If we have doubts about where we are registered, there are different ways to consult this circumstance, which concerns the place where it is registered that we live «officially». The Municipal Register is a administrative record which includes the neighbors who live in a municipality.
In Spain, registration is mandatory and it must always be in the one of the locality in which it resides on a regular basis. Who lives in several places at the same time, will have to register only in that house where they stay longer throughout the year.
Municipalities
The council of each municipality is in charge of prepare, maintain, review and monitor the Register. The data in it are those that serve as proof of residence and habitual residence in a specific place. From the National Institute of Statistics (INE @en_INE) there is a registry base in the that each of the municipal registers are collected. Every month it is updated with the data sent by the councils, a coordination that is also carried out with the Register of Spaniards Residing Abroad.
Sometimes failures can occur due to administrative errors or the fact of having several residences, which is the most frequent, which in turn may have caused some alteration and especially if we have gone to live elsewhere.
The registration certificate is a document that they are going to ask us for many formalities. For example, if we want to enjoy the home for the elderly in the municipality where we live and the activities that take place, it is likely that they will ask us to do so. Nowadays, this data can be consulted by the institutions themselves without the need for us to present any proof, so that if we have enjoyed these advantages at the price offered to registered citizens, in theory we should be registered in the Register of that site.
However, it is recommended to clear up doubts and be clear about our situation in this regard, is request a certificate proving that we are registered in the town hall where we live. Today it is possible to order it through various means.
The most traditional way is to go to the council itself where it can be required in person. Here you can ask them to simply check if we are in their registration record. You must inform yourself when you can make this consultation, because in some localities some schedules and times are established to carry out these procedures.
In the event that we do not appear, we can ask at the other town halls where we think we can be. However, this can be difficult to implement, especially if we have several residences.
Electronic certificate
As an alternative, we can make a query through the internet in the data that appear in the INE, but for this it is necessary have a electronic certificate. Through this you can look at the registration data that appear registered in your registry base.
Once we have obtained the digital certificate or if we already have it, we will have to access the website of this organization and go to check the registry data. To do this, you have to follow the following steps: Electronic Office, Procedures, Register of Spaniards residing in Spain and, finally, Consult the registration data in the register base.
When you access you have to all the mandatory registration data will appear (where your current address should appear), when was the last variation available at the INE, and the date of registration of the version. This is what you will see on the screen and can be printed. From this body, they warn that the information they have does not have to coincide with that of the consistory and It also does not serve to issue certificates or registration flyers. These have to be requested, therefore, in the councils themselves.
Solve incidents
If after this consultation we observe that there are errors, we must go to the town hall office where we reside to indicate that we have detected them and that we want to correct them. In these cases, we will be asked for a series of documents, the most frequent being the DNI and some official document that proves that our habitual residence It is being carried out in that municipality, such as the rental contract, in the event that this is the circumstance, or the deed of ownership of the home.
There are cases in which it is possible to live in a house where we are not charged a rent, because it is, for example, the residence of a relative. In these situations it is only necessary that any other registered person or the owner of the house, sign a document that justifies it. On the other hand, it must be remembered that each registry office works differently and in some more or less requirements are requested, so before registering or making changes it is important to find out about all the procedures that need to be done, as well as the papers that may require us.
