EES
 

Sorry if this sounds like a stupid question but I'm flying to the UK next Tuesday and returning to Faro next Sunday. I will have my wife with me on the return trip as after five years and three months of solitude she's finally been given a visa to join me here. As such I don't want to mess things up, and as I'm the resident I'm supposed to know how everything here works.

I told her she will have to go through the EES biometric system, and that produced a frown. When asked for more information I told her that there would be a machine at the airport she will have to use before boarding the plane. I've just watched a few YouTube clips on this and it seems to be only ferry and Eurostar passengers who go through this before boarding while airline passengers do it on arrival.

The guy demonstrating the procedure was showing the way it works, including the Q&A bit where passengers are asked if they have a hotel, cash, return ticket etc. But I think on the first page of Q&A it asks if are you a citizen or resident of the country...? That has made me wonder whether we all need to use the system or not, even though they already have our biometrics.

If anyone's gone through this recently it would be good to know what we actually have to do.

Re: EES
 

As far as I'm aware European airports are still in the phase of testing the new machines and they aren't going to be fully in use until early next year. I flew out of Málaga to the UK on Tuesday of this week, and back into Málaga on Thursday and the machines weren't being used for either flight. Trouble is, there's no way to know in advance whether they will or won't be in use on the days you are flying.

I raised the same question as you on the Spanish forum, about whether as residents of an EU member state, we will have to use the machines, as I'd seen a guide to the new process written by the travel journalist Simon Calder, who had used one at Prague airport a couple of weeks ago. He said that after having his passport scanned by the machine, the second question asked whether he had a residence permit. Other forum members were confident that residence permit holders would be exempt, as earlier publicity had indicated. But I am now wondering whether that just means that we will be exempt from having to provide biometrics again, as those will already be on record, but we will all have to use the machine initially before proceeding to a manual Border Control desk for a physical check. If we were completely exempt, why the need for the question as to whether the traveller has a residence permit?

I am glad I didn't need to use the machines for these flights as I now need to apply for a new passport and wouldn't have wanted to confuse things by using a different passport on the next occasion I flew out of the Schengen zone if my old passport had been scanned by the EES machine this time.

Re: EES
 

I don't know about the airport checkpoints, but congratulations on getting your wife a visa!
That seems a really long time.

Re: EES
 

Possibly to ensure that you get refused, as you're exempt, and use the correct procedure for entering the Schengen area?

Re: EES
 

Thank you liveaboard. In truth it’s been a horrid form of torture. I wish we’d both come here about 20 years ago. Hopefully wife will enjoy this country as much as I do, and with her here we intend to see a lot more of it.

Re: EES
 

I came back to Faro 3 weeks ago, after new rules were in force.
I am a resident of PT myself holding a British passport.
Came in with lots of British holiday makers.
AS a resident you need o go to a normal booth to be checked through as normal, no stamp on passport.
Holiday makers went to the new Egates there, so that meant queuing with everyone else before the queue split.
Those non EU holiday makers scanned their E passport and then proceeded 10 mtrs to a office where their passports were stamped with entry date their passports with the entry date. I did not see any do anything else.

Re: EES
 

This is the summary of the procedure as issued by the Portuguese police.
The EE$S does not apply for schengen residents or long duration Visa holders. You can use the European Control Booths

Re: EES
 

Well as I said in an earlier post under Procedure at Faro under new EES rules, I came back into Portugal on 16th Oct. Whilst in the queue I asked a yellow vest `helper` if i could use the EEA/EA desk which only had a coupe of people in the queue for that booth..that young man went to the booth and asked if I could, as a British passport holder with a 5 year biometric Residency card, he came back all smiles and said yes you can.........so I approached the very short queue, and was then approached by yet another yellow vested person, who asked if I had an EU passport, to which I said no, a British passport but I am resident in Portugal..........she was not interested at all, regardless of my protestation about what her colleauge had said and just said you must go back to the big queue and go to a booth there...so interesting to see who next tries that to see what happens, maybe a copy of the law might help.

Re: EES
 

Arrived on Jet2 yesterday morning and surprised to get an air bridge. Stewardess said on the PA that we would all have to go through EES machines before immigration. We went up an escalator to then go down in a lift to immigration and on two sides of the walls were lots of shiny new EES machines, none of which were not in operation. So we walked straight through to the EU immigration booth (me with walking stick claiming disability) and were through in minutes, including the wife's D7 visa stamp in her passport. Hard to believe it was not more problematic. A nice sunny day when we walked out of the airport and continued the same after we got back to Lagos. I suggested a walk around the marina to stretch our legs after hours of sitting, and despite the "warm" weather wife complained about feeling cold. Gonna have to work on this...

Re: EES
 

Just some insight from Spain, the EES machines and the process has questions for EU residents and at least at Madrid residents currently go through the EES machines. Perhaps in theory residents are exempt from EES, but it would seem you are not exempt from providing the initial biometrics, which makes sense.

At the end of the day UK passport holders who are residents are not EU passport holders so no shock that at many ports they are denied. In reality it will differ port to port.