The digital ID of an e-resident is valid for five years. When it expires, you can no longer sign for your company digitally. But the deadline for the annual report does not wait. That is how a working company quietly slides towards penalty payments and deletion from the register.
The good news: an expired card does not mean that the report cannot be filed. There are several solutions. And it is worth acting at once, because being late becomes expensive.
What happens if the report is not filed
The register does not impose a fine straight away. First it sends a warning to the management board and gives a new deadline. Only when that deadline also passes does a penalty payment follow. If the report is still not filed after repeated warnings, the register may in the end delete the company from the register. So no single warning is a disaster yet, but every warning has to be taken seriously.
Smart-ID is not a backup plan
Many people rely on Smart-ID. It does not help. According to the Police and Border Guard Board, when the digital ID of an e-resident expires or is revoked, your Smart-ID account is deleted as well. The card and Smart-ID disappear together.
The report can also be filed without a digital signature
The report may be approved on paper. A board member signs the report by hand. The signature page is then scanned and uploaded to the portal as a PDF file.
You do not have to enter the data yourself. A board member may authorize another person, for example an accountant, to enter the report data. Up to five people can be authorized per company. The report may be filed either by a board member or by the authorized person who enters the data.
One limit still matters: the report is still approved by a board member. A signature on paper helps you get past an expired card. It does not mean that the accountant signs on your behalf.
If the company has another board member with a valid Estonian digital ID, the simplest way is to let that person sign the report digitally.
The cheapest solution: do not let the card expire
The police send a reminder three months before the validity ends. Even so, do not count on it. The card cannot be extended. You have to submit a new application and collect the card in person. The authority states that the digital ID of an e-resident must always be collected in person, including when the document is renewed.
So start early. Especially when the 30 June report deadline is close. A couple of weeks of delay may mean that you miss the deadline.
If you are already in trouble
This article was prepared with the help of artificial intelligence.