Finland Work Visa to be issued within two weeks: Finnish Employment Minister

A result of the growth in the commercial relationship between India and Finland, the exchange of goods and services have crossed about USD 2.5 billion. Given the improvement in the trade between India and Finland, the rate of issuance of work visas has increased. Therefore, for better bilateral trade, Finland is now willing to reduce the existing processing time from 52 days to as little as 2 weeks by next year.

According to an interview given to the PTI, the Employment Minister of Finland, Timo Harakka has mentioned that it is a plan of the government to reduce the Finland work visa processing time to about 15 days. This change is supposed to draw more skilled Indian software professionals to the country.

"For these expert visas and for these expert work permits, which require a certain (level of) income, but are also on the express lane on permits, we are aiming to get these things handled in one or two weeks," Harakka said to PTI.

"We are looking to shorten the time frame. This can be achieved next year because we are shifting the whole process of immigration -- work-based and study-based immigration -- to my Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment from the Interior Ministry," he added.