Help Sheet 3 - Our appointment with SEF D7 Visa Process, Retiring to Portugal. Changes to SEF We attended our SEF meeting on 17th February 2023 to finally become residents of Portugal after applying for the D7 Visa. If you find this Help sheet useful Please share and consider subscribing for our YouTube channel at https:// www.youtube.com/channel/UCDA0p9Z3HxAYwP1pmy80xlg Please hit that Like button for the YouTube algorithm since it really helps us push useful videos about retiring to Portugal to reach more people, we’d appreciate that, and also be sure to Subscribe, thank you. We created a new FaceBook Group Retire to Portugal D7 Visa at https:// www.facebook.com/groups/907625067327054 to share information and experiences. There were two facebook groups with similar names that appear defunct. Please join our new group, participate and share your experiences to help others. Changes to SEF We understand that changes are happening, according to the Portugal Resident Newspaper, there is an enormous backlog of applicants for SEF appointments, and changes are taking place to hand the responsibility to APMA, the Portuguese agency for asylum and migrations. In a statement, SEF says the new model involves notifying online the 290,000 immigrants. Large temporary processing centres will then be set up in pavilions, a little along the lines of temporary vaccination centres during the pandemic. The idea is to ‘clear the backlog’ of immigrants potentially waiting to be processed before SEF’s extinction deadline of March 31 2023. See https:// www.portugalresident.com/sef-prepares-new-model-to-regularise-situation-of- thousands-of-immigrants-before-handing-over-to-apma/ Our Experience You may wonder why we travelled 800 Kms round trip to have our meeting in Portalegre, while SEF have an office 2 kms away from us in Portimao. Portimao has far longer waiting times for appointments than Portalegre, the earliest appointment available at our local office in Portimao is June 3rd. At least we got to stay in Lisbon for a few days on route, lovely city and vibe. We found the SEF staff to be efficient, friendly but under-funded. The humble offices in Portalegre could process 5 applicants at one time. Other applicants were only allowed to enter the office when their appointment time was due. Each applicant took one hour to process, photograph, have digital fingerprints taken, a digital signature is taken. The office had to employ a security guard to turn away applicants without appointments, he was polite but firm. We were asked to submit the following documents. Best to be organised with folder and dividers and sleeves. 1/. Our consultant completed an application form with our details in Portuguese. 2/. Our passports with D7 Visa stamp, plus clear Entry Stamp at airport, plus flight ticket, or evidence of luggage receipts. 3/. The Appointment date and time issued through the SEF website. 4/. Details of my state pension to show income. 5/. Details of my private pension. 6/. Bank statements from my UK bank covering the last 3 months. 7/. Bank statements showing transactions from my Portuguese bank account, with at least a balance of € 9,120.00 8/. Evidence of passive income from rental property in the UK, tenancy agreement. 9/. Proof of 12 months accommodation in Portugal, rental agreement, proof of registration of rental agreement with tax authorities. 10/. Proof of address, such as utilities bill in your name, which we did not have since our landlord pays for utilities. We showed a hospital bill and health insurance policy with our name and address in Portugal, but they wanted a utility bill, but they accepted our explanation and tax documents. 11/. NIF Number certificate 12/. Health Insurance Policy and Health card 13/. Debit card to pay fee of € 158.15 - SEF only accept payment by card but we took cash just in case of poor card machine signal. 14/. Our Address in Portugal 15/. My Email address 16/. Our Portuguese Phone Number 17/. Our Parents Name 18/. Our Civil Status. We were issued with a receipt for payment and signed / stamped certificate with process number and date, with photograph. The ID card is sent at a later date to your address after processing. We take this opportunity to thank Carolina Cruz, who attended the appointment with us to ensure our success, and Mariane Sato of EI Assessoria Migratoria consultancy https://eimigrante.pt/pt/ for all their wonderful help during the D7 Visa process. We decided to select this company to support us since they support the forum https:// expatsportugal.com/ and offer a 10% discount if you are a member of that forum. This company did a great job of supporting us each step of the way.