The CE - Certified Email - is a system of transmission and reception of emails that gives the sender the certainty, with legal value, of the sending and delivery of the message to the recipient. On the other hand, whoever receives the message has the certainty of the provenance, integrity and authenticity of the certified email message and its attachments.
The law assigns to a Certified Email the equivalent value of registered post, described as ‘registered (signed for) delivery’.
Quote from the art.47 subsection 3 of the Digital Administration Code: "Tutte le pubbliche amministrazioni hanno l'obbligo di utilizzare la Posta Elettronica Certificata, mediante il collegamento di una casella PEC al Registro di Protocollo Generale, per tutte le istanze e le comunicazioni valide ai fini dei procedimenti amministrativi di competenza."
The CE addresses of the public administrations are available in the following website: www.indicepa.gov.it .
These are the IPA (Public Administrations Index) references of Padova's ESU.
The law binds only specific subjects to acquire a Certified Email address.
For registered companies and professionals the use of a CE address is mandatory if they exchange communications and documents with the Public Administration (art.16 subsections 6 and 7 of the Legislative Decree n.185 of 2008 and subsequent amendments and additions). Moreover, the transmission of requests, declarations, data, information, and documents between private companies and public administrations must be executed through communication technologies.
The Ministry of Economic Development has established an Index of the Companies and Professionals CEs: INI-PEC - the consultation is free (art. 6 second DAC).
During public procurement procedures, according to the Legislative Decree n. 50 of 2016, the company accepts and communicates with above-mentioned operators through Certified Email; unless otherwise specified and explicitly mentioned in the tender.
Private citizens have the possibility (according to the art. 3-second of the Legislative Decree of 7th March 2005, n. 82 of the Digital Administration Code) to communicate with public administrations.
They also have the possibility to declare the account as their digital domicile (inserting it in the National Resident Population Register - ANPR - and available to all public administrations).
Public administrations must communicate with private citizens using their declared digital domicile, unless otherwise specified by the law, without any cost for the citizens.
Certified Email accounts can be opened by natural persons (private citizens) as well as legal persons (public companies, private companies, professionals).
To provide better identification of the sender of any document, anyone communicating with this company with a CE account is kindly requested to send to this company their own contacts and documents.
All communications with Padova's ESU concerning institutional activities - in particular on administrative procedures - must be sent to the CE address associated to the General Protocol Register, esu@cert.esu.pd.it, enabled only for CE communications.
Anyone who does not have a CE account, can communicate with ESU through its official standard email address: esu@esu.pd.it.
Padova's ESU communicates with its clients also with other CE accounts managed by automated control systems. Those accounts should not be considered as ESU's official CE addresses, but as other institutional accounts designated only to communicate with users. Those accounts do not need registration of date or protocol of the company.
The management of the Electronic Invoice uses a dedicated CE account, created only for automatic invoicing procedures.
Any message and its attachments, structured as explained below, are received by the company's General Protocol account and are forwarded to the competent offices through and automatic internal sorting procedure.
According to the article 40-second of the DAC, communications received from the following CE accounts would be registered by the company's General Protocol according to the following regulations:
Public Administrations:
a) communications coming from non-CE accounts, provided that the message and/or any attachments are digitally signed;
b) communications from non-CE accounts, provided that the message and/or any attachments are protocolled, according to the art.55 of the Presidential Decree n. 445 of 2000, the art.18 of the Prime Minister's Decree of 31st October 2000, the Technical Regulations for the use of the digital protocol according to the articles 40-second, 41, 47, 57-second e 71 of the DAC, and the Circular of the Digital Italian Agency n. 60 of 23rd January 2013;
c) communications from CE accounts, if the address is published in the Index of the Public Administrations (IPA);
Private citizens:
a) communications sent as attachments from CE and non-CE addresses, if the message and/or any attachments are digitally signed by the sender;
b) communications sent as attachments from non-CE addresses, if the sender is identified by the system with an electronic ID or with a National Services Card;
c) communication sent as attachments from non-CE addresses, if the documentation is signed, scanned, and attached to the message along with a scanned copy of the sender's ID (transmitted requests and communications, according to the art. 38 of the Presidential Decree n.445 of 2000);
d) communications sent from the sender's CE address, with access credentials already cleared and identified by the system, after the senders' confirmation, the so-called PEC-ID. In this case, sending emails with CE constitutes a binding declaration for the sender to accept the transmission of deeds and measures concerning them on the CE address (art.65 clause c-second DAC).
To clarify the matter, we want to inform that not all the CE accounts available fulfill these requirements; the certified email account of the network postacertificata@ is free and fulfills all the requirements to be considered PEC-ID.
Companies and professionals:
a) communications sent as attachments from CE and non-CE addresses, if the message and/or any attachments are digitally signed by the sender;
b) communications sent as attachments from non-CE addresses, if the documentation is signed, scanned, and attached to the message along with a scanned copy of the sender's ID , according to the art. 38 of the Presidential Decree n.445 of 2000;
c) communications sent from their CE address, as published in the Business Register of Chambers of Commerce, or in the National Index of the CE addresses of Companies an Professionals (INI-PEC) in the website of the Ministry for Economic Development, according to the Ministerial Decree of 19 March 2013. In this case, sending emails with INI-PEC constitutes a binding declaration for the sender to accept the transmission of deeds and measures concerning them on the INI-PEC address.
Any request sent to Padova's ESU (e.g.: requesting access to a ranking/tender, general requests on administrative procedures, etc.) must be petitioned with a single email.
The email should contain:
- the object of the communication, specifying the type of request and the norms concerning it.
The body of the email should contain:
1. the Service or the Organizational Unit (Unità Organizzativa - UO) the request is addressed to;
2. a brief description of the request. Assuming there will be further communications (e.g.: integrations, other requests concerning the same procedure, etc.) there should be given a reference to the initial request, mentioning the object, the sending date, and, if known, the ESU's protocol number;
3. the sender's identification data.
Attachments should be structured as follows:
To incoming messages received in ESU's email addresses can be attached only files in portable static formats, that don't contain macroinstructions or executable codes. International ISO documentational standarts are preferable, because the graphics of the document remain the same on print and on desktop. For text or scanned documents we request the following formats, in order of preference:
- .pdf,
pdf/A,
.tiff ,
.jpg ,
.ods,.odp,.odg,.odb (Open Document Format),
.docx,.xlsx,.pptx (Office Open XML),
.txt ,
.xml.
The company reserves the right to accept or decline attachments in other formats (i.e. .doc, .xls, etc.).
1. in the file name mention a brief description of the content, for example 'sponsorshiprequest.pdf' or 'blueprints.pdf'; the name should be max 20 alpha-numeric characters long;
2. no punctuation marks or accent in the name of the file;
3. the message, attachments included, should be max 100 MB (70 MB maximum for atthachments);
4. If there are scanned images attached, the pages should all be uniform as 'dimensions' (A4 size, margins, etc.), 'orientation' (horizontal/vertical), chromatic choice of the images (preferably black & white);
5. Heavy attachments in the above-mentioned formats can be attached in a single .zip file.
For more information contact ESU's Istitutional, Generel Legal Affairs Office (Settore Affari Istituzionali, Generali e Legali).