🚨 Extension of the validity of CRUE and of residence permits until 15 October 2025 + AIMA alerts on the circulation of fraudulent e-mails!
- Claire Vous Aide
- Jul 1
- 2 min read
Updated: Jul 1
If you are a citizen of the European Union, the European Economic Area or Switzerland, and you are settling in Portugal for a period of more than 3 months, you must be in possession of the document known as the CRUE (‘Certificado de Registo de Cidadão da União Europeia’), also commonly known as the ‘stars document’.
The CRUE is valid for 5 years (indicated on the document itself).
📆 Once these 5 years of legal and uninterrupted residence in Portugal have elapsed, if you continue to live in Portugal, you must obtain your Permanent Resident Card - known as a ‘Certificado de Residência Permanente’ - from the AIMA (‘Agência para a Integração Migrações e Asilo’), which replaced the SEF in October 2023.
Applications for the ‘Certificado de Residência Permanente’ must be made online via the AIMA portal.
The applicant must fill in a short online form so that AIMA can arrange a future appointment for the resident's card to be issued.
At the moment, you need to be very patient before you receive a reply from AIMA. It is therefore strongly recommended that you keep a record of your online application (a screen copy that can be used as a proof of registration).
🚨 WARNING: since 22 August 2024, AIMA has been alerting people to fraudulent emails circulating false information about the existence of appointments at AIMA, asking them to turn up at a specific date and time. 🚨 These emails come from "noreplyportalsef@saf-aima.pt". AIMA recommends that you do not click on any links in these emails and reminds that the official appointments set by AIMA come from the ‘aima.gov.pt’ domain. Click here to see an example of a fake email detected by AIMA. If you think you may have been a victim of this fraud, AIMA recommends that you report it to the police.👮🏻♂️.
⚠️💡As the AIMA services are currently unable to respond to requests for the renewal of residence permits, a new Decree-Law has extended the validity date of all documents and residence permits relating to residence on Portuguese territory.
As a result, documents - including CRUEs - that were still valid in March 2020 are considered valid and are therefore accepted by the Portuguese public authorities until 15 October 2025.
Legal basis: Decree 85-B/2025.
Laurent Goater, President of the Consular Council, communicated the following message to French residents in Portugal on 1 July 2025: "You should refer to this when dealing with authorities who question the expiry date on the original document. This situation was created by the previous socialist government when it abolished the SEF without ensuring that sufficient resources were provided to the administration that replaced it (now the AIMA). The new government has announced a new reform of this administration, as well as a major revision of the rules governing immigration and access to nationality, which mainly concern non-European residents."
