Paternal leave and home-based sole entrepreneurs

by **filecore** » Tue Sep 01, 2009 5:19 pm

Okay, I'm a sole entrepreneur and I run my company from home. Looking through literature for fathers-to-be, I notice that there's state-sponsored paternal leave for students who are fathers, full-time office workers who are fathers, unemployed people who are fathers, and retired pensioners who are fathers. Nowhere do I find information about self-employed working from home. I am planning to go into Kela to ask about this (when it becomes a little more relevant), but I was just wondering - does anybody have any experience/recommendations/tips in this area?

**Sponsor:**

by **kiely** » Mon Sep 21, 2009 4:27 pm

I did try looking into it but my hubby would get less money than what he needed to pay the bills so it wasn't viable for us. Also I just so confused with all the people at KELA that I just gave up!

by **filecore** » Mon Sep 21, 2009 4:33 pm

Yep, I get the feeling that it just won't be worth it for me. However, it may be worth it if it means I can take over care and allow the mother to go back to her own work a month earlier, because her income is usually higher - and definitely more regular - than mine.

Kela is the ultimate in confusion, though, like that one time I wasted an entire working day because a Kela woman in Hakaniemi sent me to the immigration police in Malmi where, after waiting in a line of twenty million African women and their screaming kids for four hours, I finally saw a police officer who said "They told you that you needed a what? We haven't given that out for years, you were told bullshit." I went back to the Kela and of course the woman had gone, and I explained the story to her replacement, who also said "You're sure that's what she told you? Because it's utterly wrong." Eight hours of my life that I'll never get back again, utterly wasted by some incompetent Kela employee making up imaginary requirements and sending me on a wild goose chase. Okay, rant over.

Thanks for the feedback anyway!

by **Rosamunda** » Mon Sep 21, 2009 6:14 pm

The big advantage of that INTO place in Kamppi is that the people there are dedicated to dealing with weird foreign requests (so they should know the latest updates) AND Kela and Vero share the same space, which means one-stop-shopping (well, almost).

But I have never been in there so I don't know how friendly and charming they are.

by **filecore** » Mon Sep 21, 2009 6:27 pm

Thanks for that. I have their website and I sent them an email asking about it, but never got a response back (this was some weeks ago). Maybe I'll pop in, the next time I'm in Helsinki.

by **Rip** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 1:12 am

On Kela webpage there is information on how paternity or parental alowance amounts are calculated for self employed persons. The info given in FInnish is more comprehensive than the one in English.

by **Mook** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 9:33 am

The money that you get paid is roughly the same as sick pay.

Anyhow, you're entitled to:
- 3 weeks off when the baby is born
- to take up to 158 days of the parental leave
or
- If you're partner takes the parental leave you can get "fathers month" which is the last 2 weeks of parental leave plus another 2 weeks for free

Anyhow, you just apply for these things (or your partner does) and make sure that your company doesn't pay you during the time you receive the benefit.

by **filecore** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 9:36 am

Mook wrote:Anyhow, you just apply for these things (or your partner does) and make sure that your company doesn't pay you during the time you receive the benefit.

This is the tricky part. My company doesn't pay me anyway! That is, I'm a sole toiminimi, not an employee of an OY; I neither pay myself nor receive a salary. Does this then mean that I can't earn any money in my toiminimi during that period? How would they even work out how much cash cover I would receive for paternal leave if not calculating it based on the total income of my toiminimi?

Aargh, this is so confusing.

by **Mook** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 11:32 am

filecore wrote:How would they even work out how much cash cover I would receive for paternal leave if not calculating it based on the total income of my toiminimi?

Well, that sounds like a good number to start with, doesn't it? (The money you get is a percentage of your salary, so bigger numbers are better, right?)

by **filecore** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 11:42 am

The only flaw with that idea being the fact that my toiminimi doesn't actually generate particularly big numbers...

by **DMC** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 12:11 pm

filecore wrote:The only flaw with that idea being the fact that my toiminimi doesn't actually generate particularly big numbers...

So what do you think the benefits should be based on?

by **filecore** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 12:13 pm

Haven't the foggiest - that's why I'm asking this question! I have no idea when I'm next in Helsinki, but I'm definitely going to stop by this INTO place. Does anybody know if I need to make an appointment in advance?

by **filecore** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 12:32 pm

Ah, I see where you're coming from. Allow me to rephrase, and to check that I'm understanding:

If I don't earn "enough" (an arbitrary amount that my paternity leave would be based on) then it might actually not be cost effective for me to take any paternity leave at all, in order to be better able to pay the bills. I have to choose between paternity time and earning a livable amount of money. Does that sound right? Is there any provision for earning from a toiminimi while being on paternity leave?

by **DMC** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 1:11 pm

filecore wrote:I have to choose between paternity time and earning a livable amount of money. Does that sound right?

Sort of, from one point of view. Another view is that if you cannot show a significant income from your work, why should you expect to receive a significant income from benefits during paternity leave?
Another aspect you should consider is the impact on your business of closing it down whilst you take paternity leave. You can lose customers very easily if you are not available when they need you, so when you start up again you could find yourself starting from scratch with no customer base. The cost of losing customers could be more significant than short term loss of income, or short-term benefit payments. Of course that depends on the nature of your business. What do you do?

by **filecore** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 1:15 pm

Yes, that's the other thing, and very true too. I work in a field where I'm simply one of many subcontractors to a large company (like having a pool of freelancers), and they can choose me or not, as they see fit. Although I've been in the field for quite a long time, and I'm quite well known/trusted by the companies I work for, I'm still nervous about being away for a long time - it's really sounding like paternity leave would be a poor choice for me. Oh well, at least I can use the quiet periods during the day as a sort of part-time paternity leave...

As for not getting a significant paternity leave income, it's all about how you define "significant". I earn enough to pay the bills and live comfortably, but I don't earn enough so that to take a big drop in income (only getting some percentage of my income as paternity benefits) would move me from being over the "can afford to pay the bills" line to somewhere underneath it. It's rather precarious.