speaking to a neighbour who was speaking in turn to an engineer from aquas do algarve..anywya he said next year all boreholes will have meters fittted to them ..

anyone else heard this

Well I heard guest (second hand though) that there may be a tax imposed on borehole owners.

The question is, will that be applied on only registered i.e. legal boreholes or will they tax/put meters on every borehole out there

I think I already know the answer to my very stupid question. Oh I'm so cynical!

well there is a licencce reqd when you drill (assuming the drilling people bother ) but of course we pay tax on the electric we use to pump up with ..people on mains water dont.

anyway seeing the headline in todays Algarve news should concern alll

Yes ..thank goodness I illegally drilled ..........8000 Euro plus I pay for the Electric....about 10 years water for most........why should I pay more.......

maybe you shouldn't pay more but you could have probs if you want to sell your property at a later date without the licence surely?

I think more than half the villas and apartments here are not fully legal for many reasons...Balconies turned into another room is the big one (Millions) and illegal pools...thousands....Basements turned into a lower floor ...thousands.....etc etc......at least with a bore hole one can apply any time...might get a small fine ....

I am afraid you are right there guest, as it seems unlike in other countries, the authorities never request people to take down, remove, destroy or change what they have done...they just impose fines and things stay. In fact, I am not sure why they have any systems to follow or bodies like the ambient and planning in the first place. They might as well say to everyone do what you like and let us know afterwards and we will fine you...simple eh? It could save a lot of admin and staff couldn't it?

The only sad thing is that Portugal could (and probably will) end up a lump of concrete dotted by loads of dried up boreholes like a Swiss cheese. Not an entirely nice thought but that's what they call progress isn't it?