National Identification Number - Argentina

Argentina

In Argentina the only nationally issued identification is the DNI, Documento Nacional de Identidad (National Identity Document). It is a number not related to anything in particular about the person (except for immigrants who get assigned numbers starting at 90,000,000). It is assigned at birth by the Registro Nacional de las Personas (National Registry for People), but parents need to sign up their children, and because of this there are many people, especially the poor, who don't have a DNI.

This ID is required for most things, for example applying for credit, opening a bank account, and even for voting. Law requires a person to show his DNI when using a credit card. Prior to the DNI the LC (Libreta Cívica, for women), and LE (Libreta de Enrolamiento, for men) were used. This was later unified in the DNI.

For taxpaying purposes, the CUIT and CUIL (Código Único de Identificación Tributaria, Unique Code for Taxpaying Identification and Código Único de Identificación Laboral, Unique Code for Laboral Identification). An example of the ID is 20-10563145-8. It's based on the DNI and appends 2 numbers at the beginning and one at the end. For example, 20 and 23 for men, 27 for women, and one control digit at the end. Employees have a CUIL (assigned at the moment the DNI is created), and employers have a CUIT. The first two digits to identify the CUIT for companies are for instance: 30 or 33. If a person decides to open a company of its own, his CUIL usually becomes his CUIT. The CUIT was needed because a different identification is required for companies, who cannot be identified by a DNI number.