Registration, banking and utilities in Porto

The NIF, and getting it early

The número de identificação fiscal is nine digits and it is required for employment, contracts, bank accounts and social security. A foreign national applies in person, by prior appointment, at any Serviço de Finanças or Loja do Cidadão, bringing a civil identification document such as a passport and proof of a foreign address. You do not have to be in the country. A representative can apply through the tax authority's e-balcão under Registo Contribuinte > Identific > Atrib/Alter NIF-Singulares, supplying their own identification and a power of attorney with a recognised signature, which is what makes getting the number before you fly practical rather than theoretical.

• Appointments are booked on the Portal das Finanças under Contactos > Atendimento por Marcação, or by phone on +351 217 206 707, weekdays 09:00 to 19:00.

Why the order is forced

The sequence is set by document requirements rather than by custom. Registering with the health service asks for the NIF, the civil identification number, the residence permit and a permanent Portuguese address, so healthcare cannot be done before the tax number and the housing are settled. Where a residence authorisation document is not available, a rental contract or a utility bill is explicitly accepted as the proof of address. That is exactly why an undeclared, receipt-less tenancy stalls everything downstream of it.

AIMA, and the dates on your certificates

AIMA, the Agência para a Integração, Migrações e Asilo, is the body that handles residence documents, and it is the entity the health regulator points foreign nationals to when their access to care is blocked. Its published checklists set a maximum age for civil-status certificates — marriage and birth certificates have to have been issued recently, and the window differs by route and by the applicant's age. Those windows change, and an out-of-date certificate stops an application being accepted at all rather than being accepted and then refused.

• Get AIMA's current checklist for your own route from aima.gov.pt, and read off it how recently each certificate must have been issued and whether it needs an apostille or a certified translation.
• Do that before you pay for a single translation or apostille, because a certificate that expires in the queue has to be bought again.

Two things to confirm rather than assume

The registration certificate EU citizens are expected to hold is not listed among the Câmara Municipal do Porto's Gabinete do Munícipe services, so ask the câmara and AIMA which counter issues it and what it wants before you turn up on spec. The same goes for the NISS, the social security number: ask Segurança Social what it requires and where it sits in your sequence rather than assuming it can wait. Neither is something to leave to the week before a job starts.

In order

1. 1Apply for the NIF, in person by appointment or through a representative holding a power of attorney with a recognised signature.
2. 2Take a passport and proof of your foreign address to the appointment.
3. 3Open a Portuguese bank account once the NIF exists.
4. 4Sign a lease and confirm the landlord files Modelo 2 by the end of the following month.
5. 5Put electricity and water in your own name; the bill doubles as proof of address.
6. 6Get AIMA's current checklist for your own residence route before you order a single certificate, and ask how recently each one must have been issued.
7. 7Register at the centro de saúde for your address, taking your identification, your NIF and proof of where you live.
8. 8Ask Segurança Social what a NISS requires and when, rather than assuming it can wait.