“ASAE intervenes in this sector to ensure compliance with legal requirements regarding licensing and registration rules, safety conditions, the obligation to provide information and other applicable regulations, having inspected, since 2020 and up to the present month of December, 12,344 economic operators, of which 3,321 in person and 9,023 in a digital environment,” the Ministry of Economy and Territorial Cohesion told ECO.

“These inspection actions resulted in the suspension of approximately 129 local accommodation establishments, mainly due to the verification of a lack of safety conditions,” clarifies the Ministry of Economy.

The Government says that “electronic platforms that provide, advertise or sell accommodation must require and display the respective National Tourism Registration number on the platform.”

As part of its inspection, ASAE (the Portuguese Food Safety and Economic Authority) detected infractions on the Airbnb platform related to the advertising and sale of accommodations without the required National Local Accommodation Registration number. These irregularities led to four administrative offense proceedings against the platform and eleven additional proceedings for offering, advertising, and brokering unregistered or outdated accommodations.

“In this context, four administrative offense proceedings were initiated, as well as eleven administrative offense proceedings for infractions related to the offering, provision, advertising, and brokering of unregistered or outdated local accommodation establishments,” the Ministry led by Manuel Castro Almeida told ECO, at a time when Spain fined Airbnb €64 million for illegal listings.