EN Työsuojelutarkastus - How to prepare for an occupational safety and health inspection

Occupational safety and health authority’s instructions for workplaces | Published on 30 December 2025

Why are we inspecting your workplace?

The aim of the occupational safety and health authorities is to ensure that work is safe, healthy and fair. We use versatile enforcement methods to inspect workplaces. We provide advice and guidance to both employers and employees in many ways. The Occupational Safety and Health Divisions at the Regional State Administrative Agencies are responsible for the tasks of the OSH authorities.

During inspections, we ensure that risk management, occupational health care cooperation and orientation procedures are in order. We aim to carry out comprehensive checks on different types of workplaces in various sectors. In particular, we target inspections at workplaces where it is presumed that workers who are in a vulnerable labour market position work.

An inspection is more than just supervision

Our inspections help us to ensure that occupational safety and health issues are handled in accordance with the law. An inspection is not just about supervision, however; it also aims to help the workplace to develop its occupational safety and health activities and working conditions. Our visit is an opportunity for dialogue between the occupational safety inspector, the employer and the employees.

The inspection also deals with any issues that employees at the workplace wish to raise. The inspector cannot solve matters on behalf of the workplace, but they can explain good practices and provide advice on where to find help and tools for challenges.

Prepare for an inspection with documents and self-assessment

An occupational safety and health inspection may focus on such things as working conditions, working life rules or psychosocial workload. The matters to be covered by the inspection are described in the inspection notification.

Before an inspection, the employer should ensure that documents relating to the matters under inspection are readily available during the inspection. This helps make sure that the time allocated for the inspection is not spent looking for information.

Before the inspection, it is also a good idea to carry out a self-evaluation of the occupational safety and health activities at the workplace. This allows the workplace to gain greater benefit from the inspection and be better prepared to develop its occupational safety and health activities. The Halmeri method is one tool for assessing the status of safety management.

Employer checklist

  1. Find the documents you need to have ready.
  2. Even before the inspection, assess the state of occupational safety and health at the workplace.
  3. To support this assessment work, use the information provided on the Tyosuojelu.fi website.
  4. Make sure that an employee representative is involved in the inspection.
  5. Consider who else it could be beneficial to have present at the inspection (the person responsible for human resources matters, occupational health care).
  6. Adhere to the obligations and deadlines issued as a result of the inspection.
  7. Continuously monitor and develop occupational safety and health.

How an occupational safety and health inspection is carried out

Normally, the inspector contacts the employer in advance in order to agree on the date and time of the inspection. If there is a justifiable reason to do so from a supervision perspective, inspections may also be carried out without prior notice.

The object of an inspection is usually a place of work. We also carry out document inspections based on written materials and remote inspections through a meeting application.

The inspector will want to consult representatives of both the employer and the employees during the inspection. The employer may also request that other participants attend the inspection – for example, the presence of occupational health care is recommended.

During the inspection, the inspector will observe working conditions based on discussion, documents, and a tour of the workplace. Working conditions may also be assessed using different indicators or surveys. The results will provide a workplace summary, which will also provide comparative data for the industry average.

At the end of an inspection, the inspector explains their assessment of the work environment and what possible legislative shortcomings they have observed. In such cases, the inspector will issue obligations that will be recorded in the inspection report.

Use our e-service to report any corrections you have made

The employer can use our e-service to submit a report on almost all obligations issued by occupational safety and health inspectors. In the e-service, an employer can also assess the safety of the work environment. For more information, see the page E-service.

The rectification of any defects that are serious or cannot be classed as minor shall be controlled ex-post. Please note: we will only have to resort to strict measures such as conditional fines if deficiencies are not rectified despite a request to do so.

Until 31 December 2025, our telephone service is available at +358 295 016 620. From 1 January 2026, the service will be available at +358 295 256 808. In our telephone service, we advise both employers and employees in matters concerning occupational safety and health and terms of employment. For more information, go to our Telephone service page.