Awaiting Final Approval (Stage 4)

Residencies & citizenships Portugal Golden Visa
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3053

Hi, i’m new on this forum, but been watching for a while.

I’m currently living in Lisbon since last April. Here’s my timeline:

Applied December 2021
Wife applied early 2022 on my GV.
Initial accepted sometime in 2022
Biometrics for both of us in Oct 2023.
Filed court case November 2024 when i knew we wanted to move here.
May 2025 the judge sent AIMA a letter asking why they hadn’t issued my visa. 30 days were given to them to respond.
June 2025 - AIMA responded with little excuse and asked the judge for a deadline to complete.
Criminal record documents requested for us both in October 2025.
Portal status has been ‘Transferred’ since Oct/Nov.

Still waiting for the judge to respond to AIMA. Seems they are just as slow as AIMA.

Now just waiting for final accepted and DUC, but getting very frustrated because I want to go back home in April to do some things but seems risky. The wife, cat and all our things will not be coming until we get the visas.

I’m just trying to learn Portuguese and about Portugal.

Any advice would be appreciated?

3054

Welcome to the forum!

The best advice about Portugal is: patience, patience, and more patience! Everything moves at a glacial pace (without global warming). And so, you will get your DUC eventually, but it would cause you much more frustration along the way.

As for travel, if you have a pending application on file with AIMA, you can use that document to travel. We did it many times (back and forth to the U.S.). I would advise flying to/from Portugal into non-Schengen country (like England, Ireland, U.S., Canada, Turkey, etc.). We never had any issues (with our U.S. passports).

We also moved to Portugal in 2022, 2.5 years before I got my card (Mar 2025), and 3 years before my wife received hers (Oct 2025). It has not been much of an issue for us, though we took few risks travelling by car to Spain, France, and by plane to Italy, Croatia, and Montenegro.

If you want to attempt to accelerate your final approval, try a written letter to AIMA (in my case - Funchal). I posted it registered, receipt-requested (costs about 5.30 €). In this fashion you receive a proof of communication with AIMA, meaning that at least someone has received and possibly read your letter. I think it helped me to resolve couple of issues (wrong NIF on my first residency card, and request to issue my wife’s card).

Good luck!

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3055

Our lawyers got this AIMA reply a few days ago, fwiw :man_shrugging:

…the processes relating to the residence permit applications in question are awaiting processing, in accordance with the chronological order of application receipt, and that at this time we are processing applications formalized after the second week of February 2024.

Unfortunately, due to a clear lack of resources, it is impossible to process requests submitted to the AIMA Lisboa I store more quickly, and we are unable to give an estimate of when the processing of these applications will be completed.

xxx
Senior Technician | DPAQ | UARI

“formalized” seems to mean Biometrics collected

Note we are “old process” ARI and did Bios in Dec. 2024, but don’t get to pay our €6k/ea. fees until final approval.
I don’t know if “new process” ARI (Bios in 2025 and later) are still in a different queue (they were for a while last year), now merged into our “chronological order of application receipt” queue, or what.

3056

Overheard this in public, at the AIMA Lisbon office while I was waiting during my biometrics appointment: someone was telling their client who had just finished their appointment that AIMA has 90 working days to make the decision now, which is more like 180 calendar days. And also the timeline for the decision was separate from printing the card. So they estimated a 6 to 12 month wait for the card following the appointment. Whether this was an appointment on the old process or the new, I don’t know.

This is literally hearsay, and almost certainly nobody knows any hard numbers, including AIMA. But it can be “fun” to speculate.

3057

That was also the case years ago, and has turned out to be another big PT GV lie :roll_eyes:

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3058

Have provided bio’s in September 2023 and still waiting in this total scam

3059

Yes, 6 months seemed overly optimistic to me, having heard the stories on this forum.

3060

Hi! Could you tell me how you were able to move to portugal without the residency card? I’m guessing this was after you had give your biometrics? Were there any problems while you were residing in portugal, regarding apartment rentals, etc? Did you travel on a tourist visa the first time you moved there?
Would love to hear more about your experience.
I submitted my application back in June 2022, and now in March 2026 i finally have my biometrics, so i was wondering if such a move would be possible after I complete my biometrics. Thanks for your time.

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3061

Hi - please see:

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3063

Hello Aman,

First, I must set the stage: I am an American according to my passport, and I have a visa-free access to Schengen for 90 days out of 180.

We applied for the GV in October 2021 via real estate option, and we had our place in downtown Lisbon available to live when we arrived. Hence I do not know anything about renting in Portugal without a card.

We arrived in October 2022 on our visa-free Schengen access, some three months before our biometrics. We purchased a car in Spain with just our passports and managed to register it in Portugal (still before biometrics).

We had our biometrics in January 2023, and then waited another two years (for primary) and two-and-a-half years (for dependent) until we received our cards in 2025. During this wait, we encountered no issues staying in Portugal.

We travelled with our car numerous times to Spain and France, all with no issues - we were never stopped or questioned by anyone during any border crossings. We flew with overstayed visa to/from France, Australia, Italy, one-way to Croatia, crossed by car to Montenegro (outside of Schengen), and returned to Lisbon via Serbia by air. Nobody ever questioned us or even checked our passports for stamps. We were just waived through.

In general, your card really does not matter all too much here, though I had issues with Novobanco for a while due to my original place of birth, Russia, due to sanctions imposed on all Russians. Once I received the card, Novobanco unblocked my account. We buy our own health insurance here, and use private hospitals even though we received our NISS (after we received our cards). We are now in the process of exchanging our driving licenses for Portuguese ones, again after receiving our cards. This process is taking quite some time due to slow-moving bureaucracy, but I continue to drive with my U.S. license whether they like it or not. So far, so good…

And so, I can only speak from my experiences as an American expat. Your results could vary greatly depending on your specific passport and visa requirements.

Good luck!

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3064

I’m in a similar situation. If you decide to move, it’ll have to be overstaying on a tourist visa. (Assuming you don’t have a passport with visa-free access or a long-term multiple entry visa.)

The key limitation is you have to stay put in Portugal once your tourist visa expires, until you get your residence card. In an emergency in your home country, you can go back, but you must exit the Schengen area via Portugal itself, and in most likelihood, you’ll have to wait for the residence card before reentry.

The receipt you get after biometrics confirming your presence and residency application in process helps. Some things might require more explanation but will be done (bank accounts, renting properties, declaring tax residency and paying taxes), some things are uncertain (getting NISS, registering for SNS), while some others can only be done after getting a residence card (Revolut or resident status on bank accounts, driver’s license).

In the very unlikely chance that some January biometrics start seeing residence cards by March, that’ll significantly derisk the move. But yes, as of now, you’ve got to be prepared for the worst-case scenario - being stuck in Portugal for a couple of years.

3065

I rented an apartment in Lisbon before even applying for my GV in 2021. No issues, and my landlord is a corporation who registered everything with the authorities ( as required), again without a problem.
So unless the law has changed since then, this aspect should not be a problem.

3066

Thank you all for your feedback. Since my passport doesn’t allow a visa free entry to schengen, I understand if I plan to overstay my tourist or professional visa, I will have to take caution travelling to other european countries. And if international travel I must enter and exit through portugal. This really helps. I will consult with my lawyers as well and see what they think. But it’s definitely looking positive in terms of atleast making a move. Thank you all once again for all the info and your time.

3067

Hi,

thanks for the advice and response.

I can see how moving to and from the UK would probably be fine as they never check how many stamps I have, but I’m becoming more worried with all the new tech and news I read. I always have my visa application with me that shows I’ve been accepted in the first part. Hopefully that’s enough.

That’s a good idea about sending them a letter. I will try. Did you send with CTT? They don’t seem very reliable? Or did you use another company?

3068

Thanks for this thread. It’s very helpful. Are any of you in Lisbon and in this position?

3069

So they are processing those that did biometrics after Feb 2024? Wouldn’t it make sense to do those that have been waiting longer first? :face_exhaling:

3070

Yes, if and when the electronic passport controls would finally be deployed, it would make it harder to travel to and from the EU, but probably not within it.

For all the communications with SEF/AIMA I used CTT. Within Portugal they are fairly reliable, especially when I used registered post. All correspondence was tracked and visible on CTT Web site.

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3071

In original Portuguese, the AIMA response was:

Na sequência do e-mail infra, informa-se V. Exa. que os processos relativos aos pedidos de autorização de residência em causa encontra-se a aguardar instrução, em observância do critério da ordem cronológica de entrada de processos, sendo que nesta data estamos a instruir processos formalizados após a 2ª semana de fevereiro de 2024.

…so “após” = “after” in my limited PT skills. But I assume what they really meant was applications with Bios taken up until Feb. 2024.

However AIMA is the most random government entity I have ever seen, so who knows what’s really happening in each office :zany_face:

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3072

My dear Roo: sense has nothing to do with how Portugal does business. Do not look for logic, fairness, truth, consistency, or even compassion. If you do, you will be bitterly disappointed.

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3073

Just got residency cards!
Initial application Oct 2022
Biometrics June 2025
Cards Jan 2026.
No court cases.

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