Wasn’t disagreeing with you… only clarifying for the other poster that there’s never been a “grey zone” w.r.t. PR eligibility.
I’m not far behind you; coming on 3.5 years and still no card. But does Portugal care? They’ve got our money and aren’t bothered about delivering their part of the bargain.
One only has to look at the huge money grab of scheduling all these ARI Biometrics appointments this year, only to collect €6k from people and then leave them hanging for another year or two (or more, like us).
From my personal experience with PT’s legal system, it’s also random on judging what’s “fair and reasonable” - so I don’t put much hope in suing for justice here either.