Good luck to all, I am scheduled in Porto next month. I see plenty of information surrounding appointments in Lisbon and Cascais. Haas any one had appointments or know of the flow and outcomes at the Porto AIMA office?
Travel to Casa da Musica Metro Station.
AIMA is 2 minutes walk, literally just across the street.
There is a tiny shopping center adjacent with a cafe and good toilets on lower ground floor.
Don’t be put off by the volume of people waiting outside. Your lawyer will speak to the guard and he will move the barrier to let you in.
Chairs in the waiting room inside.
Whole process for us, two applicants, took 1 hour.
Paid by credit card.
Good luck!
Thank you very much for he information.
2:00pm apt for main applicant only today at Lisbon Av. António Augusto location. Spouse and dependent not included. Arrived 1:30 with law firm representative to get number. Told that law firm associate for another client for 12:00 still waiting for their number to be called so based on their number in queue and time they are already running 2+ hours behind.
Just now notified all systems are down. Not sure if they will allow rescheduling or if they will just take photo or prints while we are here. Total chaos.
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Well total wash. Rescheduled for Wednesday since AIMA closed for carnival. Feel bad for those who flew in and had flights leaving the next day. We met a couple from Japan in this scenario. They had to push their flights/ hotel or scrap this trip and hope for the next, but they opted to reschedule all their flights and hotel…
Will open some Portuguese wine for comfort tonight and hope for the best Wednesday. Luckily we buffered a few days just in case. I highly suggest others add a week to your appointment to cover scenarios like this, but not everyone has that option.
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@kevin10 feel your anguish was in same situation as you last Tuesday but luckily had flexibility in my return to work and was able was to get rescheduled for today at 9am with completion of biometrics. Enjoy the portuguese 
My appointment was at 1pm today (Feb 16th) at Cascais…but because of the nationwide system crash, I got rescheduled to Thursday morning. I rebooked my flights at significant added expense) and added nights in Portugal. Extremely frustrated, but it is what it is…
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Todd sorry to hear that hopefully all will go smoothly for you on Thursday
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So realistically how often is this happened where the system goes down and things need to be rescheduled? Seems it has happened a lot recently
Often enough that you should try to keep your flight/stay flexible in case your appointment gets bumped a day or two later.
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I wonder if these nation wide outages might be related to the recent spate of bad weather here in Portugal?
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For the first time I thought, maybe the Portuguese Government could justify the delays of processing applications for folks who are concerned about spending a few days in Portugal.
Fly in and straight out seems to be the pattern here.
There is another thread on spending the minimum 7 day requirement and proving it for GV renewal.
Just saying.
Seeing that the 7 days doesn’t start until after your card is issued would complicate that argument.
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Well I said, proving it for GV renewal, the word renewal implies that a card has been previously issued.
Hahaha I’m staying in Cascais and my appointments have been in Lisbon. Too bad I couldn’t swap😜
We need to check back in with each other later this week and see how it goes for each of us. I’m on my way to Lisbon for my “rescheduled” appt now.
DM me if you’re staying in the Cascais area. Maybe we can grab a glass of wine and compare notes.
I’ll be in Cascais next week for my appointment. Feel free to DM if you’re still around! Invite extended to anyone else who might be there, too 
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I’ve got my appointment in Lisbon Friday. DM me if anyone is in the same boat and wants to grab a beer.
Look if the government wants more days just change the law so the requirement is upfront. Some of us have very limited vacation days and many responsibilities back home like looking after kids.
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My Wed 9:30 (rescheduled) appt from Monday was a bit strange. Huge crowd outside but seems the police and security were limiting to only those pushed from Monday, so the waiting area was much less crowded that prior on Monday. Mostly lawyers and their clients like us. In and out in 1 hour but the “gotcha” is they wouldn’t take payment. Photo, fingerprint and signature taken but no payment. Lawyer said they are scheduled to come in March for payment and other doc checks (without me). Not clear when the clock starts for card issuance, lawyer said it starts that day of biometrics- even without payment, but I doubt it as everything else I’ve read said the submission isn’t complete without payment.
Wife still irritated as hell that she couldn’t do hers, I can’t blame her. Verbally told hers might be July. I tried escalating to a supervisor there only told to talk to the hand and that they can’t get to my wife’s file, it’s only mine they can access and it’s controlled by someone in Porto. Whatever… fine line to walk in escalating vs them getting irritated and messing with my file. Pick your battles I guess…
Good luck to others. We fly out Saturday.
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My second attempt at doing my biometrics was this morning at Cascais office (after Monday’s failure due to AIMA’s country-wide system crash)…
It went very smoothly. My appointment time was 9:00am. I arrived at 8:50am, which was exactly when the guard started issuing numbers to the people waiting outside. I was finished and walking out by 9:27am. I made my payment using my US visa credit card, which the machine accepted without any problem.
Now I’ll hurry up and wait for my first resident card… Also still waiting for my mother’s biometrics appointment, which I’m hoping will be this summer 
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