Kotihoidon tuki

Home-care allowance is governed by the Act on Home Care and Private Care Allowance for Children (laki lasten kotihoidon ja yksityisen hoidon tuesta 1128/1996). The benefit is part of the early-childhood-education funding package, in which a family essentially has three options: municipal day care, private day care (with the private-care allowance) or home care (with the home-care allowance).

The benefit is paid by Kela, but a significant share of municipalities additionally pay a kuntalisä (municipal supplement) at their own discretion. For example, Helsinki, Espoo and Tampere pay substantial municipal supplements that can multiply the basic Kela package. Conditions vary between municipalities — in some the supplement ends when the child turns 18 months, in others it continues to age 3.

Home-care allowance ends automatically when the child turns 3 years old or moves into municipal day care — whichever comes first.

Home-care allowance consists of three parts:

• Care allowance — a flat amount per child under 3 in care (in 2026 about €384/month for the first child, €115/month for further children under 3, €73/month for siblings over 3).
• Care supplement — a means-tested supplement that depends on the family's monthly income. The care supplement is at most about €207/month and decreases as income rises.
• Municipal supplement — a municipality-specific, discretionary top-up. About €264/month in Helsinki for longer-term carers, €180/month + a step scale in Espoo, €218/month in Tampere. Check your own municipality's pages.

Altogether a capital-region family can therefore receive about €850–1,000/month for one child under 3 once child benefit is also counted in.

Home-care allowance can be received by a family with at least one child under 3 who is not in municipal day care. The carer can be:

• The child's parent
• The child's grandparent or other relative
• A private childminder or family day-care provider
• One of the parents on family leave

If the family also has children aged 3 or older who are also kept at home rather than in municipal day care, home-care allowance is also paid for them — but at a much smaller amount (about €73/month per sibling over 3).

The benefit is not paid if the child uses a municipal day-care place even part-time, or if the family chooses private day care and receives the private-care allowance for it (which is a separate benefit).

By default, the parent at home can do part-time work while receiving home-care allowance, but their own income affects the amount of the care supplement. If the other parent is in full-time work, only the parent at home receives the home-care allowance.

If you want part-time work rather than full-time home care, look into the flexible care allowance or partial care allowance, which are smaller amounts available instead of home-care allowance. Their condition is that the working week is reduced to no more than 30 hours.

If the family has multiple children and only some are in home care, the benefit is paid only for the children kept at home. Children in day care do not generate the benefit.

Home-care allowance is not paid in parallel with parental daily allowance or an unemployment benefit. The typical chronological order is:

1. Parental allowance — until the first parent's 160-day quota runs out (around the child's 9th month).
2. Other parent's parental allowance — taken at a freely chosen point before the child turns 2.
3. Home-care allowance — once the parental-allowance period ends, if the child is still being cared for at home.

A low-income family should additionally apply for general housing allowance and, if needed, basic social assistance. Child benefit runs throughout, automatically.

Note: if the other parent is unemployed and receives an unemployment benefit, the home-care allowance is paid to the parent at home, not to the unemployed one. The unemployment benefit continues separately for the unemployed parent.

The application is filed in OmaKela. The attachments needed are minimal: the child's personal identity code (retrieved automatically from the population register), the applicant's personal identity code and bank-account number.

The benefit can be applied for retroactively for at most 6 months, so a delay does not always mean lost money — but support older than that is not paid.

The decision usually arrives in about 2 weeks. The municipal supplement is applied for separately via your own municipality — each municipality processes the supplement application and decision itself, and Kela does not handle it. In many municipalities the supplement is applied for via your own municipality's online service or a paper form.