The Italian fiscal code, officially known in Italy as Codice fiscale, is the tax code in Italy, similar to a Social Security Number (SSN) in the United States or the National Insurance Number issued in the United Kingdom. It is an alphanumeric code of 16 characters. The code serves to unambiguously identify individuals irrespective of citizenship or residency status.[dead link] Designed by and for the Italian tax office, it is now used for several other purposes, e.g. uniquely identifying individuals in the health system, or natural persons who act as parties in private contracts. The code is issued by the Italian tax office, the Agenzia delle Entrate.
What the Italian fiscal code is needed for? This code identifies a subject in front of Italian Tax Authority. Among others, the code is necessary for opening a bank account, enrolling at University, signing a lease, purchasing a property and others.
In the past, each person in Italy was handed a paper or plastic card with a magnetic strip, bearing the tax code as well as the surname, given name(s), sex, place and province of birth (or country of birth if foreign), date of birth and date of issue. Today, the fiscal code card has been replaced by a combined Italian health insurance card for qualifying residents which shows an expiration date.
Fiscal code generation
The laws covering the calculation of a fiscal code were put in place by the Ministry of Economy and Finances on December 23, 1976.
For natural persons, the fiscal code is made of 16 alphanumeric characters; for legal persons (e.g. corporations) it comprises 11 numeric-only characters. While it is possible to calculate one's tax code, the only official tax code is the one provided by the tax office, which avoids cases of identical tax codes (which is a frequent case for people not born in Italy, as in this case the 4-characters town code in the codice fiscale is replaced by "Z" followed by a 3-digit country code) as well as cases where a code is incorrect, but still valid (because provided by the tax office).
The algorithm that follows is used to generate natural persons' fiscal codes.
Surname (3 letters) the first three consonants of the surname are used. If there is more than one surname, both are considered as if they were one. If the surname has less than three consonants, then vowels will replace the blank spaces, in the same order they appear in the surname (e.g. "Rossi" would be RSS, "Masi" would be MSA). If the whole surname has less than three letters, the blank spaces are replaced with an X (e.g. "Fo" would be FOX, "Hu" would be HUX). The surname used is always the name that appears in the person's primary identification document: for native Italians, this is the carta d'identità (identity card).- It is important to note that in Italy women do not 'officially' change their surnames when they marry: therefore, a woman does not require a new fiscal code (or identity card, or passport) if she already has one at the time of her marriage. However, when a woman obtains a fiscal code after she is married (generally, this applies only to foreigners born outside Italy) then the surname that appears in her primary identification document (usually, her passport) must be used to produce the fiscal code: in many cases, this will be the surname of her husband.2
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- the eight odd characters (1st, 3rd, 5th, etc.) are set apart; same thing for the seven even ones (2nd, 4th, 6th, etc.).
- after that, each single character is converted into a numeric value as shown in the tables below:
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- after that, all of the values are to be added up, and the final result has to be divided by 26; the remainder (Modulo) will give the last character, according to the following table:
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Digit | Letter | Digit | Letter | Digit | Letter |
0 | L | 4 | Q | 8 | U |
1 | M | 5 | R | 9 | V |
2 | N | 6 | S | ||
3 | P | 7 | T |
Examples
Here is the fiscal code of a fictitious Matteo Moretti (male), born in Milan on 8 April 1991:
- Surname: MRT
- Name: MTT
- Birthdate and gender: 91D08
- Place of birth: F205
- Check digit: J
- Fiscal code: MRTMTT91D08F205J
Here is the fiscal code of a fictitious Samantha Miller (female), born in the USA on 25 September 1982, living in Italy:
- Surname: MLL
- Name: SNT
- Birthdate and gender: 82P65
- Place of birth: Z404
- Check digit: U
- Fiscal code: MLLSNT82P65Z404U
See also
NotesExternal links
- [1](from Italian Legal Website)
- Health card contains the fiscal code (from the tax office web site)
- Tax identification number for foreign citizens (from the tax office web site in English)
- Codice Fiscale Generator (from expiter.com, in English)
- International Social Security Number Validator (from randommer.io, in English)
References
"Tax code (Codice Fiscale) and SPID". conslondra.esteri.it. 2025-02-25. Archived from the original on 2025-02-25. Retrieved 2021-06-26. https://conslondra.esteri.it/consolato_londra/en/i_servizi/per_i_cittadini/codice_fiscale ↩
"Application for a tax code, notification of change details and requests for a tax code card/duplicate of the national health system card(natural persons)" [Form AA4/8 instructions] (PDF). agenziaentrate.gov.it. p. 3, Part B. Retrieved 30 October 2019. https://www.agenziaentrate.gov.it/portale/documents/20143/278995/Instructions+on+how+to+fill+in+this+form_AA4_8_istruzioni_ING.pdf ↩
"Table of the Italian municipalities cadastral codes" (PDF). agenziaentrate.gov.it. Archived from the original (PDF) on 19 August 2016. Retrieved 24 January 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20160819012136/http://www.agenziaentrate.gov.it/wps/wcm/connect/321b0500426a5e2492629bc065cef0e8/codicicatastali_comuni_29_11_2010.pdf?MOD=AJPERES&CACHEID=321b500426a5e2492629bc065cef0e8 ↩