Finland: a tax card set in advance, a decision that settles it
No Finnish employee files a return from scratch. Your employer withholds tax at the percentage on your tax card (verokortti), which Vero works out in advance from an estimate of the year and rounds up to the next half percent. In spring Vero puts the pre-completed return (esitäytetty veroilmoitus) in OmaVero, filled in from what employers, unions and banks reported. You check it, add what is missing and correct it by the date printed on it. The final assessment (verotuspäätös) then sets the year's tax against what was withheld: the difference comes back as a refund (veronpalautus) or is charged as residual tax (jäännösvero) in two instalments.
Refunds arise because the tax card cannot know what you will claim. Travel between home and work, worked out at the cheapest means, is deductible above an own liability of €900 for 2025 and €800 for 2026, up to €7,000. Unemployment fund fees are deductible in full beside the automatic €750 income production deduction, and trade union fees were too until the end of 2025. The household credit (kotitalousvähennys) for cleaning, care or renovation bought from a business is the largest item for many people: 35% of the work share less €150, at most €1,600, in 2025, raised for 2026 and 2027 to 40% and €2,100.
The credits are taken in a fixed order. The work income credit comes off state tax first, then the household credit from what is left, and whatever exceeds the state tax is taken from municipal tax, the medical care contribution and church tax in proportion. The daily allowance contribution and the broadcasting tax are never reduced, and a household credit your taxes cannot absorb is lost rather than carried forward.
A claim made during the year does not have to wait for the decision. A new tax card ordered in OmaVero lowers the withholding on the pays still to come, which is how the household credit reaches you sooner.
Withheld at an 18% tax card: €8,100. Travel of €2,400 less the €800 own liability leaves €1,600; with the €150 fund fee and the €750 deduction, net earned income is €42,500.
The contributions of €4,081.50 bring taxable earned income to €38,418.50. State tax €6,554.89, municipal tax at 7.60% €2,919.81, the medical care contribution €422.60, the daily allowance contribution €396 and the broadcasting tax €160 make €10,453.30.
The work income credit of €3,280 and a household credit of €650 on €2,000 of work leave €6,523.30. Refund: €1,576.70, against €208.02 with nothing claimed.