Heirs can claim Certificados de Aforro more than 10 years after the holder's death, Lisbon court rules
Heirs can claim the money held in state savings certificates — Certificados de Aforro and Certificados do Tesouro — even if more than ten years have passed since the holder died. The Tribunal da Relação de Lisboa, the Lisbon appeal court, ruled this in October (ECO).
Heirs must claim a deceased person's certificates within ten years; otherwise the money goes to a fund used to pay off the public debt. IGCP, the public debt management agency, counted those ten years from the day the holder died. The court took a different view: the period starts when the heir learns both of the death and of the certificates' existence. The limitation period is meant to penalise someone who could have claimed the money and chose not to, and it is unreasonable to expect a person to claim money from securities they did not know about, the ruling says (Jornal de Negócios).
The case concerned a mother who died in 2009. Only in July 2021, while preparing paperwork for the tax authority, did her son and sole heir discover that she had held certificates worth more than €90,000. IGCP refused to pay: by its count, the deadline had passed in May 2019. The agency argued that statements had been sent to the deceased's address and that the son visited Portugal from time to time. The court replied that it was up to IGCP to prove the heir had known about the certificates earlier, and that an heir is not obliged to find out whether a relative held any. IGCP must now pay him €126,800 — the original sum plus interest up to March 2026.
A lot of money is at stake: according to the Court of Auditors (Tribunal de Contas), certificates worth €1.2 billion were at risk of being lost to the limitation period, and more than half of them belonged to people who had died.
If a relative who lived in Portugal has died, as an heir you can ask IGCP for a statement of the certificates they held on the date of death. Documents for transferring certificates to heirs can be submitted at any CTT post office or at an Espaço Cidadão public service point (IGCP).
