Having a personal tax code while living in another country can be absolutely vital to making sure you can navigate the various steps you will have to take during your move abroad. I've come to realize there are a number of you who watch/listen to Not Your Average Globetrotter who are considering a move to Portugal or a move to Italy. In this expat podcast episode about living abroad in these countries, I wanted to compare and contrast what many may consider to be a boring topic, but can actually be quite important: ‘how to use the codice fiscale and how to use the NIF’.  It will be a little bit of a brief overview of how to get a codice fiscale and how to get a NIF as well as when to use them.  When living in Portugal you may find that the NIF gets asked for more than the codice fiscale that is used I n Italy.  However,  you do see many similarities between the two personal tax identifiers. When moving to Portugal or moving to Italy having you personal tax number will be extremely important for taking care of some of the most major steps in setting up your new life living abroad and to help things go smoothly. As I've mentioned, I think it's very important if you can get your tax code before arriving in your country of choice so that it's possible to arrive and hit the "ground running" so to speak.