Had the appointment in Sept in Lisbon and approved 2 days ago (could have been sooner as my lawyer had to respond to SEF about a few things back and forth at one point ). Hopefully will receive the resident card next month…who knows. I also think maybe the Ukraine refugees issues have delayed the process a bit more these days
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Congrats , was the approval through the email ? Any status change in Ari Portal ?
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My lawyer just notified me. I don’t have any access to the portal.
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When were you notified to pay for the final approval/card fee?
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I was notified to pay anytime now.
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Do you notice any changes to your ARI portal ? Payment section?
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An update my earlier timeline post. My spouse’s visa was finally approved today! That’s just over 6 mths after the biometrics appointment. Card should arrive in about four weeks.
So we are finally at the end of our process. We submitted our application in Oct 2020 so today has been a long time coming 
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Good to hear that something is processing at least even if new appointments are on hold.
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Yes, I really sympathize with everyone’s frustrations. We had to wait through the first long period of no appointments (and no application processing) at the beginning of 2021 when all the offices closed during Portugal’s big wave of Covid cases.
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Congrats . Did you see in Change in the portal like “Examining Application “ any status change there ?
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Don’t know sorry. I don’t have access to the portal. My lawyer handled that.
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SEF was really processing a lot and quickly but since current biometrics are based on SEF extending invitation for appointment, it necessitates that SEF has resources to make and schedule new appointments. If SEF is too busy handling other matters and cannot reach out to make appointments, it makes sense that matters will stall.
That seems to be the case at the moment.
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You are very lucky. I applied in Nov ‘22 and have no updates so far.
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Primary application:
Biometrics: Lisbon Oct 5th, 2021,
Final approval notification: April 4th, 2022
Card received: TBA
Spouse:
Biometrics: TBA
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@myakira Did it actually take 6 months or were there missing documents you supplied during that time that slowed down the process?
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Yes. Six months until final approval. All documents current (so I thought). In the ARI Portal, payment status changed (with a payment request of EUR5325).
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Biometrics October 2021 in Porto.
Updated Background Check summited in December 2021
Paid for card in February 2022 and received in March
Update: Following a call with the lawyer today, SEF did request a translation of the background check into Portuguese from English (apparently it was submitted untranslated) in Jan 2022. This was communicated/completed between SEF and the law firm without (the need of) my knowledge at the time.
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Finally we got the cards today .
Biometric taken on 12 Nov 2021 Portimao SEF
Approval received on 25th March 2022
Today my lawyer Received the cards 11 April 2022
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Congrats. Card production: 18 days from final approval.
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