Ned to renew my passport, no biggie. Took the GF 3 weeks last year, sending it to Wellington.
What I hadn't realised was that in the mean-time all of the passport offices around the world have been moved to Liverpool and that 3 week turnaround is now AT LEAST 6 weeks. Apparently it's taking more like 8 weeks at present.
🙁 😐
Major headache time.
Has anyone had theirs renewed (overseas) recently and how long did it take?
Not overseas but mine was renewed last month, took about 3 weeks. I was very pleasantly surprised given the recent press.
Mine took 5 days. Paid for the 7 day service. Worth the wee bit extra.
Paid for the 7 day service
Absolutely would have done but you don't get that option with the overseas service.
I suppose I could have posted it to someone in the UK to then send on for me... 🙁
tonyd- Good the hear that the summer backlogs have cleared a bit, here's hoping they can beat their "at least 6 weeks" target
mine wasn't "recently".
sent it to consulate in dusseldorf. got it back 8 days later.
think the procedure and times may have changed since then.
does confuse a few people from time to time though, when it says "FCO" for place of issue.
8 weeks in may this year from Oz, took them 6 to look at the form. Online updates are crap. That was before they admitted it had gone bad so may be more now.
Not overseas but again despite the negative press 10 days from check and send at post office to passport on my doormat (received it on monday)
I sent an application off from Oz for our newborn, it was received about 3.5 weeks ago and the status is still on "being processed" - Who knows how long it will be, it may even be back here before the online status changes...
Who knows how long it will be, it may even be back here before the online status changes...
Mine was still processing when it was back here in my hands. Processing means nothing. There was a mistake on my form that was picked up after 6 weeks. The phone line they give you isn't connected to the passport office it's just a call centre that seems to read the same online screen.
We had an issue with my lads renewal earlier this year, picture at age 10 changing to a 15 year old meant he looked quite different.
Online said processing for over a month, missus chased it up and was told it was in processing, then it had gone for security check etc.
After pushing them again (just over a week before he travelled) they told us the problem was that they had sent a 2 letters to the signatory for the picture for confirmation with no response.
Problem is the signatory is a friend of the missus who is a temp teacher so it was sent to the temp office who just filed the letters and didn't let her know. By this point it was too late for her to be the signatory authoriser as the letters were too old. (Shame they didn't tell the missus this a few weeks earlier when she called them up to check).
Then, I have to say the support from the passport office was excellent.
We had to re-apply with a new signatory, this was done on the Friday, they received it on the Monday and processed it then, they then sent a fax for confirmation to signatory on the Monday evening, chased us on the Tuesday morning to confirm when it would be sent, sent that morning, they dispatched the passport on the Tuesday afternoon and we received it Weds morning.
Total time was over 2 months but actually took them only a few days in the end.
Even after we got it we got a letter about the processing still taking place.
got mine in two weeks from posting the application, under the normal (cheaper) process. If i remember correctly, I had two options. Normal and cheap, or quick and expensive. I can't remember the exact costs, but it was around 150GBP for mine.
Including postage times, it probably took a week to process. I did use a recorded, tracked and urgent service when i sent it to Liverpool.
I suppose I could have posted it to someone in the UK to then send on for me...
That's what we've done, last year for mine and last week for my wife it took less than a month for mine and that was including my mum faffing about getting it in the post!
When the processing was centralised at the start of this year, someone made a serious adding-up error to estimate demand. By about May/June there were press stories about huge backlogs, people waiting over 12 weeks and so on.
I had to send in a renewal for travel in July, but only found out the above in June!
I sent it anyway (taking care to get all the details correct), with the plan to drive to Marseille and get an Emergency travel document if it didn't get back in time (an extra 120€ !!!). In the end, either the Passport Office crisis management was working, or it got fast-tracked as a simple renewal, and it came back in about 4 weeks.
got mine in two weeks from posting the application, under the normal (cheaper) process. If i remember correctly, I had two options. Normal and cheap, or quick and expensive. I can't remember the exact costs, but it was around 150GBP for mine.
There is no express version available for overseas renewals.
I am in ireland and my ten year uk passport is up. If you have not already reapplied and passport expired within last 6 months you can get a one year extention free by visiting your embassy. I did this last week as I need to fly next week.
youngest expired (dumb parent forgets dumb 5 year kids passports)
got someone going to the UK to drop completed form in at a UK post office for me to speed things up - worth trying around friends/colleagues
I got my passport extended last week too....
in the Dublin embassey...
It's quite a shoddy ink stamp affair coupled with a low rent piece of paper.
Still, it means I get to go on holibobs so all is good.
Yes from Wellington, 9 weeks.
I got mine back this month, renewed from Spain, forget exactly when I sent it but it didn't take 8 weeks, more like 5/6. Still too late to travel in August, which wasn't really a bad thing.
I got mine back this month, renewed from Spain, forget exactly when I sent it but it didn't take 8 weeks, more like 5/6. Still too late to travel in August, which wasn't really a bad thing.
If that's the most recent sample from the above list of overseas renewals then there is hope that I won't be an illegal alien after all!
Cheers all for the anecdotes 🙂
p.s. I could have got work to send me on a jolly to Wellington to get it extended but then I'd run in to worse trouble next year when my travel schedule is possibly going to be even tighter.
There are also a number of countries in SE asia that don't accept Extensions or Emergency Docs. Are you heading back to the UK? If so I would extend it and renew on the day in the UK by appointment it costs about the same.
Just been back to the UK but thought that would lead to problems getting back in to NZ with no valid visa... I reckon I should have checked that out beforehand.
Mine landed 4 8 hrs before heading over to nz, faxed the forms for the visa transfer and I think it was done with a few hours to spare but I think you can enter nz as a brit on a tourist visa. It was getting back to Oz that would be more interesting.
March this year, inside four weeks, From Auckland.
As a conclusion to this exercise...
I had the passport back in about 3 and a half weeks! Took another week to get the old passport back.