Passport Office lead times

miller

Sent a passport renewal to Durham last Wednesday morning, signed for First Class. Assuming that landed in their PO Box sometime Thursday.

Signed for Friday morning in Durham, text message confirming receipt (i.e. envelope opened) receieved today (Tuesday).

That seems relatively quick. As up to 9 months can be added on to an existing passport which is expiring it may be worth sending yours now too in this quiet period (hopefully there wont be a repeat of Summer 2014 but who knows).

mustmakealist

It's definitely the right time to do it. I've just renewed mine and it only took a week to get a shiny new one back

Archergirl

I also heard of someone getting theirs back in a week, Guess they are going to get busy now lol.......

miller

The Government could encourage the public to spread the load by some variable pricing bands according to the time of year e.g. £67.50, £72.50, £77.50.

Passport expiry is probably one of those things that a lot of people only notice at the last minute.

miller

Got a text message saying it is being printed today as well (Wednesday).

At least it means I've filled the form in correctly as well!

Lemoncurd

Gosh, we are having a different experience. Sent mine and daughters renewals (having applied and printed forms online) 1st class recorded on 3rd Feb. Received a letter stating that my form couldn't be scanned on the 10th Feb, bearing in mind that all I had to do was sign and date one piece of paper, this was surprising. They asked me to sign and return the enclosed duplicate (nothing enclosed). After being told over the phone that I needed to get a new form from the post office and fill the lot out again, they eventually conceded that I could just reprint the declaration form from my original online application. Did this and returned it 1st class the same day.
Didn't hear anything until today (26th Feb) when they sent another letter saying that my photographs can not be accepted as I don't appear to have a neutral expression in them (I really can't see why not).
Still haven't heard anything about daughters renewal and haven't had old passports returned or anything.

Starting to worry that they won't be with us in time for our trip in early April, also need to submit a copy of my daughters passport to her school in the next couple of weeks or she won't be able to go on a trip in June.

Those of you who have had a quick turnaround, which application method did you use?

miller

I got the forms from the post office in the end and filled them in with biro (they had the Durham address on the envelope already), as it took over a week to get the blank ones I requested online (these arrived with a Peterborough address on).

I cannot understand why they would have problems scanning their own form (although a while back I sent a form to HMRC which if it got scanned the same way had the figures entered completely incorrectly).

Sorry to hear your bad luck, but really they should have told you about the photos at the same time IMO.

Lemoncurd

Ours went to a Liverpool address so it looks like they are handled by a different office. Certainly frustrating that they didn't pick up on both issues at the same time!
Not sure why we haven't heard a thing about my daughters application though.

theGrinch

I recall on Christmas Eve 1991, getting a passport done the same day, returned at the back of the office in London after 5pm when they had offically shut for Christmas. They were troopers that day and all they asked for was a travel ticket.

How timescales change.

miller

Lemoncurd wrote: »

Didn't hear anything until today (26th Feb) when they sent another letter saying that my photographs can not be accepted as I don't appear to have a neutral expression in them (I really can't see why not).

In my (hopefully now) previous passport, I wasn't smirking, but it wasn't the usual full on grimace (if you can imagine someone who has been told a joke and is trying to stifle it).

This current one looks like a proper criminal mugshot, as well as being 10 years older.

Oh well, my driving licence expires in 3 years, so I'll probably end up having that face on two forms of ID when the DVLA grab my passport photo. It's quite depressing really!

miller

Lemoncurd wrote: »

Ours went to a Liverpool address so it looks like they are handled by a different office. Certainly frustrating that they didn't pick up on both issues at the same time!
Not sure why we haven't heard a thing about my daughters application though.

Did you receive a text message confirming receipt? You can probably get an idea of how busy that office is (i.e. how long your envelope spent unopened) from the date it was signed for to the date of the initial text.