How to get a Tax Number (Vergi Numarasi) in Turkey as a Foreigner

By Justin Mays:

Getting a tax number in Turkey whether you are a resident or not is one of the easiest things to do. A tax number is important as it is required for various purposes such as buying a car, opening utility accounts paying taxes, opening a bank account, and payment of residence fees just to mention a few.

The Vergi Numarasi (Tax Number) will be required for many of your transactions in the process of setting up your new life in Turkey and is easily obtained online with no fees. Before you can buy a property and get settled in Turkey you will need to acquire this ten-digit tax number as well.  

There are two ways to get your tax number:

1. Local tax office

Visit your local tax office with colour hard copies of your passport’s photo page and the last incoming stamp page (stamped at the time of immigration checkout).  Luckily the process has moved online now just taking ten minutes to get. We recommend using Google Chrome if you need to translate the page from Turkish.

2. Get your tax number online

For getting the Tax Number Online, you can visit e-devlet, a Turkish Government website that helps residents with all digital information including acquiring tax numbers and clear tax payment steps. Or you can directly have your passport ready and visit the virtual tax office website ivd.gib.gov.tr and click on “Yabancılar İçin Potansiyel Vergi Kimlik Numarasi” (Application for non-citizens potential tax number) located on the lower centre of the page, fill out the required information and upload a photo of your passport’s page with the photo.

The final step is to fill in the security code box and click “Tamam” (okay). Upon successful completion, you will get a pdf file from the webpage and can immediately start using it to set up your life in Turkey and buy that dream property.

If you lose your tax number, you can easily retrieve it by visiting the same page to recover it, the system simply could not be any simpler!