Key figures — as of 2026-09-02: Estrutura de Missão wound down at the end of 2025 after handling over 760,000 appointments and closing with a €62 million budget surplus — of 327,597 approved cases, more than 16,000 residence cards were still awaiting issue when the task force stood down — from May 2026 AIMA runs document submission almost entirely electronically, with in-person visits reserved for biometrics only — Porto was the one city where a physical desk stayed open into 2026 as an exception.
The counters have closed
AIMA's temporary walk-in task force, the Estrutura de Missão, has stopped taking people through the door. The agency was already preparing for the closure of the Estrutura de Missão, which had added 20 extra immigration service points since September 2024. By December, its coordinator, Luís Goes Pinheiro, was confirming the shift in practice: contact with users will now be by email, and if an in-person appointment is needed, it will be scheduled at AIMA stores.
The numbers behind that closure are substantial. Of the 327,597 approved cases, more than 16,000 immigrant cards still needed to be issued. Even Goes Pinheiro, the man who ran the operation, wasn't pretending the transition was smooth — asked whether AIMA was fully ready, he answered plainly: "No. It has a huge challenge ahead." He described the task now as one of "working together to give AIMA's service centres greater capacity and robustness."
Not every city lost its physical desk at the same pace. Facing the large number of immigrants still with pending matters at AIMA, the government decided to keep the Porto service point from the Mission Structure running, with walk-in information provision there continuing from 5 January 2026 even as the rest of the network went digital-only for that kind of enquiry.
An old engine under a new dashboard
The digital push isn't just a policy choice — it's also a necessity dressed up as one. AIMA's own leadership has acknowledged the agency was born with "an obsolete and inefficient" technological base that is "absolutely critical." That base is the SIGAP system inherited wholesale from SEF: the agency began operating with the same staffing levels as the old SEF and without a more modern IT system. Data-centre failures tied to that legacy infrastructure have already disrupted services once, when cooling problems at AIMA's Tagus Park data centre affected the "legacy" systems inherited from the old SEF.
By May 2026, the digitisation drive reached a new phase. AIMA took a new step in digitalising processes for foreign applicants, fully switching to electronic document management. Paper is on its way out entirely: the submission of paper documents at service centres is being gradually phased out, though in-person visits to AIMA offices remain necessary for biometrics — fingerprints and photo.
GrowIN's read on the numbers
Run the maths on AIMA's own December count and a quiet detail emerges. Of the 327,597 cases already approved, the outstanding 16,000-plus cards represent close to 5% of that total — meaning roughly one in twenty people who have already cleared the hardest part of the process, the substantive decision, were still waiting purely on administrative issuance when the walk-in safety net disappeared. That entire remaining pipeline now depends on a system built on 2007-era foundations, with no counter to fall back on if an email bounces or a portal login fails.
GrowIN Portugal Editorial's take: the queue outside AIMA's doors hasn't vanished — it has simply moved online, where it's every bit as long and much harder for outsiders to see.
What this means in practice
For foreigners without a Portuguese phone number, reliable broadband, or fluent digital Portuguese, the end of walk-in access is not a minor inconvenience — it removes the one channel that let a confused or locked-out applicant physically show up and get a human to look at their file. Complaints logged before this closure already pointed to systems that don't talk to each other properly and email inboxes that bounce messages back as full. With that fallback gone, an error in a NIF number, a mismatched surname, or a document rejected by an automated check can leave someone stuck with no obvious next step other than waiting for a reply that may not come quickly.
Anyone renewing or applying for a residence permit should keep every digital receipt and confirmation email, check the official renewals portal directly rather than relying on search results, and build in time for technical hiccups that have nothing to do with the strength of their case. Our visas hub covers the current AIMA routes and what documentation to have ready before you submit anything online.
What to watch next
Whether AIMA's promised capacity upgrades at its permanent stores actually absorb the caseload the Mission Structure used to handle is the open question for the rest of 2026. If card issuance delays and portal errors persist without a physical fallback, pressure will likely grow — from immigrant associations and lawyers alike — for AIMA to reopen some form of in-person triage, at least for cases the system itself cannot resolve. For now, the counters are closed, and the portal is the only door left.