yellowbelly

Quick question!!
We are at the house waiting to be sold part of the immigration:curse: and our Visa's expire in April, and our childrens passports expire in Jul 09. Do we need to be renewing our kids passports or are they ok to travel with a few months left?

We did read that if the passport expires before you year of the visa the visa's expiry date would be brought forward to the passports date.

kiton6

To be better safe than sorry, I'd renew them. I have heard of people not being allowed to enter countries with 6 months left on their passports.

lins and Stef McLachlan

Hi,
I would renew them all. Now. You will be given a longer expiry date on the new ones if you renew early up to a maximum of 9 months. If your visas are in the current ones then you would just have to make sure that you use the old and new passports together. The visa should still be valid as it is a Permanent Residents visa and they do not 'expire' after you have landed correctly, but you may need to show them for all things official until your PR cards are issued.

I have also heard that it is more expensive and sometimes problematic to renew them once in Canada.

I used to work in the Passport Office and now is a quieter time, so you should get them back fairly quickly.

Did you know that your photocard driving licence also expires as they only have a validity of 10 years. A lot of people don't know this. If you land and your UK DL has expired, it could cause you all sorts of problems when trying to swop a UK DL for a provincial one.
Hope this helps
Stef and Lins

yellowbelly

Thanks for the replies

It does worry me that if we renew it'll cause hassle when we finaly land. Also if i remember rightly when you get a passport renewed they cut the corner off the old one, this would then damage the visa, and proberly gives us more hassle at the airport when we land!!!!!!!!!!!

JAJ

They should only cut the corner off the passport on the cover, not every page.

However, if the passports are damaged they may be destroyed.

There is no problem travelling as long as passports are valid, however it is a lot more awkward to get new ones at the British High Commission in Ottawa. (service standards for British passports overseas are slower, it's twice as expensive and the process is more complicated).

Up to you to decide what you want to do.

lins and Stef McLachlan

Hi
From my experience as a previous Passport officer, we only cut the corner off of the front an back covers in order to preserve any valid visas contained on the pages within the passport. it certainly won't hurt to write a letter with the application drawing the visa officers attention to the fact that you will need the old passport returned (if it looks scruffy and may not be returned) as you have PR visas in them.
Hope this helps
Kindest regards
Stef and Lins

yellowbelly

Thanks Lins and Stef McLachlan for your replies, they were very useful and have set our minds to rest and we will now renew the passports.