Many thanks EU.flag. Your URL is most helpful especially as it has an English & Portuguese language so I can show the Border Control who is thus compelled to understand the rules and show them our marriage certificate etc etc.

The pennies are beginning to drop. That I mentioned I’m more interested in negating the Schengen 90/180 day rule…is now a question that the trump is the FOM rule. Being a EU citizen allows my wife as a 3rd national to enjoy EU FOM with me as long as she travels with me. Seems entirely appropriate as she is married to me and long may it last!

Also I re-read my initial message re 3a with the Schengen Regs which does not apply to spouses of EU nationals AND those with resident cards….doesn’t actually mean both situations have to apply, it should read OR, then it makes sense.

So all is good and very grateful for the sounding board support. I would have expected some replies of actual experiences at Border Control with 3rd nationals and EU spouses…but so far no one has commented. Perhaps the 3rd national just has their passport stamped and all is fine as no one cares about the 90/180 rule at the border anyway (as they have no way of checking anyway…hence the reason for the EES implemention).

UNTIL the EES self service checks come in. If the 3rd national then walks through those egates they are clocked in the Schengen count. Be interesting to see whether the 3rd national can join up with their spouse in the EU queue and just have their passport stamped with no Schengen count enabled. If so all’s well. I read somewhere recently that a couple entered Germany with the same situation and the 3rd national (UK) said ‘you should not stamp my passport’ and the German Border Control person complied!
Interesting…..

Lisbon Border Control has for quite a while seemed inconsistent. On leaving last time, my passport was stamped although I showed residence card, previous times it wasn't. On entering last month, instead of going through together as before, we were split up. A border officer was checking everyone in the queue. My wife as a citizen was directed to the queue to a citizen card scanner whereas I was directed to the third country queue for electronic passport scanning. After that, official was stamping UK passports except when I held up my residence card, he just glanced at it and waived me through without any passport stamp. Bear in mind, when passports are manually scanned, the screen shows arrival and departure history.

GrahamF. Thx for your account, the Lisbon Border certainly have a haphazard process. So in theory if the manual scan by the official shows the history, they can calculate how many days in the last 180 you were in PT. As a resident this is not relevant to you I know. But for my wife it is until they accept that FOM with me trumps all. So I’ll ask when we leave back to the UK shortly. They probably can’t and will so say things like ‘don’t have the time’ etc…but it’s worth trying just to see. Also when we return to PT we’ll have a sit down with the Border Officials (their office is in the Customs area) and get to the bottom of why they think my wife is still subject to Schengen rules rather than FOM. I will report back in a few months….

Rooftile, your wife could apply to SEF for residence, I hear they send a letter or email which can be used until appointment made. Hope everything works out for you both.

GrahamF. We are both UK residents and wish to remain so. We love coming to Portugal but our home and kids are in the UK. Thx for the headsup.

I think we are in a transitional period before the EES system is live. EES will deal with third country overstayers automatically via the new automated barriers but Europe Direct made it clear to me that partners of EU nationals who are exempt from the Schengen 90/180 day travel restrictions will always have to go to a manual both with their EU partner together with supporting documentation. So that makes sense and it should bring an end to any uncertainty.

I think the EU are trying to shore up their external borders by making travel for their own citizens as easy, invisible and frictionless as possible while making it harder for third country nationals to overstay.