Recovering an Unpaid Invoice in Portugal in 2026: A Practical Guide to the Injunção, the 51 Euro Court Fee, the Fifteen Days the Debtor Gets, and the Enforcement Title You Hold If Nobody Objects

Somebody owes you money in Portugal and has stopped answering. You have an invoice, maybe a contract, and a growing suspicion that going to court over 2,000 euros would cost more than the 2,000 euros. That suspicion is roughly correct, which is why Portuguese law has a separate, cheaper track that mostly skips the court: the injunção.

It is not a lawsuit. It is a procedure that turns your claim into an enforceable document, and it only becomes a lawsuit if the debtor bothers to object. The court fee starts at 51 euros. You do not need a lawyer to use it below a certain amount. And if the debtor stays silent, which happens often, you come out the other end holding a título executivo, an enforcement title, that lets you go straight to seizing assets.

This guide covers what the injunção is for, what it costs, where it is filed, the deadlines on both sides, what happens when the debtor opposes, what happens when the debtor cannot be found, and the traps that quietly kill otherwise good claims. The framework is Decreto-Lei n.º 269/98 of 1 September 1998, which turns twenty-eight years old this week, together with Decreto-Lei n.º 62/2013 of 10 May on late payment in commercial transactions.

What an injunção actually is

Article 7 of the annex to Decreto-Lei n.º 269/98 defines it as the procedure whose purpose is to give executive force to a request seeking payment of a money obligation. That phrasing matters. Nobody weighs your evidence. No judge reads the file. A court clerk checks that the paperwork is in order, notifies the debtor, waits, and then either stamps the request or sends the whole thing to a judge because the debtor pushed back.

Two consequences follow. The first is that it is fast and cheap when it works. The second is that it only works for money claims arising out of a contract. If what you actually want is a declaration that a contract was validly terminated, or damages for something other than an unpaid price, the injunção is the wrong instrument and a clerk can refuse it on the ground that the claim does not fit the purpose of the procedure.

The two value routes

There are two ways in, and which one you are on decides whether there is a ceiling at all.

Route one: contracts up to 15,000 euros. Article 1 of the preambular decree covers money obligations arising from contracts of a value not exceeding 15,000 euros. That figure is not arbitrary: it is half the alçada of the Tribunal da Relação (Court of Appeal), which sits at 30,000 euros in civil matters. This is the route for a debt owed by a private individual, the classic consumer debt.

Route two: commercial transactions, no ceiling. Article 10(1) of Decreto-Lei n.º 62/2013 gives the creditor the right to use the injunção for late payment in a commercial transaction "independentemente do valor da dívida", regardless of the amount owed. A commercial transaction, under Article 3(b) of that decree, is a transaction between undertakings, or between an undertaking and a public entity, for the supply of goods or services against payment. An undertaking, under Article 3(d), is any entity other than a public body carrying on an autonomous economic or professional activity, including natural persons. A sole trader invoicing another business is inside it.

Contracts with consumers are expressly excluded from Decreto-Lei n.º 62/2013, so a debt owed to you by a private individual has to fit inside the 15,000 euro ceiling of route one.

If you are on route two you must say so on the form. Article 11(1)(g) of the annex lets the clerk refuse a request that exceeds 15,000 euros without carrying the commercial transaction indication, and Article 10(2)(g) is the box where you make it.

Three things to do before filing

1. Demand payment in writing

The law does not require a formal demand before an injunção. Doing it anyway is standard practice for a reason: registered post with acknowledgement of receipt is the only method that produces proof of sending, of delivery, of return, or of refusal. Send the outstanding invoices and a statement of account, and set out the total owed, the invoices it breaks down into, a deadline, your IBAN, and an email address for the payment confirmation. If the debtor is a company, the registered office address is the one to use, and it is publicly checkable.

2. Check the claim has not prescribed

This is where good claims die, because the short limitation periods in the Civil Code are much shorter than people expect.

• Six months under Article 316: credits of accommodation, food and drink establishments for what they supply.
• Two years under Article 317: among others, credits of traders for goods sold to somebody who is not a trader, credits of educational, care and treatment establishments for services rendered, and credits for services rendered in the exercise of a liberal profession together with reimbursement of the related expenses.
• Twenty years under Article 309: the ordinary period, which is what applies to debts between companies.

Read that middle line carefully. A freelancer's unpaid fee against a private client is a two-year claim, not a twenty-year one. So is a private school's unpaid tuition. Chase late and you are chasing nothing.

Two pieces of good news sit on the other side of it. Under Article 13(2) of the annex, the notification of the injunção interrupts prescription under Article 323 of the Civil Code, so a fresh period starts running from that date. And once the fórmula executória has been stamped on, the resulting title carries the general twenty-year period regardless of what the underlying debt was.

3. Pay the court fee first

Payment of the taxa de justiça comes before filing, not after. Under Article 20 of the annex, a request filed without proof of payment is struck out of the file, which means it counts as never having been presented. Where the request goes in electronically, it is only treated as filed once payment is confirmed, so a request submitted a week before the money clears is dated to the payment, not the submission. Against a two-year limitation period, that week can matter.

What it costs

Court fees run in units of conta, the UC, which the 2026 State Budget again froze at 102 euros. The relevant figures come from Table II of the Regulamento das Custas Processuais (Procedural Costs Regulation), approved by Decreto-Lei n.º 34/2008.

• Injunção up to 5,000 euros: 0.5 UC, 51.00 euros
• Injunção from 5,000.01 to 15,000 euros: 1 UC, 102.00 euros
• Injunção from 15,000.01 euros: 1.5 UC, 153.00 euros

An aggravated column exists, at 0.75, 1.5 and 2.25 UC respectively, which is aimed at the bulk filers rather than at somebody chasing one invoice.

The European payment order, which is a different instrument for cross-border claims inside the European Union, costs exactly double at every band: 102, 204 and 306 euros. Published guidance frequently confuses the two, so if you are quoted 102 euros for a domestic injunção worth 4,000 euros, somebody has read the wrong line of the same table.

The procedural value of the injunção is the amount claimed, counting only interest already accrued at the date of filing.

One detail that softens the cost: the debtor is notified to pay the sum claimed plus the court fee you paid. If the debtor simply pays, the 51 euros comes back with the debt.

Where it is filed, and by whom

The Balcão Nacional de Injunções (National Injunctions Desk), or BNI, is a general secretariat inside the judicial court structure, created by Portaria n.º 220-A/2008 of 4 March, with exclusive competence across the whole country for processing injunções. It is in Porto, at Rua de Camões n.º 155, 1st floor, 4049-074, on 22 094 9310 to 22 094 9320 and at [email protected].

There are three filing routes:

• Electronic form on Citius. Filling in and submitting the form through the Citius portal.
• Electronic file upload on Citius. Sending the data as a computer file.
• Paper. Delivered at a judicial secretariat.

The catch is that electronic filing is reserved to lawyers and solicitadores. Article 19 of the annex requires an advogado or solicitador to file electronically and only electronically, on pain of an immediate fine of half a unit of conta. The practical effect runs the other way too: if you are representing yourself, you cannot use Citius, and you cannot hand the request in at the BNI either, because Article 5(3) of Portaria n.º 220-A/2008 bars paper filings there.

Filing on paper therefore means going to the competent judicial secretariat, which under Article 8 of the annex is, at the creditor's choice, the court of the place where the obligation was to be performed or the court of the debtor's domicile. The paper form is the model approved by Portaria n.º 21/2020 of 28 January.

On representation: you do not need a lawyer for a claim up to 5,000 euros. Article 40(1)(a) of the Código de Processo Civil (Code of Civil Procedure) makes a lawyer compulsory in cases before courts with an alçada where ordinary appeal is admissible, and the alçada of the first-instance courts in civil matters is 5,000 euros under Article 44(1) of the Lei da Organização do Sistema Judiciário (Law on the Organisation of the Judicial System). Above that figure, plan for a lawyer, because the case may not stay administrative.

What goes on the form

Article 10(2) of the annex lists what the request must contain: the secretariat it is addressed to, the parties, the place for notification and whether that is a contractually agreed domicile, a brief account of the facts founding the claim, the claim itself broken down into capital, accrued interest and other sums due, the court fee paid, the commercial transaction indication where applicable, your own domicile, an email address if you want to be contacted that way, whether you want the file sent for distribution if notification fails, which court is competent if it is, whether you want notification carried out by an enforcement agent or a lawyer, and, where the contract is with a consumer, whether it contains general contractual terms. Failing to declare that last point exposes you to being treated as a bad-faith litigant.

You do not attach the invoices. The request describes the facts and the documents that support the debt; the proof comes later, if there is a later. What the description should carry is the sequence: the services or goods supplied, the period, the invoices by number, date and amount, the total, and the demand you sent, with its registered post number and what happened to it.

One box deserves particular attention. Article 10(2)(j) asks whether you want the file sent to a court for distribution if the debtor cannot be notified. Tick no, and Article 13-A says the secretariat simply hands the papers back to you and the procedure ends. Tick yes, and you have to name the competent court in the next box, and the matter carries on as an ordinary action.

Once filed, nothing can be changed. Article 10(3) prohibits altering any element of the request during the procedure, including the amount claimed. Get it right the first time.

What happens next

Within five days, the clerk notifies the debtor by registered post with acknowledgement of receipt. The debtor then has fifteen days to pay the amount claimed plus your court fee, or to file an opposition. Deadlines here are counted under the Code of Civil Procedure rules without any additional grace period, they run continuously, they suspend during judicial holidays, and if the last day falls on a day the courts are closed, it moves to the next working day.

If the post fails, the secretariat looks the debtor up. Article 12(3) lets it obtain, of its own motion, the residence, workplace or registered office from the civil identification, social security, tax and driving-licence databases, and then notify by ordinary post to the address or addresses it finds.

Where the contract was in writing and the parties agreed a domicile for notifications, Article 12-A changes the mechanics: notification goes by plain letter deposited in the letterbox at the agreed address, and the fifteen days start running the day after the postal worker certifies the deposit. For anyone drafting service contracts in Portugal, a domicile clause is the single cheapest thing you can do to make a future injunção work, and the same logic applies to the notice clauses in a contrato-promessa de compra e venda.

If the debtor does nothing

This is the outcome the procedure is built for. Under Article 14, the clerk writes on the request the sentence "Este documento tem força executiva", this document has executive force, dated, initialled and sealed or signed with an advanced electronic signature. That is your enforcement title, under Article 703(1)(d) of the Code of Civil Procedure, and you can take it into an execução and start attaching assets. The enforcement itself is run by an agente de execução, a role held by solicitadores, and a profession the regulator polices: 50 enforcement agents have been struck off the register in the past decade.

Silence also costs the debtor the right to argue. Article 14-A precludes the defences that could have been raised in the opposition, provided the debtor was personally notified and properly warned of that consequence. Four things survive the preclusion: misuse of the injunção procedure and other dilatory defences the court must consider anyway, the grounds for opposing enforcement listed in Article 729 of the Code of Civil Procedure that are compatible with an injunção, illegal or abusive general contractual terms, and any peremptory defence the court can raise of its own motion.

The clerk can refuse to stamp the formula only where the claim does not match the amount or purpose of the procedure, and that refusal can be complained of to a judge.

The interest, including the punitive layer

The notification warns the debtor that failing to pay means default interest from the date the request was filed, plus interest at 5 percent a year running from the date the fórmula executória is stamped on. That second layer is a compulsory penalty, and it does not all belong to you: under Article 21(3) of the annex, the interest that accrues on top of the ordinary default interest is split in equal parts between the creditor and the Instituto de Gestão Financeira e Equipamentos da Justiça (Institute for Financial Management and Justice Facilities).

The ordinary rate depends on who owes you. For commercial transactions under Decreto-Lei n.º 62/2013, the rate for the second half of 2026 is 10.40 percent, set by Aviso n.º 16623/2026/2 of the Entidade do Tesouro e Finanças, published in the second series of Diário da República on 3 July 2026. The general commercial rate under paragraph 3 of Article 102 of the Código Comercial (Commercial Code) is 9.40 percent for the same period. Both come from the European Central Bank's main refinancing rate plus eight and seven percentage points respectively, and are republished each January and July.

Two more entitlements sit in Decreto-Lei n.º 62/2013 and are routinely forgotten. Under Article 4, interest runs automatically from the day after the due date, without any demand being needed, and where the contract sets no due date, from thirty days after receipt of the invoice or of the goods or services. Under Article 7, a creditor owed interest on a commercial transaction is entitled to a minimum of 40 euros as compensation for recovery costs, again without any demand, and can claim more on proof of reasonable costs actually incurred, including lawyers, solicitadores and enforcement agents. Clauses excluding either are void under Article 8.

If the debtor opposes

The opposition does not need to be set out in numbered articles, but it does need to be filed in duplicate. Once it lands, or once notification has failed and you asked for distribution, the clerk sends the file to the next distribution and it becomes a court case: the ação especial para cumprimento de obrigações pecuniárias, the special action for performance of money obligations, or ordinary process where the value is above 15,000 euros.

From that point the economics change. Both sides pay court fees within ten days of distribution, with the creditor crediting what was already paid on the injunção. For a claim between 2,000.01 and 8,000 euros the fee under Table I is 2 UC, so 204 euros in total, of which 153 euros remains to be paid after the 51 already spent. The hearing then runs the short-form way: the judge tries to conciliate the parties, each side may call up to three witnesses where the value is at or below 5,000 euros and up to five above it, closing submissions are brief and oral, and the judgment is dictated straight into the record with summary reasons.

Opposing is not free either. Article 17(4) of the annex says that where the file goes to distribution because of an opposition whose lack of foundation the debtor should not have been unaware of, the judgment condemns the debtor to a fine equal to twice the court fee due in the declaratory action. That is the counterweight against opposing purely to buy time, though it requires the judge to make the finding.

You can also stop. Under Article 15-A you may withdraw at any point up to the filing of an opposition or, if none is filed, until the opposition period expires.

Injunção, julgados de paz, or European payment order

Three instruments overlap in this territory and they are not interchangeable.

• Injunção. Administrative, no judge unless the debtor objects, produces an enforcement title but not a judgment, from 51 euros. Best where you expect silence, and where you want an enforceable document quickly.
• Julgados de paz. Actual small-claims courts with a 15,000 euro limit and a 70 euro fee, offering mediation and a hearing. Better where the debtor disputes the facts and you want a decision on the merits rather than a race to enforcement. We covered them separately in our guide to resolving a dispute through the julgados de paz.
• European payment order. For cross-border claims within the European Union, and twice the price at every band.
• Not on this list: the Livro de Reclamações, which is a regulatory complaint route and cannot make anybody pay you.

One jurisdictional limit worth knowing: the injunção works only in the ordinary courts. It is not available in the administrative jurisdiction, so a money claim against a public body that falls to the administrative courts has to go the ordinary declaratory route instead. Note that this is about which court has jurisdiction, not about who the debtor is: a public entity buying goods or services under a contract that stays in the common jurisdiction is squarely inside the commercial transactions regime, and public bodies do run late: one municipality in twelve pays suppliers past the 60-day statutory limit.

The traps, in one list

• Two-year prescription on professional fees. Article 317(c) of the Civil Code. The most common way a freelancer's claim dies.
• Filing before paying. The request dates to payment confirmation, not submission.
• Not ticking the distribution box. If notification fails and you did not ask for distribution, the file comes back to you and the procedure is over.
• Not naming the competent court. Article 11(1)(a) makes that a ground for refusal.
• Not flagging the commercial transaction. A claim over 15,000 euros without that indication is refused.
• Not declaring general contractual terms in a consumer contract. Exposes you to a bad-faith finding.
• Assuming the fee scale you read is the domestic one. Half the tables circulating online quote the European payment order figures.
• Getting the amount wrong. Nothing in the request can be amended once it is in.
• Defective notification. Where the form of notification prescribed by law is not observed, the notification is null under Article 191(1) of the Code of Civil Procedure, and the enforcement title built on it can fall with it.

The injunção is a blunt instrument and it is meant to be. Used against a debtor who has simply stopped paying and has nothing to say about it, it is the cheapest route in Portuguese civil procedure from an unpaid invoice to a seizable asset. Used against a debtor with a real defence, it buys you a fifteen-day delay and then puts you in court anyway, with the fee to make up. Knowing which one you are dealing with before you pay the 51 euros is most of the skill.