The activities of the Regional State Administrative Agencies will end at the end the year 2025. Most of our tasks will be transferred to the new Finnish Supervisory Agency, which will launch its operations on 1 January 2026. Tasks related to animal health and welfare and to food will be transferred to the Finnish Food Authority. Competition and consumer administration tasks will be transferred to the Finnish Competition and Consumer Authority.
Read more: Reform of regional state administration
An operations inspector evaluates a corporation with regard to how its administration is organised, the accuracy of its accounts and financial statements, the appropriateness of benefits awarded to management and of related party transactions, and whether members are treated equally.
Previously, any person was allowed to perform the duties of an auditor, even if they were not a professionally qualified auditor. Subsequently, the title of ‘auditor’ was restricted to professionally qualified auditors, and the function of an operations inspector was differentiated from it.
An auditor may, of course, perform the duties of an operations inspector. Corporations that are allowed by law to appoint an operations inspector may themselves determine whom they consider to have sufficient competence to perform the duties of an operations inspector.
If a corporation is required by law, articles of association or statutes to have an operations inspector and the inspector has not been appointed, you can ask us to appoint an inspector.
If a corporation does not need to elect an operations inspector by law, articles of association or statutes, shareholders or members may, under the conditions laid down by law, require the election of an operations inspector at the corporation’s meeting.
If a limited liability housing company does not have an auditor, and shareholders holding at least one tenth of all shares or one third of the shares represented at the meeting request it at an ordinary general meeting or at a general meeting where the matter is to be discussed in accordance with the notice of the meeting, the limited liability housing company must appoint an operations inspector.
If a right-of-occupancy corporation does not have an auditor, and at least one tenth of all the members of the corporation or one third of the members present at the meeting request it at an ordinary general meeting or at a general meeting where the matter is to be discussed in accordance with the notice of the meeting, the right-of-occupancy corporation must appoint an operations inspector.
If a cooperative does not have an auditor, and members who hold at least one quarter of the total number of votes of the members of the cooperative or one third of the votes of the members represented at the meeting request it at an ordinary meeting or at a meeting where the matter is to be discussed in accordance with the notice of the meeting, the cooperative must appoint an operations inspector.
The operations inspector must possess financial and legal knowledge and experience to a degree deemed necessary in light of the nature and extent of the operations of the corporation.
Basically, the corporation itself should determine what is required of the operations inspector.
It is customary for parties submitting such a request to propose an auditor or other person with expertise in financial management as the operations inspector.
An application for the appointment of an operations inspector may be submitted by a shareholder of a limited liability housing company, a member of a right-of-occupancy corporation or a member of a cooperative.
When the shares of a limited liability housing company are held jointly by several parties (known as joint owners), all joint owners must be applicants in the matter, or the applicant must have a power of attorney from the other joint owners.
The application must be received by the Regional State Administrative Agency for the region where the corporation’s registered office is located within one month of the meeting at which the appointment of an operations inspector was requested and supported.
Send a freeform written application to the registry of the Regional State Administrative Agency for the region where the corporation has its registered office. A link to the contact information of Regional State Administrative Agencies’ registries is provided at the bottom of this page.
There is no application form, but you must apply in writing. Include the following information and supporting documents in your application:
We charge a fee for processing the application. 2024 the fee is EUR 290.
If you withdraw the application, we will charge a portion of the fee equivalent to the work done in processing the application up until that time.
First, we investigate the grounds for the application. If the requirements specified by law are not satisfied, we will dismiss the application.
If the matter as explained in the application is unclear, we will send a request for further information to the applicant.
Once we have received an explanation that the unconditional requirements specified by law are satisfied, we will consult the board of the corporation concerning the application.
After we have received the information we need to process the application, we either appoint an operations inspector to the corporation or reject the application.
The corporation for which an operations inspector is appointed must pay the fee of the operations inspector.
For an estimate of how much the fee is likely to be, please consult the person proposed as an operations inspector in the application.
The appointment shall remain valid until an operations inspector or substitute operations inspector has been duly appointed for the corporation to replace the operations inspector or substitute operations inspector appointed by the Regional State Administrative Agency.
The Regional State Administrative Agency cannot make an appointment once the financial statements for the financial period in question have been confirmed and the decision on same has acquired legal force.
If an operations inspector has been appointed for the corporation and the applicant does not withdraw the application, we will reject the application.
If the applicant withdraws the application, we will charge a portion of the fee equivalent to the work done in processing the application up until that time.
No, it does not. The Regional State Administrative Agency simply names the person for the appointment. If the person submitting the informal request does not include a proposal for a person to be appointed operations inspector, it may be impossible for us to find anyone else than a professionally qualified auditor to serve as operations inspector.
Such a company may appoint an operations inspector instead of an auditor as specified in the Articles of Association if:
If the Articles of Association of the limited liability housing company were drawn up before 1 July 2010 and have not been amended in any way since 1 July 2010, then any provision in the Articles of Association adopted before 1 July 2010 concerning the waiving of an audit shall be construed to refer to the waiving of an operations inspection as well.
If the Articles of Association have been amended in any way since 1 July 2010, then any provision in the Articles of Association concerning the waiving of an audit shall be construed to refer only to the waiving of an audit, not to the waiving of an operations inspection.
Once the Articles of Association have been amended (e.g. to change the name of the company), the exemption clause shall no longer apply. In other words, if there is a provision in the Articles of Association that the company must have an auditor, then the company must appoint a professionally qualified auditor.
The exemption clause only applies to cases where the Articles of Association were drawn up before 1 July 2010 and have not been amended in any way since then.
The Finnish Patent and Registration Office may appoint an auditor for a company.
