Because of the above technically, be they resident or not, Brits are supposed to carry their passports with them at all times.

Not just Britons, but any non-EU citizen, but who does carry their passport with them unless they are flying back to Spain or need to bring it to an appointment at a government office? Even banks only want to see the TIE. Carrying it around with you could cause more problems than it solves.

Since the gag law (4/2015), the argument is that the foreigner ID card (TIE) does not prove ID (yet somehow it's good enough for banks) but someone from the ministry of justice said this in 2021...

If that's not an admission that it's a badly-written law, I don't know what is.

All passport numbers change but maybe a Spanish passport has both the passport number (which changes with every passport issued) and DNI (which never changes) listed?

That is a great turnaround time for a passport renewal.

Has anyone applied recently? Are they still processing renewals this quickly?

I need to do mine next week so I'm wondering too.

My daughters just came back within 3 weeks to the Middle East.

Many thanks. I'll be posting the old passport at a UK post office on Dec 5th (Friday) as I'll be over for a few days. So I assume they'll get it on Monday, Dec 8th.

Just wondering whether they'll be able to deliver the new passport to Spain before the end of the year or whether I should expect to receive it in 2026...

would it be worth considering a fast track appointment if you are going to be in the UK ?

Good idea but it's only a short visit and I won't have time to pop into a passport office (flying out on Sunday). It's our usual method of renewal, sending off an expiring passport when in the UK, departing on a different passport, and then waiting for the new UK one to arrive at our overseas address.

I renewed mine last September, 3 weeks turnaround to Japan, and strangely the new and old passports arrived at the same time, in seperate envelopes. Quite surprised at the smooth service

My update from Germany is it arrived at the passport centre on the 17th Sept and I got it back today (26th Sept) - so ten days including a weekend.
Superb I think.

Last update, old passport arrived back today.

I don't know what's changed but incompetence seems to have crept into the Passport Office.

I had a picture taken for my daughter at the nearest photo centre in the uk, filled out the application online, posted EVERYTHING they asked for (original passport and photocopies of all pages of other passports) and basically thought the case was done just like last time.

Now that I've left the UK I get an emai from them to send in the birth certificate. Something they didn't even mention during the application process (or I would have sent it along with everything else). And they're trying to make it seem like it's required from everyone (yet somehow not mentioned on the application process).

From now on I think it's best to just mail out a ton of other documents just in case they need something they failed to mention in the first place. I mean you do get them all back after all so it's can't hurt...

My husband and I both completed online applications to renew our UK passports on Sunday 23 November, and posted our old ones back to the Passport Office the following day (just by normal post, not certified or via a courier. On Thursday evening 27 November we each received a message confirming that they had received our old passports. We were notified when the applications had been approved and when our passports had been printed and despatched to us, and received the new passports via DHL at 2pm on Thursday 4 December (less than 2 weeks after applying), could not fault the speed or efficiency of the service. The only hitch was that we would have preferred to have them delivered to a DHL Service Point rather than having to wait in for delivery, but despite a total of 3 messages from DHL to say that facility was available to us, we couldn't get either their website or app to action such a request. I wonder if the Passport Office specifies that delivery must be made to the address given on the application form? I remember the last time I renewed mine I did collect it from a Service Point but perhaps things have changed. We're expecting the old ones to be delivered to us tomorrow, we did manage to change the delivery date from today as tomorrow will be more convenient.

I think you’ll find that they can request supporting documents at any point during the process.