Employers get three months to fix employment register entries

An employer that filed wrong employment data in Estonia has two different routes, and the route depends on how much time has passed since the filing duty aroseEmta. Within the first three months the employer fixes the entry itself electronicallyEmta; after three months only a reasoned request to Maksu- ja Tolliamet can change the entryEmta.

Inside the three-month window an employer can correct data in the Töötamise register electronically from the start, suspension start, suspension end or termination dateEmta. Entered dates can be moved up to three months backwards for both current and ended entriesEmta. Once the correction period has passed, the date fields no longer accept changesEmta. Detailed employment data cannot currently be corrected retroactively at all.

Where an entry was made by mistake or the work never starts, the employer can cancel the entry electronically within three months after the marked start dateEmta. Cancellation runs inside the register: on the employment search page the employer clicks the entry number, opens the detail view and presses Tühistan at the bottom of the entry data page.

After more than three months since the filing duty, data can be corrected only on the basis of a reasoned request to Maksu- ja TolliametEmta. The request is filed in the e-MTA menu Suhtlus – Kirjavahetus, sent digitally signed to emta@emta.ee, or lodged at a Maksu- ja Tolliamet service bureau. It states the name and contact details of the data submitter and attaches evidence showing why the change is needed. Maksu- ja Tolliamet assesses the justification on the submitted evidence together with other available circumstances and refuses the correction when it is not justified.

Maksu- ja Tolliamet decides on the correction or on the refusal within 30 days after the request was filedEmta. Responsibility for the correctness of an entry sits with the person who made it, and a mistake must be corrected without delay; where self-correction is no longer possible, the request route with its 14-day filing rule after learning of the need to amend is the only way forwardRiigiteataja.

Data carried over from Tervisekassa needs no correction. Registration of employment at Maksu- ja Tolliamet started on 1 July 2014Emta, and employments valid before that date were moved into the Töötamise register from then-Eesti Haigekassa dataEmta to reduce administrative burden. A start date from before 1 July 2014 therefore does not always match the real start of workEmta. That older data is informative onlyEmta and Maksu- ja Tolliamet generally does not amend itEmta. Register data carries legal significance from 1 July 2014Emta, so the employer must keep entries made from that date correct and currentEmta. Where a pre-July 2014 start date differs from the employment contract, that alone generally brings no loss of rights or benefitsEmta, and social guarantees for periods before 1 July 2014 are assessed primarily on payments declared on the income- and social-tax return TSDEmta.

Legal basis: Maksukorralduse seadus §§ 251, 256 and 257.