Experience renewing passport from Saint Martin
Jul 30th 2014, 3:06 pm
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Experience renewing passport from Saint Martin
My passport was getting close to renewal so I hopped the Anguilla ferry as usual with 2 pictures in hand and a wad of EC Dollars, and expected to pick it up in a few weeks. To my shock, they said they no longer do passports. All has to be done online. 3 month delay I am told. So the UK centralised all passport issuance. So I get back and go to uk.gov web site and the fun begins.
Now we were preparing a few months earlier to travel to Puerto Rico for our 6th anniversary and the tickets and accommodation were booked and paid for in February, so we expected this to be a cake walk. My wife is French so she got her renewal passport in 8 days, so I guessed mine would take a week or so more. Was I wrong!!!
I check the Anguilla immigration claim of 3 month delays, and I read MPs raising questions in parliament on behalf of their constituents that they are waiting 5 months in the UK. The government claims the backlog is due to an improvement in the economy and people are travelling for the holidays. Of course the UK government should have known that by closing every one of their their international offices, driving people to HMPO added to the usual UK citizens applying ahead of the holiday period, this would cause a backlog. Oh and I forgot, they are doing even more checks by demanding uncancelled non-British passports to be sent to them, ostensibly so they can snoop and see what countries you have visited before, but under the guise of preventing terrorism. Just my luck, I thought. more red tape.
I write a letter requesting more information on my application and all they can say it we have it and it is being examined. They give no time frame. I ask why they want my old Australian passport, and instead of answering, they send me a complaint form, which I did fill out. Then I get an answer saying they are investigating my complaint. This is not what I wanted to hear.
I write back and ask for rush service, but they say it is not available in the Caribbean. I just have to wait. So every day I look at my file online and it says "Processing declaration" with No Action.
By now we are getting closer to the deadline for our travel plans, so I have to take a decision: I cannot wait and estimate my passport will arrive after my travel date, so we decide to cancel and at least give some notice so we qualify for some small refund, rather than leaving it up to the wire and losing 100% Fortunately the beach condo was re-rented so we got some refund. Of course the airlines, that's another story.
A few days later, the executive branch of HM Passport Office replied to my long complaint in a letter scanned and emailed to me, informing me my passport will be issued, but without any time frame given. I reply, take your time, we don't need the passport until my wife's vacation this time next year. (sarcastically).
As an aside, sending my Australian passport left me without any form of ID that was acceptable to banks for all this time. In retrospect I would not have sent it, but of course the risk of the UK government being able to know I held that passport and denying my application for making a false declaration, was too high, so I reluctantly sent it. I would not suggest you even mention it.
It finally arrived on the 29 July by DHL, but of course had I not written a long complaint in beautiful Queen's English, I may still not have it. For those reading this in Saint Martin, I had to go to Cole Bay to collect it. Imagine your package being sent to the wrong country. Make sure you do not show your return address as Guadeloupe 97150, or they will still send it to Guadeloupe for an unnecessary trip and wait there before being sent to DHL Cole Bay. You would expect it would be sent to the French side, but no, I had to collect it myself. Still at least I finally got it.
So here is how to do it properly and hopefully this will save you some stress, as I did.
You must pay online, so the credit card you use MUST be verified by the card issuer before you use it on their their site to pay. In my case it is Visa Certicode. Every time time you try and complete the application it will be rejected without reason and eventually after some retries they will block your card, which happened twice. Get that in order with your bank before you even try ordering. This stopped me getting through for a week. My local bank could not help and after many calls to Paris, they finally managed to verify the card.
Next, you need to pay for a courier (in my case Chronoposte) 50 Euros and get a tracking number. My application arrived in Durham in 6 days.
Make sure you read everything carefully on their site which is required or they will just delay or reject the application.
If you are applying from the French side (Saint Martin), don't put Guadeloupe on your address, even though that is technically the address. That delayed the passport a few more days while it took an unnecessary trip to Guadeloupe before being sent to DHL in Cole Bay, (which of course is foreign country).
They did not deliver it to my French address, but told me to come to the Dutch side and pick it up. By this time I was not arguing, once I knew the passport was almost in my hands. so I picked it up from DHL.
In summary, I put in my application in on 26 May 2014. I just picked up the DHL package 29 July, but that was only bitter complaints to anyone in the UK that would listen.
OK, I hope no one has to go through what I did, so hopefully this saves you from the pitfalls and you don't miss your holiday waiting for the slow wheels of the HM Passport Office to move.
Happy travelling.
Now we were preparing a few months earlier to travel to Puerto Rico for our 6th anniversary and the tickets and accommodation were booked and paid for in February, so we expected this to be a cake walk. My wife is French so she got her renewal passport in 8 days, so I guessed mine would take a week or so more. Was I wrong!!!
I check the Anguilla immigration claim of 3 month delays, and I read MPs raising questions in parliament on behalf of their constituents that they are waiting 5 months in the UK. The government claims the backlog is due to an improvement in the economy and people are travelling for the holidays. Of course the UK government should have known that by closing every one of their their international offices, driving people to HMPO added to the usual UK citizens applying ahead of the holiday period, this would cause a backlog. Oh and I forgot, they are doing even more checks by demanding uncancelled non-British passports to be sent to them, ostensibly so they can snoop and see what countries you have visited before, but under the guise of preventing terrorism. Just my luck, I thought. more red tape.
I write a letter requesting more information on my application and all they can say it we have it and it is being examined. They give no time frame. I ask why they want my old Australian passport, and instead of answering, they send me a complaint form, which I did fill out. Then I get an answer saying they are investigating my complaint. This is not what I wanted to hear.
I write back and ask for rush service, but they say it is not available in the Caribbean. I just have to wait. So every day I look at my file online and it says "Processing declaration" with No Action.
By now we are getting closer to the deadline for our travel plans, so I have to take a decision: I cannot wait and estimate my passport will arrive after my travel date, so we decide to cancel and at least give some notice so we qualify for some small refund, rather than leaving it up to the wire and losing 100% Fortunately the beach condo was re-rented so we got some refund. Of course the airlines, that's another story.
A few days later, the executive branch of HM Passport Office replied to my long complaint in a letter scanned and emailed to me, informing me my passport will be issued, but without any time frame given. I reply, take your time, we don't need the passport until my wife's vacation this time next year. (sarcastically).
As an aside, sending my Australian passport left me without any form of ID that was acceptable to banks for all this time. In retrospect I would not have sent it, but of course the risk of the UK government being able to know I held that passport and denying my application for making a false declaration, was too high, so I reluctantly sent it. I would not suggest you even mention it.
It finally arrived on the 29 July by DHL, but of course had I not written a long complaint in beautiful Queen's English, I may still not have it. For those reading this in Saint Martin, I had to go to Cole Bay to collect it. Imagine your package being sent to the wrong country. Make sure you do not show your return address as Guadeloupe 97150, or they will still send it to Guadeloupe for an unnecessary trip and wait there before being sent to DHL Cole Bay. You would expect it would be sent to the French side, but no, I had to collect it myself. Still at least I finally got it.
So here is how to do it properly and hopefully this will save you some stress, as I did.
You must pay online, so the credit card you use MUST be verified by the card issuer before you use it on their their site to pay. In my case it is Visa Certicode. Every time time you try and complete the application it will be rejected without reason and eventually after some retries they will block your card, which happened twice. Get that in order with your bank before you even try ordering. This stopped me getting through for a week. My local bank could not help and after many calls to Paris, they finally managed to verify the card.
Next, you need to pay for a courier (in my case Chronoposte) 50 Euros and get a tracking number. My application arrived in Durham in 6 days.
Make sure you read everything carefully on their site which is required or they will just delay or reject the application.
If you are applying from the French side (Saint Martin), don't put Guadeloupe on your address, even though that is technically the address. That delayed the passport a few more days while it took an unnecessary trip to Guadeloupe before being sent to DHL in Cole Bay, (which of course is foreign country).
They did not deliver it to my French address, but told me to come to the Dutch side and pick it up. By this time I was not arguing, once I knew the passport was almost in my hands. so I picked it up from DHL.
In summary, I put in my application in on 26 May 2014. I just picked up the DHL package 29 July, but that was only bitter complaints to anyone in the UK that would listen.
OK, I hope no one has to go through what I did, so hopefully this saves you from the pitfalls and you don't miss your holiday waiting for the slow wheels of the HM Passport Office to move.
Happy travelling.
