Being an entrepreneur does not accumulate the employee’s employment condition and you can keep your membership in an unemployment fund for employees for a maximum of 18 months from the begin of your full-time entrepreneurship. If you your business ends within 18 months from the beginning, you can receive earnings-related allowance from the fund based on the employment condition you have fulfilled during your previous status as a wage earner.
If you start working as a full-time entrepreneur while being unemployed or temporarily laid-off, paying out earnings-related allowance ends. Please notify the fund and the TE office of any business activities started as an unemployed person. If your entrepreneurship ends within 18 months from when it begun, the daily allowance will continue to be paid from where it was left off when you started your business.
As an entrepreneur, you should consider becoming a member of an entrepreneurs’ unemployment fund in order to secure your entitlement to earnings-related daily allowance beyond the first 18 months of your entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurs may turn to Yrittäjäkassa (former SYT).
Read more: Entrepreneur and Going from employed to an entrepreneur.