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Tax receipts from Alojamento Local property owners rise to €123 million

al“Tax revenue from local landlords in the Alojamento Local (AL) tourist rental scheme “has almost doubled in about two years,” according to the Secretary of State for Tourism, Ana Mendes Godinho.

The rise from €69 million in 2015, to €123 million in 2017*, (up 78%) has been the result of property owners registering on the AL scheme due to Godinho’s campaigns to integrate owners into formal economy.

These ‘campaigns’ have had "very positive results, namely through a new rule that requires the AL registration to appear on booking websites,” said Godonho.

The figures may be positive but show that the majority of those letting their properties to tourists have decided the AL scheme is not for them.

The new law that makes it imperative to record AL registration numbers on property listings led to a “rise of registrations from 28,000 in 2015 to more than 50,000 currently," said the Secretary of State for Tourism, forgetting perhaps that the law to which she attributes her success came into being only on July 1st, 2017 and the number of illegal rental properties remains significantly higher than those registered, in a total market of around 120,000 rental properties.

The decree law from the Ministry of the Economy states that, "The electronic platforms that make available, advertise or market accommodation ... must demand and display on the platform the respective National Tourist Registry number."

According to Godinho, the obligation to register local accommodation with the tax office, the local council, the national tourist board, the social security department and the Foreigners and Borders Service, has resulted in the tax revenue rise.

Godinho was at the conference ‘Online Fraud affecting the Global Tourism Industry,’ sponsored by Safe Communities Portugal, an association whose mission is to help and inform people on how to live safely in Portugal.

"What Portugal is saying at the moment is that everything that is registered online is reliable accommodation. It is an important step for security, because it gives a guarantee that the accommodation actually exists,” concluded Godinho.

_________

* The basis of these figures was not made clear, nor the period of comparison.

 For property owners looking to go legitimate, contact the National Association of Local Lodging Establishments at www.nalle.pt  and/or ask afpop for information.

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Comments  

-1 #1 Charly 2017-11-12 17:33
How touching is that... and specially how naive is that ! Logically AL should generate 1 BILLION to the portugese gov. Ignorancy, incompetence and stupidity cost hands full of money to the portugese goc.

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