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- Tax, Live in Portugal
Paying a Home Cleaner in Portugal: Social Security, IRS and the Domestic Work Deduction
🧹 You Pay a Cleaner — So You're an Employer
Many families in Portugal have someone who comes to clean, iron or help around the house. What many don’t realise is that, when you pay a person directly for this work, the law usually treats you as an employer under the domestic service contract regime (Decree-Law 235/92) — even if it’s just a few hours a week.
That brings three sets of rules:
- Social Security — registering the worker and paying contributions every month
- Tax (IRS) — declaring what you pay and, in some cases, withholding tax
- Employment law — a contract, holidays, subsidies and work accident insurance
The good news: since 2024, you can also deduct part of what you pay from your own IRS.
📝 Step 1: The Contract
- Agree the tasks, the schedule and the pay (per hour, day or month).
- A written contract is required for fixed-term arrangements and strongly recommended in all cases. It should identify both parties, the place of work, the tasks, the pay, and rest days and holidays.
- Your worker is entitled to 22 working days of holidays, a holiday subsidy and a Christmas subsidy — proportional if they work part-time.
- You must take out work accident insurance (seguro de acidentes de trabalho) covering accidents at work and on the way to and from work. Many insurers have specific, inexpensive policies for domestic workers.
🏛️ Step 2: Register with Social Security
- Use Segurança Social Direta, under Emprego → Serviço doméstico, to register as an employer and to communicate the start of the work. If the worker isn’t yet registered with Social Security, they need to be registered first.
- The admission must be communicated in the 15 days before the work starts. You can also do it by email, post or in person, using the official form together with a copy of the contract.
- Whenever the arrangement is suspended or ends, communicate it too — by the 10th of the following month.
⚠️ Not declaring a domestic worker can lead to fines and to having to pay the missing contributions later, with interest. It also leaves your worker without protection in illness, maternity, unemployment or retirement.
💶 Step 3: How Much You Pay in Contributions
There are two ways of calculating contributions:
1. Conventional base (the most common for part-time cleaners)
- Contributions are calculated on a fixed reference value linked to the Social Support Index (IAS — €537.13 in 2026), not on what you actually pay.
- Monthly base: €537.13; daily base: €17.90 per day worked; hourly base: about €3.10 per hour worked — with a minimum of 30 hours declared a month, even if fewer are worked.
- Rate: 28.3% — 18.9% paid by you and 9.4% by the worker (you deduct it from their pay).
- This option doesn’t give the worker unemployment benefit.
💡 Example: a cleaner who comes 4 hours a week is declared at the 30-hour minimum. The base is about €93, and total contributions are about €26 a month — around €17.60 from you and €8.70 from the worker.
2. Actual pay
- Available for full-time, monthly contracts paying at least the minimum wage — €920 in 2026, rising to €970 in 2027 under the social concertation agreement (pending official publication).
- Rate: 33.3% — 22.3% from you and 11% from the worker — calculated on the real salary.
- This option includes unemployment protection.
Paying: contributions for each month are paid between the 10th and the 20th of the following month, by Multibanco or home banking, using the reference in Segurança Social Direta. If your worker is paid by the hour or by the day, keep the hours or days worked up to date there.
🧾 Step 4: What You Declare to the Tax Authority
For your worker, what you pay is employment income (category A), taxed in their own IRS. As the payer, you have a few duties:
- No withholding (most part-time cases): if the pay is below the withholding threshold, you don’t withhold IRS. Instead, you submit the Modelo 10 on the Portal das Finanças, normally by 10 February of the following year, with what you paid and the contributions deducted.
- With withholding: if the monthly pay is above the threshold (in practice, above the minimum wage — €920 in 2026 and €970 expected in 2027), you must withhold IRS, submit the monthly remuneration declaration (DMR) and pay the tax withheld. In this case, you don’t need the Modelo 10.
These declarations matter for your worker’s IRS — they’re how the Tax Authority knows what they earned and what they contributed.
💸 The IRS Deduction for Domestic Work
Since the 2024 State Budget, article 78.º-H of the IRS Code lets you deduct from your IRS:
- 5% of the pay you (or anyone in your household) gave to domestic workers during the year
- Up to a maximum of €200 per household — which you reach with €4,000 of pay a year
Conditions:
- Only pay to workers under the domestic service contract regime counts.
- Only pay declared to Social Security counts — an undeclared cleaner gives you no deduction.
How it works: you don’t need to keep invoices or fill anything in. Social Security sends the Tax Authority the amounts declared under your NIF by 15 February of the following year, and the deduction appears automatically in your IRS return. Check it on the Portal das Finanças before you submit your return.
🏢 What If You Use a Cleaning Company?
- If you hire a company or a self-employed professional who issues you an invoice, you’re a client, not an employer — no Social Security registration, no contributions and no insurance on your side.
- In that case, the article 78.º-H deduction doesn’t apply. But invoices issued with your NIF count towards the general household expenses deduction (35% of the expense, up to €250 per taxpayer), together with your other everyday spending.
- ⚠️ Be careful with a cleaner who works only for you, on a fixed schedule and under your direction, but sends you recibos verdes — this may be an employment relationship in disguise.
✅ Quick Checklist
- Written contract with tasks, schedule and pay
- Work accident insurance in place
- Worker registered and admission communicated to Social Security before the start
- Contributions paid every month, between the 10th and the 20th
- Holidays, holiday subsidy and Christmas subsidy paid
- Modelo 10 (or monthly DMR with withholding) submitted to the Tax Authority
- 5% deduction checked on the Portal das Finanças before you submit your IRS
- Suspension or end of the contract communicated to Social Security
🚀 Final Considerations
Having help at home in Portugal comes with responsibilities, but they’re manageable — and for a part-time cleaner, the monthly cost of doing things properly is modest. In return, your worker is protected, you avoid fines and back payments, and you get up to €200 back in your IRS every year.
📢 Expert Advice: Set everything up before the first day of work — contract, insurance and Social Security — and keep a simple record of hours and payments. It makes the monthly contributions, the Modelo 10 and your IRS deduction straightforward.
Hiring help at home, or unsure whether your current arrangement is in order? Step Inside Portugal can check your obligations, help you get set up and handle your IRS return — find out more about our tax services here. ✨
This article is for general information only and doesn’t constitute legal or tax advice. It reflects the rules as of November 2026; amounts such as the IAS and the minimum wage are updated every year, so confirm the rules that apply to your case.
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