Alojamento Local in the Azores: SIBA, SREA statistics and municipal tax
What differs for AL owners in the Azores — SREA statistical reporting instead of plain INE routing, regional registration rules and which islands charge a tourist tax.
Most AL guidance is written for the mainland, occasionally for Madeira, and almost never for the Azores. The national obligations are identical; the statistical and regional layer is not.
What is the same everywhere
- RNAL registration through the Balcão Único, one registration per unit, with the number now verified automatically by booking platforms under EU Regulation 2024/1028.
- SIBA/AIMA — a Boletim de Alojamento for every foreign guest, filed within three working days of arrival, one SIBA registration per AL licence.
- Income tax, VAT/Article 53 thresholds, insurance, complaints book, safety equipment — the national AL regime applies in full.
If you run units on both São Miguel and the mainland, the guest-facing workflow should be identical.
What is different: SREA
The Azores has its own regional statistics service, the Serviço Regional de Estatística dos Açores (SREA), which works with INE on tourism statistics for the region. In practice, accommodation establishments in the Azores complete the monthly tourism survey with the regional flow, and the figures feed both regional publications and the national series.
The data you need is the same data as WebInq:
- guests entering (V1), by country of residence;
- overnight stays (nights), by country of residence;
- rooms and beds available, and days open in the month;
- guests present at the start of the month carried over from the previous one — the classic validation error.
Practical rule: keep the monthly figures per unit, per country, per month regardless of which portal asks for them. The portal changes; the arithmetic does not.
Regional registration nuances
The Azores has legislated regionally around the AL regime, and individual municipalities can restrict new registrations in pressured parishes in the same way mainland containment zones work. Before buying or converting a property:
1. Check with the câmara municipal whether the parish has any limit, moratorium or capacity rule in force.
2. Confirm the modalidade you are registering (moradia, apartamento, estabelecimento de hospedagem) matches how the building is legally described.
3. If the unit is a fraction in a building, read the título constitutivo before assuming AL use is allowed.
Tourist tax in the Azores
Unlike Madeira, where the regional ecotaxa framework applies broadly, tourist tax in the Azores is municipal and patchy — some municipalities have introduced a per-guest, per-night charge with a night cap and exemptions for children, others have not. Two rules keep you safe:
- Ask your câmara for the current regulamento da taxa municipal turística and the declaration deadline. Rates and caps change by deliberation, not by national law.
- If a platform collects the tax for you on some bookings but not others, you are still the one who declares. Track the collected/not-collected split per booking from day one.
How Chave AL fits
Chave AL is built around per-unit records: licence and RNAL, capacity, municipality, guest registrations and monthly statistics. The Azores workflow uses the same guest form and the same SIBA submission as the mainland, and the monthly statistics output gives you the guest, night and capacity figures in the shape the tourism survey wants. Where a municipal tourist tax exists, add the rate and cap for that câmara and the monthly declaration is produced from the same bookings.
FAQ
Do I file to INE or to SREA?
The regional service handles Azorean tourism statistics in coordination with INE. Follow the notice your establishment receives; the underlying figures are identical.
Is SIBA different in the Azores?
No. SIBA is national and runs through AIMA regardless of region.
Is there a region-wide tourist tax like Madeira's?
No. Where a charge exists it is municipal, so check the câmara for the island and municipality where the unit sits.
Chave AL — SIBA, tourist tax and INE compliance for Alojamento Local. Pricing · Guides · Glossary