During the
coronavirus epidemic, many questions and situations are of concern to
applicants. We have compiled the most common situations in this article from
the perspective of unemployment security and, in particular, applying for daily
allowance.
If you are fully unemployed
and fall ill with coronavirus or are quarantined
When a person falls ill, the normal course of action for when an
unemployed person falls ill is followed. If you are fully unemployed or laid
off and the doctor orders you to be quarantined or isolated, continue applying
for earnings-related allowance from the unemployment fund as usual.
Report sick days
in your application, and if the illness lasts longer than 9+1 days, apply for
sickness allowance from Kela. Sickness allowance prevents the payment of
earnings-related allowance. If a person has received earnings-related allowance
when he or she falls ill, earnings-related allowance may be paid until the right
to sickness allowance begins. In this
situation, allowance may also be paid for the period of deductible for Kela’s
sickness allowance. Enter the sick days for information in your
earnings-related allowance application and state in the application that you
are applying for sickness allowance from Kela.
If you become
seriously ill and are hospitalised, state this in your application. No
earnings-related allowance can be paid for the period of hospital or
institutional care.
If you work part-time and fall ill with
coronavirus or are quarantined
As a rule,
part-time workers can receive adjusted daily allowance from the fund. If you are ordered to be absent from your
part-time work due to an infectious disease, you may be entitled to an
infectious disease allowance for your work.
Kela will compensate for the loss of earnings for your part-time
work. Receiving an infectious disease
allowance does not prevent the payment of earnings-related allowance, but the
infectious disease allowance received is deducted from the earnings-related
allowance paid to you.
The employer may pay the person sick pay, in which case the infectious
disease allowance is paid to the employer. Indicate in the application if you
are quarantined and are applying for an infectious disease allowance.
If, on the other hand, a quarantined person is able to work as usual,
quarantine alone has no effect on the daily allowance. This situation can be
the case, for example, for people working remotely.
If
you are now working part-time – reducing hours
If your working hours are reduced due to
coronavirus and you already get the adjusted allowance, continue to apply as a
normal way. Mark the hours on to the application, as they are paid to you.
Send the unemployment fund the employer’s certificate of reduced hours.
The employer’s free-form report must include the following:
- Have the tasks/hours decreased? What are the weekly working hours since the
change?
- Or have the hours finished completely? Since
when does the change apply?
- Since when will/has the payment of wages
end/ended?
- What are the causes of the changes (coronavirus
epidemic)?
If a person’s working hours are reduced as a result of a lay-off, the
fund will need a lay-off notice. In most cases, however, as the number of hours
in the education sector decreases, this is a situation comparable to a lay-off.
If you are laid off- reduction in working hours
If you are laid off, register as an
unemployed jobseeker online on the first day of your lay-off.
Apply for earnings-related allowance 2
weeks after the start of your lay-off.
If your lay-off lasts for a shorter period,
apply for earnings-related allowance by filling in the application for the
whole week, ending on Sunday. Please attach
lay- off notice to your application.
If you work remotely by permission of the
employer
If an employee is
normally employed or works remotely, the employer pays the normal wages for the
hours worked. If you work remotely while
in part-time work, apply for unemployment benefit in the same way as you would
if the working hours were performed at the employer’s premises.
If you are voluntarily absent from work because
of the coronavirus
Payment of daily
allowance requires that the TE Office considers you as unemployed, for example
due to a lay-off or a reason comparable to a lay-off. Unemployment benefit
cannot be paid for a period in which your job search is not valid. Voluntary
absence from work without an isolation order or sick leave does not entitle you
to wages or an infectious disease allowance.
Indicate in your
allowance application if you are voluntarily absent from work.
Infectious disease allowance
Kela may pay an infectious disease allowance when an employee has been
ordered to be absent from work in order to prevent the spread of an infectious
disease, such as coronavirus. The guardian of a person under the age of 16 is
entitled to an infectious disease allowance if the child has been quarantined
and therefore the guardian cannot work.
Report a quarantine and an infectious disease allowance in you
earnings-related allowance application. An infectious disease allowance can
only be paid to a person who has actual loss of earnings (the person is
quarantined by the communicable diseases authority and is therefore prevented
from doing his or her job). A person who
is fully unemployed or laid off is not entitled to an infectious disease
allowance because he or she does not have a loss of earnings. He or she may be
paid daily allowance, as is normally the case for a person who is fully
unemployed or laid off.
You can read more
about the infectious disease allowance on Kela’s website.
Please note, that the unemployment fund pays only allowances based on the
Unemployment Security Act and The Act on Job Alternation Leave.
Additional
information how the corona epidemic effects on to eployment contracts and the terms
of employment can be found in your union’s homepage.
More information on coronavirus can be found on the website of the Federation of Unemployment Funds in Finland