Got my final approval today from PortimĆ£o. Approved on 10/19/2023, but my lawyer just forwarded the notification to me. Paid fee directly to SEF, no DUC issued.
Unfortunately my spouseās application (same biometric date as mine) has no update. Asked our attorney about this and they mentioned that this is pretty common for spousal approval to come through after the primary card has been issued.
This doesnāt seem to be the case based on the posts here but not much we can do about it, waiting to see if a request to local SEF office yields any results. Was hoping to avoid the increased fees but I guess Iāll take any small win that I can at this point.
My lawyer just emailed me last night to say that my and my sonās application (but not my wifeās) were approved and we were asked to pay in ten days via bank transfer to an IBAN they provided. Lawyers went back to SEF ask why the unusual request for an IBAN transfer, why not the usual standard fee collection. They also inquired about the status of my wifeās application and they are waiting for a response.
We did our bio all together at the same date in 24 Feb 23 in Faro.
We were also asked to pay by bank transfer to SEFās IBAN ā¦ but there was nothing in our email about paying within ten days. In any case I chose to pay immediately so as not to risk getting caught out by the higher fees. Incidentally my lawyer said not to worry about the fee increase as the old fees were linked to our case ā¦ but on this I ignored her and paid straightaway as I wasnāt prepared to take any chances.
Does it matter where I send the funds from? I.e any difference or requirement sending it from my local account vs sending it from account in Portugal? Iām just trying to understand if I can directly send it to their IBAN or do I need to send it to my Portugal account first and then to their account?
My recommendation is to pay locally from your PT bank.
In case of any trouble, you would have hard time proving to SEF that your overseas bank processed the payment correctly.
On the contrary, if you have a ācomprovativoā from a local PT bank, it would be much easier to argue your case and resolve a payment issue.
By the way, one very important question. After final approval, will they ask for all documents to be refreshed and submitted yet again - before they will issue the Golden Visa (or whatever its new name/form will be now)?
Not after final approval. But some people on these forums have reported been asked for various refreshed documents as final approval approaches: marriage certificates, police checks, confirmation of investment status and the like. There doesnāt really seem to be a consistent policy on this.
If I had to guess (and this is only a guess) is it possible that the marriage certificate you submitted at the beginning of the process has now āexpiredā?
This happened to me, and I am still lacking final approval, even though my wife (the primary applicant) received final approval and got her card.
Finally some good news out of Faro/Portimao. Received the Residence Card today (10/31) dated October 19th. Will update the tracker. Good luck to all of those waiting.
FYI. I barged in to the Stage 5 forum and asked the good folk there whether theyād had to refresh any expired documents in the run-up to their final approvals. Here are the results. (For some of us, getting documents refreshed is complicated or time-consuming, so I thought this might be a useful exercise.)
As you say, little consistency in practice. Judging from variations in speed of final approvals by biometrics location, final approvals do not appear to be centralised. Thus some individual discretion? And, in locations with faster approvals, the documents are less likely to expire. Just a thought.
All docs are/should be valid at biometrics. So further refresh requests are a result of an approval delay.
Husbandās biometrics went off without a hitch on Oct 31 in Coimbra. He applied Dec 28, 2021. I havenāt received pre-approval yet (applied March 22, 2022).
Exactly. And your lawyer will only say something to the effect that SEF has the right to ask for anything and at anytime. For some people getting these documents and in legalized form over and over again is biggest challenge in all of this.
Yes - in my case Iāll take advantage of a trip to the US at Xmas to get new fingerprints and a third copy of my marriage certificate, and then hold them ready to be apostilled if needed. (No doubt AIMA will ask for the FBI report exactly 91 days after itās issuedā¦)
- so this is still SEF era
