Spain’s National Police has quietly switched on a system that books ‘toma de huellas’ (fingerprint) appointments for foreigners as soon as their residence permit is approved, eliminating what has long been the most stressful step of the Spanish immigration process. According to an internal circular dated 8 October 2026, the pilot started with 10 percent of newly-approved files in Barcelona’s L’Hospitalet office and was expanded on 9 October to Madrid, Barcelona city, Valencia, Alicante, Málaga and Murcia. Applicants now receive an email and SMS with the date, time and police station for their TIE card, instead of frantically refreshing the online booking site for weeks. Law firms report that the slot is allocated by an algorithm that cross-checks the applicant’s address, the date of the resolution and real-time capacity in each documentation unit. If no appointment is received within 20 days, applicants must revert to the manual booking platform, but the police say the target is to cover a “large majority” of renewals before Christmas. For businesses, the change could drastically shorten onboarding timelines for new hires and end the black-market resale of appointments that emerged during the post-pandemic backlog. Immigration advisers caution, however, that first-time visa holders who enter Spain on a consular visa (digital-nomad, NLV, student, etc.) are still outside the pilot and must book manually once they arrive. The Interior Ministry will review the data in December and decide on a nationwide rollout. If the scheme is deemed successful, the dreaded ‘cita previa lottery’ for fingerprints could soon be history across Spain.
Source: Spainguru
