Foreign key person – you can pay tax at source on your income
If you move to Finland from abroad to work as a key employee for a Finnish employer, tax can be withheld at source on your salary at a special key employee’s tax rate even if you reside in Finland for over 6 months.
Since 1 January 2026, the rate of withholding at source is 25% on key-employee income. Until the end of 2025, the rate was 32%.
Treatment as a key employee requires that all the following conditions be met:
- You become a resident taxpayer in Finland when you start working here.
- You receive a salary of at least €5,800 per month for your key position. The threshold excludes any in-kind benefits: the gross pay must be €5,800 in cash terms.
- You work in tasks that require special expertise.
- You have not been a resident taxpayer in Finland during 5 calendar years before the start of your work.
- Your pay is sourced to Finland, in other words, you work mostly in Finland during the tax year for an employer company which is Finnish.
If you come to Finland to teach or to conduct research in an institute of higher education, the requirement on tasks that require special expertise is not applied, and there is no threshold for the cash salary.
These rules also apply if your employer is not Finnish but your salaries are paid by a Finnish party at your foreign employer’s request. For example, your salaries may be paid by an accounting agency.
What should you know about tax treatment as a key employee?
Until the end of 2025, the tax-at-source rate for key employees was 32%. If you were issued a tax card designed for the income of a foreign key employee in 2025 or earlier, and the card instructs your employer to withhold 32%, your employer can nevertheless start applying the 25% tax rate as of 1 January 2026 according to the changed legal rules. There is no need to request a new card only because of the tax rate having changed.
From 2026, the new rules also allow a citizen of Finland to ask for tax treatment as a key employee, on the condition that he or she has been a non-resident taxpayer in Finland during the 5 calendar years preceding the start of employment.
Because the key employee treatment involves the withholding of a source tax which is final, no tax deductions are available. This also means that you cannot deduct (not even from any other income that you may have) any expenses, which you need to pay in order to support your key-employee income.
You are not under a duty to include your key-employee income on a tax return you file to the Tax Administration. However, if your employer has not withheld the key employee tax at source from your salary, you must apply for the assessment of tax at source on the part of the income from which it has not been withheld.
Another situation where you need to declare the key-employee income on your tax return would arise if you had had other earned income that you received simultaneously when receiving the key-employee income. For more detailed instructions, see below.
If the conditions for treatment as a key employee do not apply to you, select the instruction page that matches with your circumstances:
Get a tax card designed for the income you receive as a key employee
The tax card issued to a key employee contains a marking that states the card is designed for key-employee income. You need to submit your request for the card within 90 days after starting the work as a key employee as outlined in your contract of employment. You are entitled to the beneficial tax treatment only for your first 84 months of work.
However, if you are a Finnish citizen moving to Finland, the maximum length of time is 60 months.
If your key employee’s tax card expires but you continue working and the maximum period of 84 months (or 60 months if you are a Finnish citizen) has yet not ended, you can apply for an extension of time for the card. Make the request within 30 days from the expiration date of your original card.
However, if you change jobs and start working for another employer, please request a new card. If you still qualify for key employee treatment, you will again be issued the type of tax card designed for key-employee income.
Submit a request for a personal ID code
If no Finnish personal identity code has been issued to you so far, see the instructions on Finnish personal identity codes for workers arriving in Finland.
How to request a tax card
First, tick the box for the selection: “I am applying for a key person tax card.”
Enclose the following documents:
- A photocopy of your employment contract, work orders, etc. or alternatively, a written statement by your employer company providing information on your salary and your duties that require special expertise.
- A photocopy of your A1 certificate or equivalent social security certificate proving that you are covered by the social security system of your country of residence. Your country of residence – in other words, the country you are coming from – can issue you an A1 certificate, if that country is an EU country, an EEA country, the United Kingdom, or Switzerland. X
Send the completed form and documents to the Tax Administration. The address is on the first page of the form.
Your employer will deduct insurance contributions from your salary
No Finnish healthcare contributions will be collected (their Finnish names: sairaanhoitomaksu, päivärahamaksu).
There is an obligation requiring your employer to garnish the worker’s share of pension insurance and unemployment insurance contributions from your pay unless you have
- an A1 Certificate, or
- a certificate similar to the A1 Certificate, proving that you are covered by social insurance in your home country.
Periods of work abroad
In order to be treated as a key employee with the beneficial taxes you need to work, during the tax year, primarily in Finland. However, you may do a part of your work outside of Finland. Your tax treatment including which one of the countries will impose tax on your pay earned from work done in a foreign country may vary, in accordance with the specific clauses in the tax treaty between your country of residence and Finland.
If your country of residence as it is defined in the tax treaty is still a foreign country, there will normally not be any tax imposed by Finland on the pay you receive for work done outside Finland. Your “treaty” country of residence will continue to be the foreign country, if your family members still live in your permanent home situated there.
If your work involves working outside Finland, you can contact the Tax Administration and ask us to add a special marking to your key employee tax card. The marking would be an instruction to your employer to refrain from withholding tax on the salary you earn working abroad, to the extent that has been agreed in the tax treaty between your country of residence and Finland.
If your circumstances change so that your wages from working abroad become subject to Finnish tax according to the tax treaty, the instruction on your tax card will cease to be in effect. If your living arrangements change or there are other changes to your circumstances which affect the application of the tax treaty, please notify your employer of these changes so the employer can withhold the right amounts of money during the ongoing tax year.
If you also have other income
If, during the time when you have the tax card of a key employee you also receive other earnings taxable in Finland, the key employee’s income will raise the percentage rate applicable to those earnings.
When you request a tax card or tax prepayments for your other earned income, include your key-employee income in the information that you fill in to the application form. In a case like this, call us on 029 497 024 (international income taxation of individual taxpayers) and state the amount of other income taxable in Finland in parallel with the key-employee income.
The other earnings, subject to Finnish taxes, will cause that you will also need to declare the key-employee salary on your Finnish tax return.
The paper-printed form for declaring the income received by a key employee (your pay in cash, any fringe benefits, employee stock options, etc.) is Form 50A (Earned income and deductions).
Note the following spaces on Form 50A:
- Under Wages, salaries, fees and compensation: enter the amount of your pay.
- Under Payor's name: write your Finnish employer company’s name.
- Under Type of income: write “Income received as a key employee”.
Key terms: