Cross fingers it won’t be too long before they do the same for mine then.
I think once they open it they crack on with it quite quickly.
Lol, it wouldn't surprise me if Medea's passport comes before mine, anything can happen at the moment
The book is open and bets are now being taken.
Yay, my new passport is approved and at the stage of being printed
It's now been dispatched by courier, email says to allow up to 3 weeks for delivery for the return of the old passport, but doesn't mention anything for the new one.
Takes a few days, old one comes a few days after the new one.
Depends who the Consul is!
Traveller beware though, not all countries accept this.
They stopped doing this a couple of years ago.
Still waiting to hear they’ve received my old passport.
Just got a reminder from them to send the old passport.
" If you’ve already sent it
If you sent your old passport in the last 2 weeks, ignore this email. We’ll let you know when we have it."
Come on folks, get a move on! My digital photo runs out on the 2nd May.
Probably hasn’t helped having Easter in the middle of it all either.
Apparently Boris wants to privatise the passport office, despite them handling 1m applications in the past month, as compared to 7m in an average (pre-covid) year.
When has the UK ever been successful privatising anything?
Medea, I had 3 of those emails about sending the old passport back. My new passport is being delivered by DHL tomorrow, I had a text midmorning.
I'm currently going through the same process. I believe there are different processing times for those applying from aboard to those from the UK.
I'm not too fussed though, will still travel around Schengen even without it. Whilst the long wait is irksome, it's understandable. I don't really get the criticism of the passport office per se. It's such a streamlined, easy and efficient process to get a UK passport compared to what I've seen friends and family members having to go through to get passports from other countries.
For all the criticism the Passport Office is getting in the British press, I'm actually very impressed my passport was dealt with so quickly after the application was accepted.
Most of the complaints seem to be from people who booked holiday without bothering to check how long they had on their passports or even whether their passports had expired during lockdown when nobody was travelling
Always someone else's fault in Britain these days, it's quite depressing because even some of my family are like this now
My two passports expire in November 2023 and April 2029. I’ve made a note in my diary a few months before each expiry.
Yeah, mostly people not bothering to renew when it was about to run out, book their hols and then find they need a new passport asap. Just because you couldn’t travel during covid stuff doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have missed renewing. Also I expect, even though there’s been less travel the last couple of years, the Passport Office has been short staffed same as everywhere so they’ve probably struggled during covid and now even worse with all the restrictions gone and sudden surge in demand. Doesn’t mean they’re fully staffed again.
I've just read that once you get to the "your passport is being printed stage" it gets done in Poland, so I assume this is how it gets to Switzerland so quickly after.
Well, you’ll be able to confirm that when yours is delivered.