Frequently asked questions about financial matters related to guardianship 

No, you do not. However, please explain in the question in your own words whether your client is capable of independent action or transactions and what kinds of actions/matters they manage. 

Yes, you do. First discuss with your client to find out what kind of property they have.  

You can also contact various other parties, such as the bank. 

Yes. You are obligated to secrecy in all matters related to your duties as guardian. However, your client may give you permission to  

• discuss matters concerning them with someone else, or  
• disclose information about them to others.  

During your time as guardian, you are entitled to access all the information your client has the right to access. 

The Finnish Tax Administration website provides calculation formulas for various situations. 

You cannot represent both yourself as the debtor and the client as the creditor at the same time. In other words, you are disqualified and need to apply for a substitute guardian.  

In addition, you need our permission to lend money from your client’s assets. Your substitute will apply for the permit from us. Before that, the terms and conditions of the loan must be agreed upon: interest must be paid on the loan and a security must be deposited. Granting a loan must in any case be in the interest of your client.  

Please note that the permit decision will be subject to a charge, and the decision could be negative.  

You cannot give gifts on your own initiative. Only the client can make the decision on gift-giving on their own initiative and at their own discretion. If the client wants to give a gift that can be considered normal in the circumstances and insignificant in financial value, you can see to the matter at their request. 

The client must always understand the meaning of giving a gift and be able to independently make the decision to give a gift. If the client does not understand the meaning of giving a gift, you cannot give the gift even if it could be considered normal in the circumstances. 

If your client's health permits, you must provide them with a certain amount of spending money for their own free use. If your client is able to manage a bank account, they must be assigned a running expenses account to which only they have access.  

Running expenses account is not required if the client is unable to use it. In this case, their guardian, you must ensure that your client is provided their spending money to their place of care, for example.  

Agree with your client on the amount of spending money and how it is provided. This can be called a spending-money policy. However, if your client is no longer able to agree on the spending money themselves, agree with, for example, the place of care on how much and how often you will provide the client with spending money. Request an acknowledgement of receipt if you hand over cash to your client or their place of care and append the receipt to the annual statement. 

If your client is no longer able to use spending money, explain and justify in the annual statement why there is no need for it. 

This means that the client has access to their own account and the guardian has access to the other accounts. 

In practice, the guardian opens a bank account for their client at the start of their guardianship where they transfer spending money for their client. The guardian and the client jointly agree on the amount of spending money and the payment dates (see also the previous question). Only the client has access to this running expenses account. Therefore, the guardian does not need to report the transactions of the account to us.  

Access to the client’s other bank accounts will on the other hand be given only to the guardian. Usually, the guardian will use one bank account to pay the client's bills. The guardian has to report the transactions of these accounts to us, which is why these accounts can be called supervised bank accounts. 

The accounting period is usually the calendar year.  

The exceptions to this are the first and last accounting period: The first accounting period begins on the date of the guardian’s appointment and ends on 31 December. The last accounting period begins on 1 January and ends on the date on which the guardianship ends. 

This is the responsibility of the guardian. The guardian can also buy the service from an accounting agency. If this case, the cost of the accounting agency’s services must be deducted from the possible guardian’s fee. The guardian is responsible for the provided data and signs the documents submitted to us. 

Data is calculated on the basis of the information provided in account statements. The data is itemised by type of income 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. The data is itemised by type of expenditure and reported as both a total sum for the entire accounting period and itemised amounts. 

Fair value refers to the resale price, i.e. the price for which the property could be sold. 

Determining the fair value is your responsibility. However, you do not need to ask an expert for their opinion on the fair value for your property inventory or annual and final statement. Instead, you can determine it yourself in the following ways:  

• You can use the fair value from the previous year if it has remained approximately the same. However, if a location has been renovated or subjected to other actions, you may need to determine its new fair value. 
• You can examine purchase price statistics to compare how much has been paid for a similar apartment/real estate. 
• You can justify the new value on the basis of the renovations and improvements made at the location. 
• For more information on forest holdings, see the Metsaan.fi service. 
• You can examine estate inventory deeds or inheritance settlement deeds, if these are recent. 

If you do need an expert’s assessment for managing the matters of your client, you can request assessment from a real estate agent, property manager or forestry expert. 

We do not recommend using taxable values, as they do not often correspond to the fair value. Use the methods listed in the answer to the above question instead to determine the fair value. 

The Finnish Tax Administration website provides calculation formulas for various situations. 

Ask the enforcement authority or the banks. 

You do not need to report any normal household effects. Report vehicles that cause expenses. 

Your annual statement must always include  

• account statements of all deposits held in the name of your client for the accounting period (bank accounts, investments, securities, etc.) 
• the most recent tax decision. 

Also note:  

• If you open a new bank account during the accounting period, append the related agreements (account access right changes, opening of an account for running expenses, arrangement of accounts) to the annual statement. 
• If there have been any changes to the pensions or benefits you have previously reported, append the notifications and decisions concerning them to the annual statement. Remember to always request notifications and decisions for yourself and redirect the income to your client's account that you have access to. 
• If there have been any changes to the agreements you have previously reported, append the new agreements (rent, residential care, charges for treatment, insurance) to the annual statement. 
• If you notice income to or payments from the account that deviate from the norm, append the receipts concerning them to the annual statement. 
• If you are going to charge a guardian's fee or claim the reimbursement of expenses, append the relevant calculations to the annual statement. For more information about the guardian’s fee, please see below. 

Your task as guardian comes to an end when the client dies. Therefore, you cannot manage affairs related to their estate in your role as guardian. 

If you wish to manage affairs even after your client’s death and you are not a stakeholder in the estate, all the stakeholders in the estate must authorise you to manage the estate’s affairs. In this case, contact the bank. 

If you are a stakeholder in the estate, you will manage the estate’s affairs in the role of a stakeholder. 

The use of e-services on behalf of your client is not usually possible after your duties have come to an end. 

However, as guardian, you have the right to receive, for example, the necessary bank statements from the bank up to the date when your duties were valid. You can prove the validity of your task with an extract from the Register of Guardianship Affairs, which has been sent to you at the beginning of your duties. 

Yes, you can. The estate inventory deed does not need to be attached to the final statement. 

We will audit the final statement without delay and send it and its attachments back to you as soon as possible.  

Do not append the original receipts to the final statement, only send the copies. 

Audits are subject to a fee. We attempt to audit the final statements without delay. However, sometimes the guardian is late in submitting the annual or final statement for auditing, or the audit is delayed for some other reason. 

If the guardianship has ended due to the client's death, the audit fee must be paid from the assets of the estate. If the estate's assets have already been distributed among the stakeholders, the audit fee is paid as agreed between the stakeholders. 

As the guardian of an adult client, you can charge a fee. There is a separate calculator for calculating the guardian’s fee. 

As guardian, you will report your fee to the Incomes Register. For more information, see instructions on how to submit guardian’s fee data to the Incomes Register.

Yes, you can. You do not have to charge a fee.

If you have stated that you will not charge a fee, you cannot later decide to charge a fee for that accounting period. 

We do not advise you to do that. Please note that the general limitation period for a debt is three years. You cannot charge expired fees. You may also not accumulate debt to your client for the guardian’s fees.

If you only charge the basic fee, you can charge it already during the financial year. The basic fee is EUR 440. If, however, the client's annual income does not exceed EUR 14,000 and their wealth is less than EUR 18,079.56, the basic fee is EUR 280.  

If the accounting period was 5 months, the basic fee would be 440 : 12 × 5 = EUR 183.33 

If you charge the maximum amount in accordance with fee calculation, you should charge it only after the audit. This way, you avoid having to reimburse any overpayment. 

As guardian, you will perform the transaction from your client's assets. Pay the bill in the same way as you would your client's other bills. Write in the message field that this is a guardian's fee and the year of the accounting period for which the fee applies. 

In addition to the fee, can I also pay my own withholding tax?  

No, you cannot. The guardian’s fee is subject to taxation. As guardian, you must handle the matter yourself with the tax authority. 

All income paid in cash is considered the client’s income, including  

• wages, pensions and other earned income 
• interest, rent, dividend and other capital income and  
• social benefits (e.g. housing and care allowance, social assistance). 

Withholding tax, precollection and employee’s statutory contributions are deducted from the income.  

The proceeds from selling the annual yield of the forest can be taken into account as income.  

Instructions: years for which yield is taken into account × amount of annual yield in cubic metres × average price per cubic metre - forest regeneration costs = annual yield (in euros) to be taken into account in fee calculation.  

Explanation for the instructions: 

• years for which yield is taken into account = start of guardianship or latest sale (whichever is most recent) 
• amount of annual yield in cubic metres = this is either stated in the forest management plan or you can find it out by consulting a forestry expert 
• average price per cubic metre = calculate the total income generated from selling forest yield during the accounting period and divide the total by the number of cubic metres sold. 
• forest regeneration costs = calculate the forest management costs from the accounting period  
• annual yield to be taken into account in fee calculation = the resulting number can be applied in fee calculation as income generated from selling the yield of the forest. 

Significant capital gains taxes and value added taxes on forest sales due in the subsequent year are entered as debts in advance. Wealth is also affected by any significant income from forest sales due in the subsequent year. These can be added to the wealth in advance. Please note that if timber sales exceed the annual yield of the forest, it will have a decreasing effect on wealth. 

No, they are not.

No, it cannot.  

Yes. For fee calculation, deduct the value of an apartment or property in personal use by the client. Also deduct the value any related yard area. If the property includes forest or arable land, its value does not need to be deducted. 

The apartment is considered to be in personal use if 

• the apartment does not generate income. 
• the client can no longer live in the apartment and the apartment has not been rented out. 
• the apartment is empty and waiting to be sold.  

In addition, an apartment rented out at a loss can be considered to be in personal use.  

For calculating the guardian’s fee, the value of an apartment in personal use is deducted from the wealth. 

As guardian, you are entitled to be reimbursed for expenses that have resulted from your management of your client’s financial affairs. You must always manage your client's affairs in the manner that is most appropriate and affordable. 

As guardian, you will also report any reimbursement of expenses to the Incomes Register. Please see instructions for reporting reimbursements to the Incomes Register.

You must provide a calculation of the expenses resulting 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. Also present a claim for reimbursement for the required expenses. 

If you have not been appointed to manage your client’s personal affairs, you cannot claim for reimbursement for expenses resulting from the management of such matters (e.g. grocery shopping, doctor’s visits, health and recreational visits). 

Your role as family member must also always be kept separate from your role as guardian; the tasks you have handled in your role as family member cannot be charged for during your guardianship.  

No, you cannot. The guardian is not employed by the client.  

Any fees and expenses paid by your client are considered your trade income. Tax-exempt reimbursements of expenses, such as daily allowances, cannot be paid to a receiver of trade income. For this reason, you cannot use the Finnish Tax Administration's decision on the reimbursement of travel expenses in determining the reimbursement of your expenses.