- Marriage
- Examination of impediments to marriage
- Marriage ceremony
- Prenuptial agreement
- Notification of a marriage concluded abroad
- Divorce granted abroad
- Registration of the act applicable to the matrimonial property regime
- Registration of a deed of division of property
- Dissolution of cohabitation
- Removal of marital rights to property
- Extracts issued of the register on the right to officiate at weddings
- Having or adopting a child
- Names
- Moving
- Elections and Right to vote
- Suomi.fi Web Service
- Citizen Certificate and electronic identity
- Guardianship
- Continuing power of attorney
- Appointment of a guardian
- Duties of the guardian
- Guardianship for a minor
- Who can act as a guardian?
- Actions that require the permission of the guardianship authority
- Permit to buy or sell a dwelling
- Permit for purchase or sale of real estate
- Permit for the partition or separation of property and the division of inheritance
- Renunciation of inheritance, for the surrender of one’s share of an inheritance or an agreement on the joint administration of an estate
- Engaging in trade or the establishment of a company
- Property management plan
- Pledging of property and for borrowing and lending
- Leasing or investing a client’s property
- Limited account or the management of the earnings
- Appointing a substitute guardian
- Termination of guardianship
- Giving up the guardian’s task
- Guardianship authority's means of supervision
- Looking after the interests of an absent person or the future owner of the property
- Restrictions to competency and declaration of incompetence
- Extracts from the Register of Guardianship Affairs
- Certificates from the Population Information System
- Population information in the Population Information System
- Registration of a gift notification
- Services of notary public
- Certification of purchase
- Citizens’ initiative
- Death and estate inventory
- Living abroad
- Moving
- Registration of citizenship
- Divorce granted abroad
- Death abroad
- Registration of a child born abroad
- Registration of a name change performed abroad
- Notification of a marriage concluded abroad
- Registration of the act applicable to the matrimonial property regime
- Legalisation of foreign documents
- Notification of retaining Finnish citizenship
- Moving to Finland
- Public Service Info
- Address service
- Forms
Accountability at the beginning of guardianship
Once you have been appointed the guardian for your client, who is an adult the authority will supervise your actions. The first thing you must do once you have been appointed guardian is to draw up an inventory of your client’s assets and debts, which you will submit with its attachments to the agency.
As guardian you will submit a property inventory to the guardship authority within three months of stepping into your position. The inventory must include all your client’s assets and debts the management of which has been given to you.
Attach copies of the necessary documents and receipts to the inventory. The inventory and its attachments will not be returned to you.
The information you provide in the property inventory is also the preliminary data for the first annual statement. As a guardian, you must maintain records so you can draw up an annual statement on their basis each year. You will need to attach receipts/documents from which the accounting period’s financial activities can be verified. The annual statement and its attachments will be returned to you after the audit for safekeeping. It is your responsibility to see to the retainment of documents that have accumulated over your period as guardian.
As guardian, you may not disclose information on the client to others without the client’s consent. A guardian’s obligation to secrecy also applies to audit materials.
Do the following
- First read the instructions
Property inventory instructions - Adult client (in Finnish)
- Fill in, print and sign the property inventory form.
Property inventory form - Adult client (in Finnish)
- Please return the form and its attachments to your local agency offices within three months of the start of your assignment.
An effort is made to review property inventories soon after their arrival. If it becomes apparent during the audit that more information is needed, you will be contacted.
Check list
- Keep accounting records from the very beginning of your assignment.
- Keep account statements and receipts in a format that ensures you have access to them when necessary.
- Retain the documents you acquired during your time as guardian, remember your obligation to secrecy and due diligence.
- Draw up a property inventory.
- Attach copies of the necessary attachments, the property inventory will not be returned to you.
- Survey of property and determination of fair value (apartments, properties, shares in estates, savings, safe deposit boxes, funds, listed or other stocks, investment insurance, valuables, vehicles)
- Survey of debts (bank, enforcement, collections agencies, guarantees, debt instruments, debt arrangements)
- Contact the bank (changes to access rights for account, opening a running expenses account, arrangement of accounts)
- Pension notifications, tax and benefits decisions (ask for notifications and decisions for yourself, steer the income to the account to which you as the guardian have access.
- Valid agreements (lease, sheltered housing, treatment costs, insurances)
- Taking care of running matters (payment of bills and their transfer to the guardian, address changes, review of/application for benefits)
- Agree with your client on the practices for use of money
- Determine whether a property management plan needs to be confirmed for the client’s property, for example in the case of forest property
Key terms
Client
Person on whose behalf you are acting
Guardian
Person charged with the management of a client’s financial and wealth-related affairs
Property inventory
A list where the guardian reports the client’s property including debts according to the start date of guardianship.
Annual statement
An account on the management of your client’s property that is submitted once each calendar year
Final statement
An account on the management of your client’s property from the beginning of the calendar year to the date on which guardianship comes to an end.
Audit of statements
The guardianship authority will review the annual and final statements you have drawn up.
Frequently asked questions
During your time as guardian, you are entitled to access all the information your client has the right to access.
Yes, you are. You are obligated to secrecy in all matters related to your duties as guardian. However, your client can give you the right to discuss matters concerning them with a third party or to disclose information concerning the client.
As a rule, an accounting period is equivalent to one calendar year. The exceptions to this rule are the first and the last accounting periods. The first accounting period begins from the date on which a guardian is appointed and ends on 31 December.
This is the responsibility of the guardian. The guardian can also purchase the service from an accounting agency. If this is done, the cost of the accounting agency’s services must be deducted from the guardian’s possible fee. The guardian is responsible for the provided data and signs the documents submitted to the guardianship authority.
Data is calculated on the basis of the information provided in account statements. The data is itemised according to type of revenue and reported as both a total sum for the entire accounting period and itemised amounts.
Data is calculated on the basis of the information provided in account statements. Data will be itemised by expenditure type and reported as both a total sum for the entire accounting period and itemised amounts.
Resale price
This is not recommended. Taxable value is often not equivalent to the fair value. Property is valued at fair value, so that it gives an accurate picture of the value of the client’s property.
Yes, you can. However, this will require that the fair value has remained almost the same. If the location has been renovated or other activities have been carried out, it may be necessary to redetermine the fair value.
As guardian, this is a task you are responsible for. No expert statements on fair value are required for either the property inventory or the annual and final statements. Another justified evaluation is adequate.
- You can examine sales price statistics to compare the going price of similar apartments/properties.
- The value can be justified also on the basis of renovation or improvement work completed at the location.
- For more information on forest holding, please see the Metsaan.fi service.
- Estate inventory deeds or inheritance settlement deeds if these are recent.
- If an assessment by an expert is necessary for the management of duties, you can request an assessment from a real property agent, building manager or forest sector expert.
The Finnish Tax Administration website contains formulas for the calculation of various situations.
By asking enforcement services and banks.
Normal home property does not need to be reported. Report vehicles that cause expenses.
You cannot represent yourself as a debtor and the client as the creditor. You are thus disqualified, and you must look for someone to act as a substitute guardian. In addition, lending money from your client’s assets is subject to a licence. The loan must include interest and a guarantee. Giving a loan must in any case be in the interest of your client. A decision on the licence will be subject to a charge and the decision can be a negative one.
Not on the initiative of the guardian. Only the client can give gifts. If the client wants to give a gift, which is considered normal in the circumstances and insignificant in financial value, the guardian can carry out the matter at the request of the client. The client must always understand the meaning of giving a gift and be able to independently make the choice on giving a gift. If the client does not understand the meaning of giving a gift, the guardian cannot give a gift even if it is of little financial value.
Yes, you can. There is a separate calculator (in Finnish) for the calculation of a guardian’s fee. As guardian, you will report your fee to the Incomes Register. Read the instructions on how to submit guardianship fee data to the Incomes Register.
As guardian, you have the right to receive compensation for expenses, which have resulted from the management of your client’s financial affairs. You must always manage your client's affairs in the manner that is most appropriate and affordable. You must provide calculation on expenses, which have resulted from the management of your client’s financial affairs. As guardian, you cannot directly base expenses on the kilometre expenses determined by the Finnish Tax Administration or Kela. As guardian, you will submit a request for compensation for necessary expenses.
If you have not been appointed to handle your client’s personal affairs, you cannot charge compensation for expenses for the management of this type of matters (e.g. grocery shopping, doctor’s visits, health and recreational visits). Your role as a family member must also always be separate from your role as guardian; the tasks you handle in your role as a family member, cannot be charged for during guardianship. As guardian, you will also report compensation for expenses to the Incomes Register. See instructions for reporting data to the Incomes Register.
Guardianship Services contact information
When sending an email, please use the Digital and Population Data Services Agency’s secure email to ensure that your information is sent securely. Select [email protected] as the recipient in the secure mail
Send the email as a secure email
Postal address
Property inventories, annual statements and final statements must be sent to the postal address of the service location.
All other post to the Guardianship Service must be sent to the address:
Digital and Population Data Services Agency / Guardianship, PO Box 1001, FI-02151 Espoo
Telephone number
The telephone service is open 9.00-12.00 on weekdays
Service number +358 295 536 256
Chat service
You can also contact us via chat at our web pages. Chat service is open Mon-Fri from 9.00 to 15.00. Please do not give sensitive information, such as your personal ID number on the chat.
Service locations
Addresses of the Digital and Population Data Services Agency’s service location
- Individuals
- Marriage
- Examination of impediments to marriage
- Marriage ceremony
- Prenuptial agreement
- Notification of a marriage concluded abroad
- Divorce granted abroad
- Registration of the act applicable to the matrimonial property regime
- Registration of a deed of division of property
- Dissolution of cohabitation
- Removal of marital rights to property
- Extracts issued of the register on the right to officiate at weddings
- Having or adopting a child
- Names
- Moving
- Elections and Right to vote
- Suomi.fi Web Service
- Citizen Certificate and electronic identity
- Guardianship
- Continuing power of attorney
- Appointment of a guardian
- Duties of the guardian
- Guardianship for a minor
- Who can act as a guardian?
- Actions that require the permission of the guardianship authority
- Appointing a substitute guardian
- Termination of guardianship
- Giving up the guardian’s task
- Guardianship authority's means of supervision
- Looking after the interests of an absent person or the future owner of the property
- Restrictions to competency and declaration of incompetence
- Extracts from the Register of Guardianship Affairs
- Certificates from the Population Information System
- Population information in the Population Information System
- Registration of a gift notification
- Services of notary public
- Certification of purchase
- Citizens’ initiative
- Death and estate inventory
- Living abroad
- Moving
- Registration of citizenship
- Divorce granted abroad
- Death abroad
- Registration of a child born abroad
- Registration of a name change performed abroad
- Notification of a marriage concluded abroad
- Registration of the act applicable to the matrimonial property regime
- Legalisation of foreign documents
- Notification of retaining Finnish citizenship
- Moving to Finland
- Public Service Info
- Address service
- Forms
- Marriage
- Organisations
- Certificates
- Updating customer registers
- Sampling and analysis services
- Search services of the Population Information System
- Local Register Office Register search services
- Extracts from registers
- Maintaining the Population Information System
- Suomi.fi services
- Services to promote digitalisation
- Digital security services
- Services of notary public
- Certification of purchase
- Right to officiate weddings
- E-services
- About the agency