Breakdown of Se a transportadora não processar os livros, o que fazemos?
o livro
the book
não
not / no
o que
what
fazer
to do
se
if
a transportadora
the shipping company
processar
to process
Questions & Answers about Se a transportadora não processar os livros, o que fazemos?
Why does processar look exactly like the infinitive here?
For regular verbs, the Future Subjunctive is built using the infinitive as the root. Because the subject is a transportadora (which takes the he/she/it verb form), no extra letters are added, making it look identical to the infinitive.
What triggers the Future Subjunctive in this sentence?
The word se (if) triggers the Future Subjunctive here. We use it because we are talking about a hypothetical situation in the future: we do not yet know whether or not the shipping company will actually process the books.
If this is about the future, why is fazemos in the present tense?
Just like in English, Portuguese often uses the present tense in the second half of an if-statement to discuss an immediate plan or consequence. Asking o que fazemos? (what do we do?) feels more direct and urgent than asking what we will do.
Why do we say o que instead of just que for 'what'?
While que means 'what', European Portuguese almost always uses the phrase o que when asking a direct question. You can think of it as meaning 'that which', but it is easiest to just treat the whole phrase o que as the standard building block for 'what?'.
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