News from afpop - Friday 25th of November 2022

Good afternoon to you all and if this is your first ‘News from afpop’ Briefing, welcome. It was a pleasure to speak to Members at the Living in the Algarve seminar last week, the 4^th such event we have been invited to this year and again it was also a pleasure to welcome some new Members.
 
Those of you who were there may have noticed the moustache that I have been growing this month in support of the ‘Movember’ campaign. You may of course have missed it even if you were stood quite close, as it’s not a great example of a moustache, however it does serve a purpose and you’ll hear more about that in the December edition of UPDATE magazine which should be with you in a couple of weeks.
 
After a few Briefings of not mentioning the dreaded COVID, this week we do have news about the next round of boosters for those who want to keep their vaccinations up to date. There is also information from one of our BLiP exhibitors, the Banco Alimentar Contra a Fome (Foodbank), about their collection campaign this weekend.
 
Now for this week’s Briefing:
 
COVID Booster
We have been getting questions from Members concerning booster vaccinations and at present all you can do is wait to be contacted by the SNS with an appointment, unless you are 65 and older, when you can go to the Casa Aberta (Open House) at your local vaccination centre without appointment. You can find further information in our Factsheet FS/26.
 
The booster vaccination against COVID has been extended to those in the 50-59 age group and those people will be contacted for vaccinations soon.
 
Banco Alimentar
You might have seen Banco Alimentar at our BLiP EXPO in October. Banco Alimentar collect and distribute products, meals and food baskets to those in need. This weekend, 26^th and 27^th of November, there will be another food collecting campaign from Banco Alimentar. 
Thousands of volunteers will be present in supermarkets across the country to collect food donations, in what is essential help for more than 400 thousand people. In addition to the face-to-face campaign on the 26^th and 27^th, the collection will continue until the 4th of December through the possible purchase of food vouchers available in supermarkets or contributions made on the website www.alimentestaideia.pt
 
Christmas lighting
There has been a lot of talk about whether councils will light the streets for Christmas as is usual because of the current energy crisis. It has now been announced that municipalities across the country plan to have Christmas lighting turned on for shorter periods than in other years and to resort more to the use of low-consumption technologies like LED.
For example, in Lisbon the Christmas lights will be on between 6th of December and 6th of January, but with a reduction in daily hours, the longest of which will be from 18h00 to 1h00 on Christmas Day and New Year's Eve.
 
TAP strike
The Portuguese airline TAP announced a strike which is scheduled for the 8^th and 9^th of December. People who have booked a flight for those days will be able to reschedule the dates of their flights between the 28^th of November and the 19^th of December, free of charge, according to TAP. To avoid uncertainty about which flights might be affected, TAP decided to cancel all 360 flights scheduled for the two days of the strike. The process of cancelling flights and informing passengers has already begun. If your flight is to be cancelled, you will receive a specific email with the alternatives. TAP recommends that you always check the status of your flight here.
 
SEF appointments UK citizens
We know that many of our Members who are UK citizens and Residents under the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement, have already been for their appointment with SEF to give biometric details and have also already received their new Residency card by post. We have in fact had many Members contacting us to say that the process was quick and how kind the staff were.
 
However, there are still Members who are experiencing problems with booking an appointment and for that reason we would like to remind you of the following: 

 
Do not forget that our factsheet FS/37 SEF Appointments UK citizens has information that helps with the process of booking the appointment, what to bring for the appointment, paying the Residency card after the appointment and about setting up a new password.
 
Some Members who have already scheduled an appointment but unfortunately cannot attend after all, have asked us how to either delete the appointment or re-schedule. From what we can see it is possible to re-schedule if you are still in the time window given to you on the email from SEF but if that has passed, the re-schedule option does not work. We have emailed SEF to ask how people can either cancel the appointment or re-schedule online. As soon as we have further information, we will include this in the News from afpop and update the factsheet.
 
Satellite offices
Please note that due to the Christmas holidays, there will be no Satellite Offices in December. afpop staff will be on hand in the Satellite Offices again in January 2023. If you need advice or assistance, wish to introduce a new Member to the Association, need to renew your subscription or just have a general query, please pass by and see us. Please contact the afpop office to make an appointment on 282 458 509 or info@afpop.com    
 
The next dates of the Satellites are: