COVID-19 – Use of outdated documents and new rules for the functioning of public services

After the World Health Organization characterized the spread of the COVID-19 virus as a pandemic on March 11, 2020, the Council of Ministers approved on March 12 and 13, 2020 a set of new rules and extraordinary and urgent measures of response to the epidemiological situation of the new Coronavirus, through Decree-Law no. 10-A / 2020, of 13 March, and Resolution of the Council of Ministers no. 10-A / 2020, of 13 March, among which are:

 

i. Possibility of using documents whose date has already expired

The Council of Ministers determined, among other measures, the acceptance by the public authorities, and for all legal purposes, of the display of documents subject to renewal whose validity period ended on February 24.
The citizen’s card, certificates and certificates issued by the registration and civil identification services, driving license, as well as the documents and visas related to the stay in national territory, whose validity expired on the 24th of February, are accepted, in the same terms, until June 30, 2020.

 

ii. New rules for the functioning of public services

The Council of Ministers further determined the following:
• Service for information purposes is provided exclusively by telephone and online;
• In person attendance to the public for non-informational purposes, which are considered urgent or which are not liable to be provided electronically, is carried out through pre-scheduling;
• The scheduling of public services is carried out through the ePortugal Portal (https://eportugal.gov.pt/), the Contact Lines created to support the use of digital public services by telephone, the dedicated lines of public services and entities or through online bookings from Public Administration portals and websites;
• There may be a suspension of the public service front or the total closure of facilities and services that must occur due to the determination of the competent health authorities or due to the temporary unavailability of systems or the decrease or inexistence of the number of human resources available for any cause;
• The ePortugal Portal (https://eportugal.gov.pt/) provides information on open and closed service points.