What to do?

mumof2girls_2

Advice is greatly appreciated!

I got a letter on 2nd December from TC's requesting either a pasport or birth certificate just for me not my partner (this is because I am guessing that everytime I call up and they ask DOB they have the wrong one on the system for some reason)

Anyway I sent my passport in via Special Delivery, the return envelpe was for the CBC @ Washington.

I checked and it was signed for on the 10th I think it was.

I still hadn't heard anything so between Xmas + New Year I called TC's who advised me to call Washington as it was to be sent there. So I phones Child Benefit who said they had received it on the 16th December and that she would put it on the system to return it to me asap.

I called Monday last week to Child Benefit for an update-they told me it had been passed to TC's, and to phone them, to which I did.

The guy on the phone said they have nothing on their system to show they have received it but not to worry, I should have it back within the next week.

Now I am stressing, no holidays planned but I only renewed it in September, and these things aren't cheap. I just hope it hasn't gone missing.

Does anyone have any similar experiences with sending in passprts/important documentation?

If they have lost it, can you claim against them? I wouldn't of thought so, but just dont fancy forking out £70+ for a passport again, plus it cost me just under £5 to send it securely!:mad:

Thoughts/advice would really be appreciated xx:beer:

christine_chris_chrissy

have you had this back?I had a similar problem they said they had no record of my docs,they did turn up eventually a few days later,hope yours do to.
I never sent any in the post again I took them in in person.

AnxiousMum

Experience of sending passports in the mail? boy do we....but not to tax credits!
We had sent hubby's in - along with birth certificates, grandfathers birth certificate, his father's marriage certificate and birth certificate, id of all kinds, p60's for five years worth, copies of paystubs to show continuous working for five years - you name it - it was in the package. This was all to go to Immigration to get my husbands indefinite leave to remain stamp.

They were missing one piece of information, so sent it all back to us by 'special delivery'. Our regular mail man was on sick leave, and we had a temporary replacement - from what we can gather from all the information, old neighbours were sitting outside their old house waiting on new occupants to get home so they could pick up their mail, and the mailman came. We weren't home, and the mailman had our old neighbour sign for our package. This neighbour had a harassment charge because of his ongoing 4 yr old harassment of our family, and his wife had criminal damage charges from damaging our property (didn't like foreigners apparently). As the mailman was a temporary one, he had no idea that we would NEVER allow this person (beast) to sign for anything belonging to us. Even the investigating police officer said he knew who had the passport, but couldn't get the guy to admit to it. Anyways - we never got the documentation back, and called them about 3 months later to see why hubby's application was taking so long - we then learnt that it had all been missing for over 3 months as we had never known it had been returned to us! My husband was then issued with a 'get out of the UK within 48 hours' type letter, as he had now overstayed his ancestry visa by not resubmitting the information in a timely manner. Canadian embassy wouldn't just replace the passport without a police investigation, Royal Mail wouldn't talk to the police etc. What a mess! We basically ignored the letter telling him to leave, waited another couple of months to get everything replaced and submitted again in hope - with a great result.

So.....yes......we have experience of losing this documentation in the mail - and it was quite expensive to get it all replaced - and Royal Mail would only pay out £39 because of the way it was sent back to us by Immigration and not insured for the whole amount of replacing all the documentation inside.

Be very careful about sending your documentation in the mail, and make sure that you insure it for more than the £39 that Royal mail has it covered for, and make sure it comes back to you just as secure as you sent it. Or, better, if you can - hand delivery, have them take whatever information and walk back out of their office with it.