Join PAM

You should already join PAM when you are a student at a vocational institute or university of applied sciences, studying for work in the service sector. Students don’t have to pay any membership fees.

Read more about student membership

If you work while studying, you should join as a full member and pay membership fees. You will then also have the right to get employment advice and possibly legal counselling. 

Lue lisää varsinaisesta jäsenyydestä 

You should join PAM as a full member when you start a summer job in the service sector or work in the service sector during your studies. You never know what kinds of issues you may face in your workplace, and the union can assist you with questions about matters such as your employment relationship and wages.

Unemployment security

As a full member, you can also accumulate the employment requirement for your earnings-related unemployment allowance. You meet the employment requirement once you have been in salaried work for at least 26 calendar weeks. Each calendar week in which you work for at least 18 hours counts as a week for the employment requirement, as long as you also pay membership fees based on your salary. The employment requirement must be fulfilled during a period of 28 months.

Read more about earnings-related unemployment allowance and the employment requirement on the unemployment fund’s website.

Union membership is a good idea, even if you only work in the service sector for a short while. If you later go on to another field, you can transfer to another union.

If you are an entrepreneur or self-employed, you can join PAM as an entrepreneur member, but you can’t be a member of PAM’s unemployment fund. As an entrepreneur, you pay membership fees based on the earnings that are used to define your pension insurance premium.

You are considered to be an entrepreneur if you pay YEL or MYEL pension premiums or have another statutory pension insurance, or one of the following is true:

• You work in a leading position in a limited company (osakeyhtiö) in which you own at least 15% of the share capital or have corresponding power
• You work in a leading position in a limited company in which you, together with your family members, own at least 30% of the share capital or have corresponding power
• You work in another position in a limited company in which you, alone or together with your family members, own at least 50% of the share capital or the voting power, or have corresponding power
• You work in another company or organisation in which you, alone or together with your family members, have the kind of power that has been described above.

You are also considered to be an entrepreneur if your family member is an active partner in a limited partnership (kommandiittiyhtiö), or your family member has a business name (toiminimi).

You are considered to be in a leading position if you are the managing director, board member or have similar authority in the business. Family members include spouses, live-in partners and direct descendants and ancestors of the entrepreneur who live in the same household.

If you own a share in your employer company as listed above, you are usually considered to be an entrepreneur when unemployment benefits are considered. You may then not have the right to get daily allowances from a workers’ unemployment fund.

The Entrepreneur Fund offers benefits to entrepreneurs and their family members.

It’s easy to transfer to PAM. Just enter the information about your previous union or unemployment fund in the PAM membership form. 

If you are transferring to PAM from another union or unemployment fund, fill in the information of that union or fund in the membership form. Also remember to select the item that will authorise PAM to manage your move from another organisation. You don’t need to tell your previous union about transferring to PAM; PAM will contact them and manage everything.  

When does my membership begin? 

Your membership begins on the day when the form arrives at PAM’s member register. You don’t have to pay the membership fee for the first month (the month when you join). For example, if you join on 10 September, you will start paying the fee from 1 October. This benefit does not apply to people who leave PAM and then join again within 12 months. 

When I change unions, will my unemployment security continue uninterrupted? 

It is safe to transfer to PAM from another union or unemployment fund. Just make sure there is no break in your memberships. When you transfer, your right to an earnings-related unemployment allowance will continue.  

If you have already left your previous union or unemployment fund, make sure that you join PAM within 30 days. If you do this, you will still meet the employment requirement for the earnings-related unemployment allowance. Make sure that your membership fee for the previous union or unemployment fund has been paid up until the day when you transfer.