There has been a bit of a blunder in the hobbit household - I'm due to run the Paris Marathon in three weeks time and follow it on with a little holiday, but both of our passports have expired. Oops.
Has anyone used the Check and Send service at the Post Office - it does say it takes an average of 2 weeks...
Or the Premium Service, where we go to the passport office, pay an extra £30 and get one in a week...
Or the four hour service, for an extra £50. Ouch.
Comments
It's a pain in the aris, the office is in the middle of nowhere and you have hours to kill and nowhere to kill them. But the people are very pleasant.
The irony is we didn't sort it before they expired because of the cost of renewal (£80!!), then just forgot about it, and now we will be paying more. Doh
I'm sure if we went for Check and Send, it would be back well within time, but would it be worth the stress? Probably not.
*sigh*
I must try not to think what else I could be spending that £60 on...
Last time I renewed my passport I did the check and send service and I'm sure I got mine back within 2 weeks.... so you should be OK with that if you've got another 3 weeks before you travel.... but you may decide you don't want to risk it.
Mine ended up being a bit of a rush-job when I had to go on a work trip.... it hadn't entered my mind that my passport was due to expire, and it was pure fluke that I happened to flick though it when I did; otherwise I'd have turned up at the airport (with my boss) with an expired passport.
i know three people who have recently renewed passports and got them within a couple of days, so two week one should be fine, but do you want to risk it?
My OH got his renewed in Feb and had to use to guarantee week service. Appointment was last thing wednesday afternoon and it arrived inthe post Friday! Annoying to have to spend £30 extra but was cheaper than losing out on the holiday if it hadn't arrived.
Last time i renewed my passport I did the check and send thing.
They still sent it back.
They said my photo looked "too different" to the previous passport.
which I interpreted as not meant in a complimentary way.
I've not yet braved one of those horrific machines - that's a job for tomorrow!
That kind of rejection is one of my worries though, JB - it's been a tough ten years
Go to happy snaps for the photo, costs a bit more than the machines but they do do it to conform>
I had to do a premium service job before IM Germany last year being old and senile and forgetting........ 30 mins in and out the office in Victoria so quite painless and worth the piece of mind for me
Blimey - it's improved since 2001 th...
oh shit.
Thanks for all the feedback, guys
Of course, they could still reject my application as I won't be there in person, but they have assured us that it should be fine...
However, Mr F's has not yet arrived