Migri pilots automated decision-making for student residence permit

The Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) on Thursday started using automated decision-making in the processing of residence permits for studies, said an official press release.

The authority issues an automated decision, if the application meets all the requirements for issuing the permit.

Negative decisions and decisions that require individual consideration, however, are not issued automatically.

Automated decision-making is one of the measures taken to make the processing of residence permits more efficient and uniform, said Migri.

The Migri aims at an average processing time of no more than one month for residence permits for employed persons and students.

“Automated processing will standardise the processing of applications, which promotes safe and seamless immigration. Automation also frees up specialists’ time to work on cases which need individual consideration or further clarification,” said Deputy Director-General of Migri Elina Immonen.

The Finnish Immigration Service is first testing automated decision-making with residence permit applications submitted by degree students at universities and by all exchange students. Based on the results, automation will later be expanded to include other customer groups.

The system checks that the requirements for issuing the permit are met by using the same criteria that are applied to matters processed by an official.

In addition, the applicant must have proved his or her identity at a Finnish mission or at a service point of the Migri. After that, the Migri cans issue an automated decision, if the application has been submitted in the online service Enter Finland by a university student or an exchange student, the processing fee has been paid, the application includes all the necessary information, and all the requirements for issuing the permit are met.

If the requirements are not met, or the application needs clarification, the application is always transferred to an official, who will make the decision.

This limited pilot scheme makes it possible to introduce automated decision-making in a controlled manner, making sure that it works as desired.

“We have used automation for a long time at different stages of the process to make processing more effective. Now the use of automation will be extended to both automated decisions and post-decision monitoring. When the requirements laid down by law are met, a permit can be issued effectively, and it is also possible to monitor that the requirements are still met during the validity of the permit,” said Chief Digital Officer of Migri Anna Cheung.

The processing of an application is still not fully automated. For example, the identity of the applicant must be verified by an official and officials are also responsible for individually assessing the results of register checks even though automated processing is used.