To those who don't have a Passport.....

arnie&caseysma! · 19 February 2007 at 7:57PM

.......but are thinking about getting one at some point this year then I would think about doing it before April.

In April they are going to start gradually introducing interviews for those aged 16+ who are applying for their first passport which means an additional cost of travelling to and from the interview offices at your own expense (on top of the £66 passport fee).

Not all applicants will need to attend for interview, only those contacted by the IPS when they receive the application and interviews are only expected to last between 10 and 20 minutes with the whole interview process taking 30 minutes at one of the 69 offices.

This could prove to be a costly and time consuming exercise especially the distance required to travel to the offices etc.

The 69 offices will be located in:

Aberdeen; Dundee; Edinburgh; Glasgow; Inverness; Kilmarnock; Oban; Stirling; Wick; Berwick-upon-Tweed; Carlisle; Dumfries; Galashiels; Kendal; Middlesbrough; Newcastle; Northallerton; Armagh; Belfast; Coleraine; Omagh; Blackburn; Liverpool; Manchester; Wrexham; Hull; Leeds; Scarborough; Sheffield; York; Aberystwyth; Bristol; Cheltenham; Newport; Swansea; Swindon; Birmingham; Derby; Leicester; Northampton; Shrewsbury; Stoke-on-Trent; Warwick; Boston; Bury St Edmunds; Ipswich; Kings Lynn; Lincoln; Norwich; Peterborough; Barnstaple; Camborne; Exeter; Plymouth; St Austell; Yeovil; Andover; Bournemouth; Newport IOW; Oxford; Portsmouth; Reading; Chelmsford; Crawley; Dover; Hastings; London; Luton; Maidstone;

There will also be a remote communities service will be available in area where people will have to travel for over one hour to reach with main interview offices, and in remote areas interviews apparently will be contucted via a video link provided by a partner agency (good news in my area!), these will be in:

Anglesey & North Gwynedd; Ardnamurchan & Movern; Arran; Barra, Benbecula & Uist; Bute; Canna, Eigg & Muck, Knoydart & Fort William; Central Highlands; Coll, Mull & Tiree; Cowal Peninsula; Gigha & Mull of Kintyre; Jura, Colonsay & Islay; Lewis & Harris; Lochcarron; North Aberdeenshire; Orkney; Pembrokeshire; Scilly Isles; Shetland; Stranraer; Skye; Wester Ross; West Sutherland;

http://www.passport.gov.uk/passport_first_interviews.asp

Hope this helps some who are planning to travel abroad this year but have not yet got their first UK Passport.

icefall · 26 February 2007 at 2:19AM

ooh thanks, I have a passport

but useful info to bear in mind

nedski · 28 February 2007 at 1:32AM

Not only will this new policy increase the inconvenience of getting a first passport, it will also increase the time it takes; these interviews are expected to increase the time taken for an application to be processed to between four and six weeks!

The government agency running the scheme predicts that because of the changes, as many as 1 in 4 young people will not receive their new passport in time to make their trip! "Fast Track" passports, which you can now get in an emergency within one day or one week, are being abolished for first time applicants. You will have no choice but to wait your turn to be interrogated at a time that suits them.

So it really is a good time to get your first passport now.

These new interviews will next be expanded to cover those who are renewing. So if you already have a passport, consider renewing to avoid the inevitable price hike that will happen soon, once the costs of the ID Cards scheme start having to be paid - the basic price once ID cards are introduced is going to be at least £93.

And it's not just practicalities, convenience or cost that you should consider either - People applying for their first adult passport from April 2007 are being used as guinea-pigs for Tony Blair’s ID scheme. From later this year "authentication" is planned to include fingerprinting. This is what ID cards really mean: government collecting more information about you and linking it all up.

To read more about how passports will be affected by the ID cards scheme, visit www.renewforfreedom.org.

And renew now before it's too late!

mike_paterson · 28 February 2007 at 11:11AM

This country gets more bizarre by the day.:mad:

We let in pretty much anybody from anywhere, yet we have to have an interview to see if we are fit to travel abroad!

I hope somebody starts the revolution soon.:j

monkeyspanner · 28 February 2007 at 3:43PM

mike_paterson wrote:

This country gets more bizarre by the day.:mad:

We let in pretty much anybody from anywhere, yet we have to have an interview to see if we are fit to travel abroad!

I hope somebody starts the revolution soon.:j

Second your comment about the country getting more bizarre by the day.

But this is more about making sure the applicant is who they say they are, having let all and sundry in.

e.g. Case in West Country the other day where a convicted sex offender and asylum seeker who claimed to be from Somali but was more likely to be a Kenyan of Somali descent had been given a full British Passport in error. Apparently he would have been in danger if returned to Somalia! Now that's Mad.

Winchy · 28 February 2007 at 5:49PM

Got my passport last week, took them 4 days to process and deliver it. Looks like they're getting it sorted quickly before April.

bargainbarmy · 1 March 2007 at 1:24PM

What an amazing bunch of idiots we have running this country. If they can charge us extra for anything they will...passports, congestion charging, road pricing...what is going to be next? And everybody said the Tories were bad! Well no one is as bad as this bunch !!!

CFC · 2 March 2007 at 5:01AM

Gets more like a police state every day - now we have to pay more and more just to get out of our own country for a holiday!

Not to mention that the little jaunt to a interrogation - oops, I meant registration centre, is going to cost a good number of people a day's pay or a day's holiday off work - the centres will be up to 60 miles away!

To those who don't have a Passport.....

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