The Local Spain’s reporter Esme Fox goes over the trials and tribulations of renewing her TIE residency card in Spain, comparing her experiences to that of other foreigners who’ve faced issues and contradictive information from immigration officials.
I, like many Brits who arrived in Spain before Brexit, am now having to renew my residency card for non-EU citizens, known as the TIE (Tarjeta de Identidad de Extranjero).
This is because the first Withdrawal Agreement TIE cards were issued to Brits in July 2020 and now many people’s five-year temporary residence cards have expired or are due to very soon.
The first step in the renewal process is to get an appointment at your local police station or foreigners office (extranjería), and this is where many people fail – at the first hurdle.
I’d been trying to get an appointment on and off since October last year as my card was due to expire in November 2025.
As most foreign residents in Spain are aware though, these citas can be very difficult to come by, especially in cities with big immigrant populations such as Barcelona, where I live.
READ ALSO: Brits in Spain face appointment nightmare for residency card renewals
I’d almost gotten to the end of the process several times before the website would just give up and send me an error message, but most of the time, there were simply no appointments (citas) available. ‘No hay citas disponibles‘ has been been a constant message on my computer screen for months now.
Each time I diligently took a screenshot, ready to show authorities that I simply wasn’t able to renew my TIE, if and when I was asked why I hadn’t done so.
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Finally, in December 2025, I managed to secure an appointment in a nearby town, as appointments in Barcelona extremely rare. In fact, I hadn’t seen any available in three months of trying.
Having written about the renewal process many times for The Local, I naively thought everything would be fine, but I had forgotten the golden rule of living in Spain – every administrative process here takes at least two attempts, sometimes more. In my case at least, nothing gets sorted on the first trip.
I studied all the articles I’d written, as well as other official sources about what I had to take and had everything prepared – my forms, photocopies, passport photos and more forms showing I had paid my fees.
The town where I had the cita was more than an hour away by train, so that was an extra expense I hadn’t factored into the renewal process either.
READ ALSO: How Brits in Spain can renew their temporary residency TIE card
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Once there, my name was called quickly, but as soon as they started entering my details into the system, they came across a problem – computer says no.
The officer called his superior over and she told me I had skipped a step and was supposed to have submitted my documents online first before going there in person.
She then sent me away saying I would have to make another appointment to come back once I’d done so. Had I really made such an oversight? Had I skipped a step?
I went back home and logged onto the system, ready to fill out the online forms straight away, but I ended up trying in vain for the next three hours.
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There was absolutely no page or option where it was possible to submit the EX23 online. So, I e-mailed my gestor and asked her if this was possible, she confirmed that at least in Valencia region, it was not. I had very strong suspicions that it wasn’t possible in Catalonia either.
Looking online, one member of the Malaga Expats group on Facebook also confirmed “you do not renew your TIE online, you do it in person at the police office”.
So I decided to write a message on Facebook myself stating my issue and again many people responded with the exact process I’d done, none of them said they had to submit it online first.
One commenter even confirmed to me that she’d gone to the same small town I had gone to and didn’t have any issues.
They hadn’t told her to it online first. It totally seemed to depend on which officer you had and on which day.
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So, I went about trying to get another cita after Christmas. This time I eventually found one in another small town, also more than an hour away from Barcelona.
The night before I was due to go I randomly decided to post on Instagram, detailing that I had failed to renew it on my first attempt.
Several others commented that they had also been having difficulties with the process, with many also confirming that it seemed to depend on not only which office you went to, but also which officer attended your case.
One acquaintance told me she was even in a Whatsapp group almost entirely dedicated to TIE renewals and the issues involved. She said that she had also been to a third small town to try and do the process and was unsuccessful.
Several of these people, including me, have lived in Spain many years and even so we couldn’t get it right – regardless of how knowledgeable of the rules we are.
Another friend then mentioned to me they’d recently gotten an elusive appointment in Barcelona, so quickly went on straight away and saw that there were indeed several available.
So, I cancelled my appointment for the next morning and rebooked one in the city for a week’s time.
She confirmed that the Barcelona office was so much easier and there the officers actually knew what they were doing.
This time I went with all the exact same documents and papers I had gone with last time. Again, I was seen quickly and this time there was no problem with the system, no one told me submit anything online and it was processed very easily.
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It’s not just me and my friends who have been having these issues, though. Looking at Facebook groups online, it seems like TIE renewal problems are rife.
One person in the Barcelona Facebook group wrote: “Just make sure that the actual appointment you get is on the date or after the TIE expiration date. I went to an appointment that was 1 month before the TIE expired and was not accepted, they told me a valid, existing TIE cannot be replaced, so I had to get a new date.”
This has been the case in many places around Spain, with many readers saying that they have not been allowed to renew their TIEs before they’ve expired, even though official rules say you can do this up to 30 days in advance.
Another person, this time on the Malaga expats Facebook group highlighted another issue that many have come up against: “We were told at the police station that it should be EX-17, then I read myself that it should be EX23 – we took both and guess what? In our case it had to be 23.”
She was referring to the renewal forms you have to take with you to the police station. In the case of British people that were resident in Spain before Brexit the correct form to complete is indeed the EX-23 and not the EX-17 which is for all other non-EU foreigners.
READ ALSO: Why Brits should use form EX23 and not EX17 for TIE renewals in Spain
Another person on the same group also wrote that she had been told to submit the renewal forms online and couldn’t find them anywhere, so it seems that other people are being told the same erroneous information as I was. I have since read numerous reports of this happening from other foreigners renewing their TIEs.
So is there a conclusion to be drawn? Like many official processes in Spain, you may not be having difficulties because you’ve done something wrong or don’t have the correct documents. Sometimes you’ll simply be turned away through no fault of your own.
All you can do is simply keep trying and go back for a second or even third try, it’s just part of life in Spain.
