Thursday and Friday, August 24th and 25th, are strike days for the Foreign and Borders Service staff at Portugal’s busy airports.
Struggling personnel are set to strike as their demands for more staff and further ‘technological resources’ have not been met by the government.
Portugal is undergoing a tourist boom at the same time as security measures have been increased to accord with new EU norms making airports busier and slower than ever before.
Passport control will be badly hit for two days as a skeleton crew will be operating, as is required by law.
Passengers have been told by airports operator ANA and airlines to expect delays and, as advised by Ryanair, to get to the airport three or fours hours before the flight is due to leave.
easyJet advises it customers to get to the airport just two hours before the flight is due to depart, thus adding to the chaos as this is the normal arrival time and gives no leeway for queues at passport control.
The government plans to take on 100 additional SEF staff in 2018 but current staffing levels are woefully inadequate and SEF’s union has been calling for a minimum of 200 recruits to make up for a 13-year jobs freeze.
UPDATE - STRIKE CALLED OFF
The SEF strike, scheduled for Thursday and Friday, was called off after a meeting at the Ministry of Internal Affairs late on Wednesday at which "The conditions are met so we can stop the strike."
One of the measures that contributed to this outcome was the authorization by the Ministry of Finance for the "external recruitment of 100 new inspectors, which adds to the internal competition that has already enabled this year to provide the SEF with 45 new inspectors."
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