Despite the best efforts of the IMT, combined with a brilliant assist by CTT (the Portuguese Postal service), I received my driver’s license, good until 2026, in today’s mail.
If you’ve been following this blog, you know how much of an uphill struggle this has been (See “The Worst of All Bureaucracies” for details). The last update was that I was waiting for the IMT to mail the license, but because of the extended time lag it was going to be mailed to the Porto address after we had moved to Lisboa.
I had also mentioned that I had put in a forwarding order with the CTT, so I was fairly optimistic that if the license got sent, it would make its way to me. Oh, the folly of inexperienced youth!
The forwarding order was supposed to take effect 9 August, and I can verify that as of that date we didn’t receive any mail at the Porto apartment. Since I typically get something almost every day from the bank that has my business account, it looked like everything was going as planned.
However, when we got to Lisboa on the 13th, there was no mail – and there continued to be no mail for the next two weeks, except for the letter and package forwarded to me by the old landlord which had been mistakenly delivered to the old address the day after we left …
I contacted the CTT to find out what the problem was. Unfortunately, there is no phone number for customer service, you have to fill out an online form and wait for a response.
After a week, I submitted the form again. This time, I received back a request for more information – the old address, the new address, my name, my NIF number, the branch I made the order in, etc. Of course, all this information was on the original customer service form, too, but I replied with all the requested info.
The next day, I actually received a piece of mail – a letter from the Oregon Department of Revenue which had been forwarded as expected, with an official CTT sticker on it.
Two days after that, I got another message from CTT advising me that my case would be closed in three days if I didn’t provide them with additional information, including details about every letter that I had NOT received.
This is of course insane, but I was able to give them the dates from the bank of every transaction that typically generated a letter, plus the fact that I was waiting for the driver’s license. I also gave them a scanned copy of the envelope with their sticker and my customer number on it, and asked them to contact me immediately if they needed more.
While this was going on, I was becoming increasingly worried that the license had gone astray. I was told at the IMT office in Lisboa at the end of July that the license would be sent in three to four weeks, and we were now at five. I decided that I’d try and contact the IMT, even knowing how painful that usually was.
I prepped for the call with a list of phrases, including apologies for my poor Portuguese, and started dialing. It took two days to get through, but I eventually reached a very nice and helpful operator. As I was starting to explain my problems, she said, “Would you rather speak in English?”
If you try to speak Portuguese, people will go out of their way to help you.
Anyways, she checked on my case and found that the license was all approved and ready to go, but it just hadn’t been mailed yet. At this point, I explained that I had moved and wasn’t getting my forwarded mail. Luckily, I had already changed my official address on my Citizen’s card, so she was able to make the change in the IMT system immediately. She assured me that the license would be sent to the Lisboa address, no problem.
Back to the CTT. I have been going around in circles with them now for weeks, and at this point they have stopped responding completely to emails. I have filed an official complaint – there is an official government complaint office – but it’s crickets from them, too.
But guess what happened today? I checked the mailbox, and there were TWO pieces of forwarded mail – and one of them was my driver’s license, which of course had been sent to the wrong address despite the efforts of the helpful operator.
What I’ve been told by Portuguese friends is that the mail used to be more or less reliable, but the postal service was privatized a few years ago and has gotten increasingly horrendous as time goes by. We’ve also had packages not delivered even though we sat home waiting for them all day. On the last two occasions, I checked the tracking information frequently during the day and it showed as out for delivery until the late afternoon, at which point it changed on one occasion to no response and the other refused delivery! I’ve filed complaints about these, too, but I don’t expect to see any satisfaction.
At this point, I have all packages delivered to the bakery on the corner, and I pay them 10€ a month as a thank you. I’ve changed my address with the banks and everyone else I can think of, so I don’t expect there to be too much more lost mail, and I’m resigned to the fact that the money I paid for the forwarding service is just cash down a rathole. And to all of you – please, don’t mail me anything!
A Modern Odyssey - Expatriates in Iberia 