As a PAM member you get security and advocacy in working life

• in commerce, for example as a sales assistant, logistics worker or supervisor
• in hospitality, for example as a chef, waiter or supervisor
• in property services, for example as a cleaner or property maintenance worker
• at a security company, Alko, a pharmacy, Veikkaus, an amusement park, an adventure services company, a cinema, a customer service or telemarketing company, a moving services, Avecra, or at a ski centre.

You should join PAM already when you are a student at a vocational institute or university of applied sciences, studying for work in the service sector. Student membership is free.

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. 

Read more about full membership 

It’s worth joining PAM as a full member even if you only have a summer job or occasional work in the service sector. You never know what kind of issues might come up at work, and the union can help with employment and wage matters.

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 12 months during a period of 28 months. The work requirement accumulates based on wage income. Every calendar month you are paid at least 930 euros in wages you accumulate one month towards the work requirement. If you earn between 465-929 euros, then you accumulate half a month.

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.

PAM Couriers Finland is a nationwide union branch that brings together couriers from different platform companies and aim to improve their financial and social status. For example, couriers from both Wolt and Foodora are already involved.

• you are on parental leave
• you are fully unemployed or laid off
• you are on some other leave and don’t have a wage income.