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Monetary

Moving funds internationally

Digital banking/wallet solutions

These are the common digital bank/wallet solutions, they are easy to use but watch out for the fees. - Revolut - Wise

Wire transfer or IBAN/SWIFT directly to a Portuguese bank

You cannot easily send funds to a European bank from a third-country bank, even if you're the owner of both of them. There are many issues and process involved.

  • You need a valid reason for moving these funds
  • Education expenses and tuition fee (has to be documented and on paper)
  • Buying real estate
  • Paying for medical expenses (has to be documented)
  • Starting a business/startup (need valid business plan and application)
  • Backup money or reserve money for future expenses are NOT valid reasons
  • Even if you have a valid reason to move the funds, you need to gather a heap of documents, notarization, subject to criminal background investigation, legal consult, signing waivers and disclaimers.
  • Once you meet all these requirements, you apply to your bank in third-country, and they process, decide your application. So it is not guaranteed to be confirmed. You may be rejected
  • Basically forget about it unless you have other options, it is a pain in the arse.

Deposit and withdrawal from ATM using a foreign card

  • It is possible and widely used, common across the world not specific to Portugal
  • There are usually hefty fees, taxes and cuts so be very careful
  • These fees are either fixed amount (e.g: 15€ flat) or percentage based (e.g: 2%). Some even have combination of both
  • Fees vary per bank of the ATM and your foreign card, try alternate combinations with different ATMs and different cards
  • It is usually not recommended to withdrawal massive amount of cash, as you will lose so much
  • IMPORTANT: for third-country (non-EU) cards, it is almost always the case; when you withdrawal or deposit money you interact only with your local currency account.
  • For example, say you arrived to Portugal. You inserted your bank card (say of a bank from Turkey) to the ATM. Let's assume you have three accounts defined in that card: TL (native to the card's bank), USD and EUR. When you withdrawal, it will ONLY and solely interact with the native currency account, in this scenario TL. Even though you're in Portugal and trying to withdrawal Euro, it will not withdraw from the EUR account.
  • So if your native (native to the card's bank country) currency account is empty, but you have 1000€ in EUR account, you cannot withdraw any money. If you need to, then sell/exchange from EUR account into the native currency account.

Maquina de lavar roupa solution

  • Keep your money in your third-country non-EU bank, in a Euro currency account
  • Activate foreign currency payment on your credit card (third-country bank's credit card)
  • Check your credit card limit, increase if you have to. At least 2000€ is safe, 3000€ and above is recommended.
  • Pay everything with the credit card
  • Pay your credit card debt using the euro currency account, so you basically pay euro debt with euro funds, using your bank's mobile app or internet app
  • Do not ever spend cash on daily expenditures. Always use the credit card for payments whenever you can. If you ever receive/earn cash, deposit it into your Portuguese bank account, for example your wage pays.
  • This way you slowly but steadily launder move your funds into the country. Safe, secure and legal. But seriously though, it is in legal frame AFAIK.

Carry cash in person

  • You are allowed to carry money/gold/check up to 10K €
  • Up to that limit, you don't have to declare it at the customs
  • Anything beyond that is subject to declaration at the customs. If you don't declare and get caught, this money will be treated as part of criminal activity, and you'll be in some deep trouble

Banking

Banks

  • Caixa Geral de Depositos
  • National bank
  • Some claim it is not required to have NIF to open account on them
  • Novobanco (said to be worst by some)
  • Millennium
  • ActivoBank
  • Part of Millennium
  • Common among foreigners
  • Though it is said they no longer accept passport and require citizenship card (what? Wouldn't NIF suffice)+

Opening bank account

Requirements

  • NIF
  • Copy of resident card or passport
    • Along with your visa
  • Proof of address
    • In Portugal or abroad
  • Proof of employment
    • Work contract
    • Pay slips
      • Since you cannot receive salary pay until you open a bank account, it is practically impossible to present this. Though you can provide payslips from your previous employer, as long as it is in English or Portuguese
  • Portuguese phone number
    • Though some guides online claim that it takes so little time to open bank account, I object. There are tons of comments and reviews claiming it takes weeks if not months to open it.
  • Initial deposit amount (varies per bank)
  • Email address
  • (Not sure) Company statement

Cash payment limit

In Portugal, there is a cash payment limit defined by law. If you pay above the limit you may be subject to criminal investigation and/or be subject to paying the legal fine.

  • Receiving or making payments equal or greater than 3.000€ (or its equivalent in foreign currency)
  • Defined and rules so in Article 63-E of the General Taxation Law (amended by Law No 92/2017 of 22 August 2017)
  • This limit is defined as 10.000€ for non-habitual resident or non-residents, as long as they do not do entrepreneurship activities or acting as a merchant
  • Paying taxes in cash for amounts greater than 500€ is also forbidden (OK this one is weird, but why tho?)
  • It is punishable by law and legal fine is ranging from 180€ to 4.500€ for civilian/ordinary people, and 360€ to 9.000€ for legal representatives and legal people.
  • It is NOT applicable if the transaction occurs between two private person and in a non-commercial context, e.g: lending your friend money is completely fine.
  • None of these laws and definitions apply to following financial entities:
    • Those that receive deposits
    • Providing payment services and solutions
    • Issue electronic/digital money
    • Manual exchange transactions
  • Do not take my word for it, but I find it rather difficult for them to enforce or track this law