How to pay SCUTS and electronic tolls in Portugal and avoid fines ?
If you use the roads of Portugal, whether as an expatriate or a simple tourist, then you will surely have to go through automatic tolls and gantries and other SCUTS. Payment of tolls is mandatory in Portugal, whether you are a regular user or if it is the only time you use Portuguese roads and tolls. Failure to pay SCUTS in Portugal can result in heavy fines of up to several hundred euros. It is possible to opt for an automatic payment method, that is to say, be billed via your Via Verde box or the chip on your license plate. If you do not have one of these devices you can adjust them in person. How to pay SCUTS and electronic tolls in Portugal ? What are the penalties for forgetting payment of SCUTS ? Lisbob, the expatriate assistant in Portugal, tells you all about the payment of SCUTS and tolls in Portuguese land.
How to pay SCUTS and electronic tolls in Portugal and avoid fines ?
Prepayment of SCUTS
One of the best ways to pay SCUTS in Portugal is simply to pay them in advance. Indeed, you can pay the SCUTS on an advance payment basis. For this you must go to a CTT office (Portuguese Post Office) or a Payshop agent. In prepayment, you must have a credited account with a minimum of € 10 for light vehicles, and the amount will automatically be debited from this account when you use the SCUT tolls.
You can also do it anonymously, this prepayment being valid for 90 days. In this case it will be applied an automatic renewal of the same period when a new billing minimum is applied.
What is the deadline for paying SCUTS and tolls ?
In Portugal nothing is simple, let alone the payment of automatic tolls. Indeed, they must be paid 48 hours after obtaining the ticket (not before!) And you have a period of 5 working days to do so. For example, you pass a portal on a Sunday, you can pay from Tuesday and the deadline ends on the Monday of the following week. If you do it late, you can settle your debt via the Toll Pay portal. You must enter the vehicle registration number, the time you spent the SCUTS and have not paid yet. From there, you can pay the amount by choosing a method of payment.
There is another, albeit more difficult, option of directly contacting the concessionaire of the highway. In this case, you must wait even longer, at least 15 days, until the payment failure process is entered in the system. The administrative services offer several means of payment to settle the debt. Please note that in some of these situations, additional fees may apply depending on the late payment period.
After you have passed the SCUTS, you will have five business days to pay the amount owing before having to pay more and more fines. You can find out if you have a late payment on the CTT website: just fill in your registration number to find out the associated debts. Note that the billed amount only appears two working days after the electronic gateway, so do not be surprised if your passage has not yet been taken into account.
Once 5 days have passed, you have 15 days left to avoid a debt collection procedure. You can check if you still have unpaid amounts on the Toll Pay website.
You have to respect the deadlines to pay tolls in order to avoid fines @Gotoportugal.eu
How to pay the tolls and SCUTS in Portugal?
There are several ways to pay the SCUTS in Portugal once you have used the highways. Indeed, besides the automatic payment method of the tax via a Via Verde identifier or a chip, there are three ways to pay SCUTS after passage :
In a CTT post office ;
At an Payshop network ;
By ATM machine Multibanco.
When you pay via CTT or a Payshop agent, you must go to an establishment and indicate the registration number of the car with which you have traveled on the Portuguese roads. A fee of 0.32 € will be added to the price paid for the toll. After making the payment, you will have a receipt.
Alternatively, you can pay by Multibanco ATM. To do this, you must send an SMS to the TTC. This request by SMS at a cost of 0.30 € plus VAT. You must write to the number 68881 with the text "CTTMB space Matrícula space NIF" (example: CTTMB AA-00-00 123 456 789). You will receive an SMS with the necessary information to go to the ATM. You only need to enter the data in the corresponding fields to adjust your SCUT. Although this last step to pay for SCUTS may seem simple, Lisbob advises you to go in person to a TTC office or a Payshop agent in order to obtain the necessary proofs and to make sure that SCUTS is paid. has been successfully completed.
Penalty for non-payment of electronic tolls and SCUTS
If you borrow SCUTS tolls in Portugal without paying, you should be notified by mail. After receipt of the notification, the payment period is 30 working days. If the payment is not made in due time, the relevant infringements are communicated to the Portuguese tax authorities, who will then initiate a procedure for the recovery of taxes and orders.
The minimum value of the fine for non-payment of SCUTS is 25 €, or a value corresponding to 7.5 times the total value of the sum of the tolls borrowed. In the case of company vehicles, the amount of the fine is double, while maintaining the minimum at € 25.