Most guides to Spain's entrepreneur permit stop at the business plan. The part that trips people up is smaller and duller: actually getting the file into the system. Spain does not accept this application on paper, by email or at a counter. It goes through one web page, with one form, one fee receipt and one piece of signing software. This piece walks through that page as the ministry publishes it. Everything here was checked on 8 November 2026 against the procedure page of the Ministry of Inclusion's electronic office and the UGE's "Solicitudes" page.
One rule before anything else: it is all electronic
The Unidad de Grandes Empresas y Colectivos Estratégicos (UGE), the unit that decides these files, puts it in one sentence. Applications for authorisations under Law 14/2013, and all documentation related to them, including corrections, extra documents, appeals and communications, must be submitted by electronic means through the ministry's electronic office. That covers the first filing and everything after it. If the UGE asks you for a missing document, the answer goes back through the same office.
The consulate is not an alternative. Under the law as amended in 2022, a founder outside Spain files a single application with the UGE that starts the permit first and the visa second, consecutively. The consulate's part comes after the UGE has decided.
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The procedure page, and what it is called
The electronic office lists the procedure under a long name: "Presentation of applications for residence authorization for international mobility (Authorizations regulated by Law 14/2013, to support entrepreneurs and their internationalization)". Its SIA code, the number Spain's administration gives every procedure, is 202099. If you are searching the office's catalogue and cannot find "entrepreneur", search for that code or for "movilidad internacional". The managing unit is the Subdirección General de Gestión y Coordinación de Flujos Migratorios, inside the Dirección General de Migraciones.
The page states its legal basis: Title V, Section Two of Law 14/2013, articles 63 to 76, plus Order PCM/1238/2021, which published the Council of Ministers' agreement of 2 November 2021 setting out the procedure instructions. Those are the texts the office applies. Anything a consultant tells you that is not in them is practice, not rule.
One honest warning the page gives about itself: the English version is a machine translation. Where a word looks odd, the Spanish page is the one that counts.
The three forms
- MI-T: the application model for the permit holder. This is the one an entrepreneur fills in.
- MI-F: the model for family members, filed together with yours or afterwards.
- MI-T-Audiovisual: a separate holder model for people in the audiovisual sector. Not for founders.
The UGE adds that one application model is common to every authorisation under Law 14/2013, so the entrepreneur, the highly qualified professional and the researcher all start from the same MI-T. What differs is the box you tick and the documents you attach. The UGE also publishes a few side models that a founder may need: an affidavit that a family bond still exists, and a responsible declaration that your means are sufficient.
The fee and the NRC
The fee is paid on tax form 790, code 038. On that form, point 7 is "Application for international mobility authorisations (Law 14/2013)", with separate lines for an initial residence authorisation and a renewed one, each for the holder and for dependent family members. You generate the form, which prints the current amount, and pay it. We do not quote the amount, because the form sets it and it changes from year to year.
What matters for the filing is what the payment gives you: the NRC, the Número de Referencia Completo. The procedure page says plainly that at the end of the payment you must obtain the NRC, which is necessary for the presentation of the file. In practice this means the fee is paid before you open the application, not after. A file without an NRC does not go in.
The signing software
The office signs documents with Autofirma, the Spanish administration's signing application. The procedure page keeps a troubleshooting note that is worth reading before you start rather than at midnight on the day: if access or signing fails, check that you have Autofirma version 1.9.0, and if not, download and install it from firmaelectronica.gob.es; then clear the browser cache or hard-refresh. The office also links a manual on validating the signature in PDF documents, useful when a notary or bank questions a signed file later.
The order to do things in
- Get a digital certificate, yours or your legal representative's. The UGE says you will need one to apply; the next article in this series is about who can get one and how.
- Install Autofirma and check the version.
- Generate and pay form 790-038 under point 7, and keep the NRC.
- Fill in MI-T, and MI-F for each family member.
- Open the procedure in the electronic office, attach everything, sign, submit, and keep the receipt.
From the moment of electronic filing, the UGE's legal deadline to decide runs, and if it does not decide in time the permit is granted by administrative silence. That clock is the reason to file complete: a request for a missing document stops it. Our Spain guide covers the deadlines and the ENISA report in full, and the route finder tells you whether Spain is the right file to open at all.