Employment and Economic Development Offices, i.e. TE Offices, will be discontinued at the beginning of 2025. In the future, services for the unemployed and jobseekers will be provided by their own municipality or by an employment area formed by multiple municipalities. Employment services will become part of every municipality’s basic services.
When becoming unemployed, receiving unemployment benefits will require registration as a jobseeker with the employment authority which, until now, was the TE Office. Going forward, this employment authority will be your own municipality or employment area. However, you can still register through the online service Job Market Finland.
What actions are required?
If you are already unemployed or laid off, you do not need to take any new action. Your TE Office customership is automatically transferred to your appointed employment authority and you may continue with your job search and any related matters as usual.
If you become unemployed after the reform, you can register as an unemployed jobseeker through the Job Market Finland online service as before. After this, the municipality or employment area will guide you on the next steps.
Municipal or employment area services and contact
The municipality or employment area will also be responsible for supporting job search efforts and monitoring the obligations related to unemployment benefit payments. Therefore, it is advisable to contact the municipality or employment area in situations such as:
- if you need help or tips for job searching
- if you are considering training or a course that could improve your employment prospects
- if you are considering starting a business
- if you need broader support for employment (e.g. pay subsidy)
- if you want more information about the obligations associated with unemployment benefits
- if you want more information about the labour market policy statement, which serves as a basis for paying unemployment benefits.
Contact
Job Market Finland will remain the primary communication channel for jobseekers to contact employment authorities. You can send messages to your municipality or employment area through the service.
Phone numbers and addresses for municipalities and employment areas are available on the regional pages of Job Market Finland.
Change does not affect operation of unemployment funds
Several municipalities provided employment services as part of local government pilots even before the legislative amendment entered into force. However, these pilots only extended to some recipients of earnings-related allowance. Therefore, majority of the recipients will see the impact of the transfer of services only at the turn of the year.
The change does not affect the processing of unemployment benefit matters in the unemployment fund. The fund’s responsibilities remain the same, and unemployment benefits will continue to be paid based on the statement issued by the employment authority.
Why will TE services transfer to municipalities?
The reason behind the transfer of services to municipalities and employment areas is to bring them closer to customers. Transferring the responsibility for employment, municipal education and business services to one organiser promotes the objective of faster employment. Municipalities are considered to be in a good position to offer targeted and tailored services that meet the needs of customers and local labour markets.
