Mandate themes for non-Finnish companies

To transact with Finnish Customs, foreign companies must register a right to grant a mandate for an assigned person using the Digital and Population Data Services Agency DVV’s mandate service provided by officials. The registration is a requirement for all foreign companies that have a business identifier, that is, an EORI number granted in Finland or some other EU country.

The registration is also mandatory when a foreign company wants to transact using the EU’s e-services and, when logging in to service, selects Finland as the country where it wishes to be authenticated.

The registration process may take months to be completed, so it is advisable to start the process well in advance.

If a non-Finnish person handles the company’s transactions with Customs, this person must apply for a foreigner’s identifier (UID) in the Finnish Authenticator Service.

How a company can give a non-Finnish person the right to grant a mandate for a foreign company

The company must have an EORI number. Apply for a number in your own country if your company is established within the EU.

Decide who will be given the right to grant a mandate, that is, the right to authorise other persons to transact with Customs on behalf of the company. The person to be authorised is usually the CEO or managing director of the company, but the person can also be, for instance, the CFO or the head of operations in Finland.  

The non-Finnish person should apply for a foreigner’s identifier (UID) in the Finnish Authenticator Identification Service. The company needs the identifier for the application to register the mandate that is to be submitted later.

  • Submit a registration application in the mandate service provided by officials to give the non-Finnish person the right to grant a mandate. Add the foreigner’s identifier (UID) of the person to the application.
  • The person who signs the application must have the right to sign for the company. Print out the application and mail it to the DVV as instructed or submit it at one of the DVV’s service locations.

Links to the mandate service provided by officials: 

The DVV will notify you by email once the mandate has been registered. 

Using form 1131e, notify Customs of your company’s EORI number and the EU VAT ID or national business ID that you have provided to the DVV in the application for registration of the mandate. Send the form to Customs as instructed in the form after you have filled in the application for registration of the mandate.

After the company has obtained an email from the DVV stating that the right to grant a mandate has been registered, the non-Finnish person can identify him- or herself in the Suomi.fi e-Authorisations service using the foreigner’s identifier (UID) from the Finnish Authenticator Identification Service. The person can now grant a mandate for transactions to the person who will use Customs’ e-service.

If you are going to use Customs’ e-service yourself, you must also grant the mandate for transactions to yourself.

If you are granting the mandate to another non-Finnish person, that person must obtain a foreigner’s identifier (IUD) in the Finnish Authenticator Identification Service as described under item 2. Once the person has obtained the UID, you can grant him or her mandates for the transactions that he or she needs.

Example: if the carrier authorises the driver to submit presentation notifications for goods transported across the Åland tax border, the driver should be granted the mandate for transactions “Customs clearance”.

If you are granting the mandate to a Finnish person, you will need his or her personal identity code for the authorisation.

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