Wol

In case you are renewing a UK passport, and are concerned about the reports of extensive delays, listen up!

Mrs Wol's UK passport expires in January, so we applied online (the old procedure whereby AusPost takes the application has stopped, and you can't even get one at the consulate except in emergency). You fill in the online form, get an application no., print out a form and send the form, old passport etc back to the UK.

We posted the form etc on the 3rd Sept and the new passport arrived back (in NSW) this morning - 29th Sept.

They must have shaken themselves up after the summer fiascos!

Having said that, I saw last week that they are set to change the system yet again, closing the passport office and transferring the work direct to the Home Office - so keep an eye on it.

One other thing - if you hold an Australian passport as well as the UK one they require THAT to be sent in as well, which means you have no passport at all for a while. We sent copies of all pages of it, certified by a friend as true copies, with a note saying we needed the Australian passport for travel and identification - they evidently accepted that.

bcworld

I did the same, except I didn't get it certified in any way...again, they happily accepted that, no questions.

koalakim

Thank goodness mine was only done a couple of years ago. I wonder how many more systems we will go through before I have to do it again!

Seems daft to have to send your Aussie one as well. I suppose extra checks...

Pollyana

They can ask for passports from other countries, but you don't have to send it and they have no right to insist. Photocopy is fine.

BadgeIsBack

Glad you cleared that one up!

As we were saying....the b word of bureaucracy.

Mine expires next year - better get my skates on.

It will be the 2nd application from Australia

OzTennis

I renewed mine a few weeks ago (in UK); was warned about delays but it took under 2 weeks and I got 3 texts - to tell me application was received, to tell me application was successful and new passport was being printed and then finally to tell me it had been sent by courier. It's different applying overseas of course but just to say I got excellent service and no delays here.

astera

Not sure it's the greatest of decisions to have one facility process all British passports on a global scale, but I guess they wanted to keep things under wraps from the security side in a day and age where ID theft has become a serious issue (regardless of biometric technology stepping in).

But the best decision they ever made was to add the remaining validity of an old passport to the new one, thus taking away any incentive to wait until the "last-minute" before renewing.

OzTennis

Yep, mine is valid for 10 years and 2 months because I applied early.