Re-Entering Brazil with Intent to Live, Resolving Fines

PC,

Good luck with your plans!  They should be doable -- but probably only after you pay your fine.  Others have reported here that there are 24 hour banks at the airports in Rio and São Paulo, so arrival times probably won't be an issue.

You absolutely can be denied entry at the airport.  It wouldn't even be a "deportation", because you wouldn't have been officially admitted into Brazil at all.  I've  never heard of any reduction of fines based on future plans, and it's good that you don't seem to plan on depending on this anonymous tip.  Your best bet is to follow the advice of your current attorney, but to arrive prepared to pay on arrival if necessary, just in case.

As for entering on a different type of visa, there's  an outside chance that that may work, but I wouldn't depend on it.  Be ready for the worst:  that way, you won't be disappointed, and you may be pleasantly surprised.

Hey, I have experience with the fine and re-entering the country after over staying the tourist visa. When I left, the fine was roughly R$9300 and was told I could pay it on my re-entry. When I arrived again a few months later, the fine had gone up to just shy of R$14,000! Expect the same treatment. I was not warned about this upon leaving the country either, I even offered to pay on my way out but was told there is no rush and to do it on return.

Went down the route of a lawyer to try do something about it but they straight up said it's going to be hard to do anything and the legal costs would end up outweighing the cost of the fine plus interest. 
 
I was in the process of getting married to my wife (Brazilian) and had documentation of this but it was meaningless apparently so definitely don't expect to be let back in without paying just because you may have some intentions, sadly they mean sweet f all to the majority of people we interacted with ha.
 
As for being allowed back into the country, at the time the fine was issued to me, I was told I could re-enter to complete my marriage process if I paid the fine. Arrived in SP and went to pay the fine and afterwards they told me that I in fact could not enter Brazil for another 180 days after paying it. Luckily they let me book a different flight, otherwise you'll be heading back to wherever you just arrived from.

Thank you both for your responses! They were very helpful, although did in fact confuse me a little more in some aspects.

@English Penguin: You're saying they raised your fine by almost 5k reais while you weren't even in the country? Did they give a reason? This confuses me because from what I understood of the law, 10k reais is the maximum possible fine. Also, I was told that you can reenter upon paying the fine, but you say that you actually need to wait 180 days from payment of the fine to reenter? It's the first I've heard of that. I supposed they didn't offer much explanation for that either.

Is there an institution I can contact about this to get info? Because the Brazilian Embassy in Ireland is closed due to covid. But, I have no problem with emailing or contact some institution within Brazil, since I speak Portuguese. Any advice would be helpful. As I may seek to pay before reentry.

As the Polícia Federal have become more familiar with the current Law of Migration and more detailed instructions are issued to them, more and more returning visitors with fines pending are reporting being charged interest on the outstanding balances.  That's how a R$10,000 fine can become quite a bit higher, depending on how much time passes between visits.

As abthree mentioned, they add tax to late payments. None of this was disclosed to me or my wife in English or Portuguese at the time I received the fine. Again, I was practically convinced by the staff to pay on my return. I personally wouldn't bother trying to call anyone to find out because I've not once had the same information from more than one person in regards to any of this. I was told multiple times that it's fine to pay on return, that I could re enter the country once I paid it to finish my stable union process and all would be great. Was complete nonsense obviously, but again I can't speak for everyone as it really depends on the weather when it comes to the level of discretion the officials can show (in my experience). Hate to say, but unless the pandemic has really changed things, you're fine will be more than when it was issued and unless you've been out of the country for 180 days, you won't be getting back in unfortunately!

Thanks for the info! The lack of clarity is frustrating. I've been out of Brazil for over 2 years now, so at least it's over 180 days.

Although, the 10 thousand has gone unpaid for 2 years so I shudder to think what kind of interest is on it now. I imagine it's not worth contacting anyone but I may try just in case.

No problem, I wish you all the luck with it. I would say the space between my fine of ~9.3k and then paying it was about 200 days, so the increase was over that period. I have no idea if this tax caps out sadly. I'd also get used to that kind of general frustration, I expect you'll be seeing a lot more of it, at least I know it wasn't the only frustrating interaction I've had haha.

PorkyCheese wrote:

Thanks for the info! The lack of clarity is frustrating. I've been out of Brazil for over 2 years now, so at least it's over 180 days.

Although, the 10 thousand has gone unpaid for 2 years so I shudder to think what kind of interest is on it now. I imagine it's not worth contacting anyone but I may try just in case.

The PF system seems to be in the middle of a transition, but you still may be able to generate a payment document here:

https://servicos.dpf.gov.br/gru2/gru?nac=1&rec=2