The identification of these irregularities is included in the Court of Auditors' opinion on the 2023 General State Account (CGE), submitted to parliament, with the body led by José Tavares warning that rent support – a measure launched in 2023 to mitigate the rise in housing costs – "shows risks that may affect the veracity of the allocation, the accuracy of the calculation and consequently the correctness of the payment".

The document states that in 2023 this support reached 258,661 beneficiaries, involving a public expenditure of 350 million euros, with the annual support granted amounting to around 1,351 euros per beneficiary.

In the analysis of the measure, "non-conformities and other situations in its implementation" were identified, including the fact that the payment of support was recorded for "32 beneficiaries not resident in national territory", with there also being "2,867 non-habitual residents" who benefited from it.

Among the non-conformities were also detected the situations of 35,229 beneficiaries to whom the support was granted but not paid and the non-payment of the amounts relating to December 2023.

At issue is a support whose maximum value can go up to 200 euros per month, for rental contracts registered up to 15 March 2023, aimed at families whose rent effort rate exceeds 35%. One of the conditions for granting the benefit is that the beneficiary must be tax resident in Portugal.

Despite the improvements introduced to the support with changes in legislation that have occurred in the meantime, the TdC's analysis points out some risks in the operationalization of the measure, such as the fact that the universe is only defined annually, without any planned updates in light of changes in information, which may "lead to the payment of support that is no longer due in view of the changes that have occurred, as well as excluding from the support situations that arise later".

The fact that the annual IRS declaration is used to assess the effort rate also presents weaknesses, since there is "a large time lag in which the financial situation of tenants may have undergone significant changes".

"Using the value of the rent declared when the contract was registered introduces distortions, especially in older contracts, since this rent does not reflect increases that may have occurred in the meantime", reads the opinion, which states that, although beneficiaries may add new information, this "does not change the fact that the initial calculation is made with information that may be out of date and for which there is a better source of information, such as rent receipts issued by landlords".

In addition, the information on the household is declarative and is not subject to specific validation, and it is also noted that there is no control over situations of informal housing sharing.

"Therefore, it would be beneficial for determining the universe if there were the possibility of such validation, namely by identifying all people who have tax residence in the property being calculated (and who are not registered in the rental contract), with the commitment of the beneficiary himself", the document states.

The TdC analysis also concluded that 25.1% of the total beneficiaries received the maximum support of 200 euros, while 20.8% received between 110 and 200 euros, 17.5% between 80 and 110 euros and 13.1% between 50 and 80 euros, with the remainder receiving monthly support of less than 50 euros.