EU Blue Card for Italy, Step by Step: From Job Offer to First Payslip

You have the offer, or at least a company that wants you. You have a degree or years of solid experience. You would like to live in Italy. Between that moment and your first Italian payslip there are five documents, three offices and one recurring question: who, exactly, is your employer in Italy?

This guide follows the EU Blue Card (Carta blu UE) in the order things happen. The legal basis is article 27-quater of the Italian Immigration Act (D.Lgs. 286/1998), rewritten in 2023 to implement the revised EU Blue Card directive, with operating instructions in a joint circular of the Ministry of Labour and the Ministry of the Interior of 28 March 2024.

Step 0: settle who the employer is  

The Blue Card is requested by an employer in Italy. The application goes to the Sportello Unico per l’Immigrazione, the immigration desk at the local prefecture. A company in Bangalore, São Paulo or Austin with no Italian presence cannot easily file it.

There are two ways around that. The company opens its own Italian entity, which takes months before the permit can even start. Or an Employer of Record (EOR) in Italy becomes the legal employer: it signs the Italian contract, files the permit and runs payroll, while the company abroad keeps directing your work. That is what ItalyBlueCard does.

Step 1: check eligibility  

Article 27-quater accepts one of four qualification profiles:

• a higher education qualification of at least three years, or a three-year post-secondary qualification at level 6 of the national framework;
• the recognition required for a regulated profession, such as nursing;
• a higher professional qualification with at least five years of relevant experience at a level comparable to a degree;
• for ICT managers and specialists, at least three years of relevant experience in the last seven years.

Then two conditions on the job. The contract or binding offer must last at least six months. And the salary must reach both the level of the applicable collective agreement (CCNL) and the average gross annual salary published by ISTAT. A secondary source puts that figure at about €36,300 a year; we treat it as provisional until we read the official notice. Check the details on our Blue Card page .

Step 2: build the contract  

The nulla osta is granted on a specific contract: role, level, salary, hours, place of work. Everything in the application has to match what you will later sign and what you will be paid. Typical mistakes are a job title that does not match the qualification, a salary quoted net instead of gross, or a fixed-term contract shorter than six months.

With an EOR, the company abroad decides role and pay; the EOR translates them into an Italian contract under the right CCNL and checks the threshold before filing.

Step 3: the nulla osta  

The employer files the request online. The law sets a deadline: the immigration desk must issue the nulla osta, or notify a refusal, within 30 days. That is one of the main practical differences from the quota route, where you also depend on application windows and available places.

The nulla osta is not a visa. It is the authorisation that lets you apply for one. It also has a limited life for that purpose: the Italian Embassy in Beijing, for example, states it is valid for no more than six months after issue. Book the consular appointment as soon as it arrives.

Step 4: the visa  

You apply at the Italian embassy or consulate for your place of residence, not necessarily your country of citizenship. Expect to bring the application form, photo, passport, the nulla osta, the original qualification documents with legalisation and Italian translation, and proof of accommodation in Italy. A CIMEA comparability statement can replace the declaration of value for degrees. Each consulate publishes its own checklist; follow that one, not a generic list.

Step 5: arrival, stay contract, residence permit  

Once in Italy you and your employer sign the stay contract at the immigration desk. Then you apply for the residence permit with the “Carta blu UE” wording. The permit lasts two years if your contract is permanent, otherwise the length of the contract plus three months. Our relocation page lists the other first-week tasks: tax code, residence registration, health service, bank account.

Step 6: payroll  

From your first day you are an Italian employee: monthly payslip, INPS contributions, 13th month, TFR, at least four weeks of paid leave. The company abroad gets one monthly invoice. With ItalyBlueCard that is €250 per month plus the actual employment cost, in EUR or USD at the EUR reference rate.

What changes after a year  

In the first 12 months you do the job the card was issued for. A change of employer needs the prior approval of the local labour office, which counts as given if it does not reply within 15 days. If you lose your job you can look for another while unemployed. You can also run a self-employed activity alongside the qualified job. After that first year, the labour market restrictions fall away.

The short version  

Settle the employer first. Check qualification, contract length and salary. File, then move fast on the consulate. Keep every document consistent. Use the cost calculator to show the company abroad what employing you in Italy will cost.

In brief, your questions  

Is the Blue Card tied to one city? No. The threshold and the rules are national. The immigration desk that handles the file is the one for the place of work.

Can the company abroad pay part of my salary from home? For the permit, what counts is the Italian contract and the salary paid through Italian payroll. Splitting pay across countries complicates tax and the threshold check; we advise against it.