last day of the month following the salary payment month. Insurance contribution interest is paid for payments falling due after that. The insurance contribution interest is 2.45 % as of 1 January 2023.

As a result of the Incomes Register, the TyEL contributions will be invoiced as final payments in real time. Based on the earnings payment report submitted to the Incomes Register, the TyEL contribution is calculated and includes the basic contribution amount and, for large-scale employers, the impact of the premium category and the premium loss discount. Thus, there is no longer any need for separate annual calculations or the resulting adjusted payment.

This may be explained by a number of reasons, for example:

1. If the information given in an earnings payment report is deficient, for example, in terms of fringe benefits (read more under ‘How should fringe benefits be reported to the Incomes Register?’), the report cannot be processed at the same time as the other reports within the same material. For this reason, the reported information is not necessarily included in the invoice.
2. The report submitted to the Incomes Register may have included other earnings in addition to those subject to the TyEL insurance, such as earnings paid to persons under 17 and/or those over 68 in 2023. Read more about earnings subject to TyEL insurance (PDF) >
3. The earnings payment report or a correction has only been submitted to the Incomes Register once the invoice for the other earnings payment reports of the same month has already been issued.
4. If the earnings payment report is comprised of more than one record file, it may be that the reports have been received by Elo at different times and have, therefore, not been included in the same invoice.

Yes, it is possible, in the same way as earlier. Additionally, you can request a one-month payment extension, subject to interest, for a specific invoice before the duedate via Elo's Online Service or by contacting our customer service tel. +358 20 694 730.

At Elo, the TyEL contribution is calculated once a day. If Elo receives the earnings payment reports submitted to the Incomes Register so that the reported data are included in the calculation process on different dates, several rows will be generated for the same payment date on the invoice.

The earnings must be reported to the Incomes Register as earnings insured under TyEL insurance. If the employees are granted an A1 certificate, a replacement report/cancellation must be submitted to the Incomes Register. The earnings must be reported to the Incomes Register in a timely fashion in order to avoid any penalty fees for late reports and accrual of insurance contribution interest on TyEL contributions.

• Type of exception to insurance: Not subject to Finnish social security (earnings-related pension, health, unemployment or occupational accident and disease insurance)
•  Social security certificate: An A1 certificate or agreement for Finland.

The unduly paid contributions for January-May are refunded to the employer and the employer must return the unduly withheld employee contributions to the employee. The employer must submit a report to the Incomes Register concerning the employee's shares of the contributions that have been returned to the employee. This procedure is described in the instruction entitled Correcting data in the Incomes Register, under Section 2.4 Reporting negative numbers.

The payer must report the data to the Incomes Register primarily using a Finnish Business ID or personal identity code. If the payer does not have a Finnish customer identifier, the data should be reported using a foreign identifier, whereby the payer is also required to enter further identifying and contact details, such as name and address. If the payer has both a Finnish and a foreign identifier, both identifiers must be reported.

An income earner’s data must be reported to the Incomes Register primarily with a Finnish personal identity code. If the individual does not have a Finnish personal identity code, the data is reported using the income earner’s foreign identifier. If the given identifier is not Finnish or if no identifier has been provided, additional information, such as the name, address, date of birth and gender, which identify the income earner, must be submitted.

If a foreign individual later receives a Finnish personal identity code, this code is included in the next report that is submitted to the Incomes Register. The foreign customer identifier should also continue to be reported. If the foreign identifier of the income earner has been included in earlier reports, these reports do not need to be corrected. Once the Finnish personal identity code has been issued, this can be included in the report for the next pay period along with the foreign customer identifier. If the earlier reports have been submitted exceptionally without any identifier, these earlier reports will need to be corrected.

If you use Reporting method 1:

1. Report income type "352 Wages for insurance purposes". 
2. For all other income types on the report (such as, “101 Total wages"), report the following additional information:

• Insurance type: Subject to earnings-related pension insurance contribution; Basis for insurance contribution: No.
• Insurance type: Subject to accident and occupational disease insurance contribution; Basis for insurance contribution: No.
• Insurance type: Subject to unemployment insurance contribution; Basis for insurance contribution: No.

 

If you use Reporting method 2, submit two separate reports to the Incomes Register as follows:

1. Submit a report on the income type “201 Time-rate pay” with the following information:
   • Type of exception to insurance: No obligation to provide insurance (earnings-related pension insurance).
   • Type of exception to insurance: No obligation to provide insurance (unemployment insurance).
   • Type of exception to insurance: No obligation to provide insurance (accident and occupational disease insurance).

    

2. Submit a report on the income type “352 Wages for insurance purposes” alone.

A municipality that acts as a substitute payer includes any data about payments to a personal assistant in its report to the Incomes Register. The municipality enters the information, using the relevant Business ID, in the earnings payment report and submits it to the Incomes Register within five calendar days from the payment date.

If the municipality submits earnings payment reports and an employer’s separate report on behalf of the actual employer (acting as the employer’s representative on the basis of an authorisation), the municipality shall submit the reports monthly and no later than the fifth day of the month following the salary payment month.

If the actual employer has also made direct payments to the income earner, these must also be reported in addition to the earnings paid by the substitute payer. In this case, however, it must be noted that the reporting deadline for earnings paid by the actual employer is generally within five calendar days from the payment date.  

For example:
The municipality pays 1,000 euro to a personal assistant in August and, of this sum, the municipality withholds 200 euro in taxes. The municipality reports this payment to the Incomes Register in the capacity of a substitute payer.

-->In order to determine and confirm the social insurance contributions of the employer, the actual employer must independently include in her/her own report any earnings paid by the substitute payer for which the employer pays social insurance contributions. The municipality can act on behalf of the actual employer and report information to the Incomes Register, if agreed on with the actual employer.

 

In a substitute payer situation, two reports shall be submitted to the Incomes Register:

1. The substitute payer’s report, including the following data:
   1. The substitute payer’s basic details.
   2. The payer acts as a substitute payer.
   3. The actual employer’s details.
   4. Insurance / Earnings-related pension insurance: “No earnings-related pension insurance” (this is given as a default, do not change).

       

2. The actual employer’s report, including the following data:
   1. The details of the actual employer (Payer details).
   2. The pension policy number and earnings information for the employee.

The YEL income for YEL-insured entrepreneurs is not reported to the Incomes Register, but any wages or salary paid to the YEL-insured entrepreneur must be reported to the Incomes Register.

1. Any wages or salary paid to the owner of a limited liability company shall be reported to the Incomes Register (in the same way as the earlier notifications submitted to the tax authorities).
2. Any private withdrawals made as a sole proprietor are processed in the bookkeeping for the sole proprietor and reported in tax returns.

• No obligation to insure (earnings-related pension insurance)
• No obligation to insure (accident and occupational disease insurance)
• No obligation to insure (unemployment insurance)

The wages or salary paid to an entrepreneur are marked as being subject to paying health insurance contributions, so under the Type of exception to insurance, the following cannot be selected: No obligation to insure (earnings-related pension, health, unemployment or occupational accident and disease insurance), because this would exclude all social insurance contributions.

The YEL insurance policy number, the Business ID of the pension provider and the pension policy number are not reported to the Incomes Register.

 

 

When pension applications are being processed, information concerning the earnings from the employment relationship and the ending date of the current employment relationship are retrieved from the Incomes Register. If the register is missing some information that is necessary for the granting of a pension, Elo will send the employer an inquiry about the matter, but the employer will respond to the inquiry directly to the Incomes Register instead of Elo. When an employee retires on old-age pension, the ending date of the employment relationship must be reported to the Incomes Register.

Report the ending date of an employment relationship in connection with the report on the final payment of salary/wages. If there are multiple reports to be submitted during the first month of retirement, include the ending date of the employment relationship in each report. If it is not possible to report the ending date through your own system, you can report it through tulorekisteri.fi by submitting a new report or correcting the previously submitted report. The ending date is reported, under the earner’s detailed information, as the date on which the validity of the employment or service relationship ends.