The codice fiscale is free, and they hand you the paper certificate the same day. What actually takes time is the queue.
Taking a ticket
I went at two in the afternoon on my first attempt and was told the day's tickets were gone. The next morning I got there at 8:20, found twenty-odd people already at the door, they opened at 8:30, I drew A-14 and was called at 9:05.
The conclusion is simple: go in the morning, twenty minutes before opening. Do not count on the afternoon.
The form
AA4/8 is available at the office, or you can download it, fill it in and bring it. Two fields to watch:
- Place of birth: city plus country, written the Italian way. The clerk corrected mine to
PECHINO - CINA. - Address: a temporary one is fine — a hotel, a friend's flat. You update it later when you move, and the codice fiscale itself does not change.
Check the spelling of your name at the counter
My given name is three characters; my passport reads WANG XIAOMING. The first printout dropped a letter, and I caught it while I was still standing there.
This check is not optional: the codice fiscale is calculated from your name, date of birth and place of birth, so one wrong letter makes the whole string wrong. Later on, the bank and the university system will not match, and fixing it means another trip.
What you walk out with is a sheet of A4 carrying your 16 characters. The plastic card, the tessera sanitaria, is only sent after you register with the health service — do not wait for it.