I’m getting fed up of waiting for Isabelle’s passport. I applied for it 4 weeks ago. The passport careline (yeah right as if they care) says it is ‘in the system’.
We applied via Paris as she was born in Beziers & at the same time we applied for a British birth certificate. See British Embassy Paris
It costs a blinking fortune!
Child Passport (102 euros)
Delivery Fee (18 euros)
Birth Registration (126 euros - yes this is free in the UK)
Copy of Birth Certificate (81 euros - again free in the UK)
So whilst all the French mums are out there spending their Prime de Naissance on fancy pushchairs, I’m using ours to pay for paperwork!
On top of this, to chase up where it is, I have to pay .69p per minute to call a ‘Careline’ with a minimum of 8 minutes call time whilst they find your record, security details, oops computer not responding, lets try again, oh here you are…yes not ready yet, no sorry can’t tell you when it will be with you.
Everyone on this forum is probably wanting to come to France, I might be the only person wanting to go to the UK at the moment but I can’t as I need Izzy’s passport. Please Paris send me our Passport soon 
Forgot to mention, no sign of the birth certificate but as I’m in no hurry for that, not a problem.
Hurray - it’s finally arrived. Few interesting dates…Issue Date 24th Feb - so what was it doing once issued? Just hanging around the office by the looks of it.
Franking Date 4th March but I was told on 2nd March it had been posted!
As it was sent Registered post it took 3 days to arrive over a weekend which wasn’t actually bad by La Poste but a bit annoying that I was told it would be sent by courrier Weds 2nd and blatantly didn’t.
Anyway we now have our baby girls passport & a lesson for next time, not to wait until she can open her eyes but to put the passport request in the day after the baby is born…our eyes are now open!
Just contacted the embassy, they’ve only gone & sent it registered post instead of courrier even though they told me it had gone by courrier. Who knows when it will get here now, Well fingers crossed for tomorrow morning I guess!
ok I’m still waiting…
@Steve - nope was just so happy it wasn’t still with the examiner!
@Catherine - well if it was a man on a donkey it will probably get lost! ha
Probably being transported by a man on a donkey…
@SF. Did you think to ask for the Parcel Tracking N° when you rang the Embassy ? If so you can track it on line via the Fedex (UPS ?) site
Not here yet…come on has it been sent my snail mail or what?
Good news, I called again today. Izzy’s passport has been printed and should be sent out by courrier today. Hurray - now can I sort out all our stuff to go to England this weekend??
aha crosswires, yes we’re after British ones from Paris. I phoned twice this morning and they are constantly engaged. I told the chap it was urgent, I need my documents back for a mortgage so he said he’d send an email to get them to call me (both to the birth registrar & the passport people). He also said the passport people were very busy at the moment 
here you go, I was talking about french birth certs . And yes I’m french
I think your talking at cross purposes - my British children were in France in 2004 and 2006 and we had to pay the same as Suzanne (more or less) to have the births registered and to have a copy of the birth certificate. You couldn’t have applied to register your own birth Alexa, did you just apply for a copy of a birth certificate as opposed to the registration? Also, rereading the post, you were applying at the French embassy in London - are you French? All our french birth certificates are free but the registration of a Britisch birth overseas costs an absolute fortune.
I was in London at the french embassy , I only paid the passport all other documents were free, just had to queue .
When I asked for my own in 2004 , it was free too.
@ Alexa - how did you get it free? We paid in 2009 too!
I’m surprised you had to pay for the birth reg and the copy of the BC , I guess it must have change since last year as it was still free .Actually, that’s shocking prices!
@ Suzanne - they totally cocked mine up and after six weeks sent me one in a different name to the name I had signed with…I phoned the embassy itself not the passport line and insisted on speaking to a human. And yes, email too. Bonne chance!
First phone call chaser today, I got cut off.
Second phone call, I was on hold for 10 minutes before I gave up.
I’ve just phoned and they’ve told me nothing has changed since 9th Feb! It’s still with the examiner. Now I’m really fed up. Going to try to find a way to see what’s going on.
I got round the cost of phoning them by sending an email complaint which they had to answer for free! Worth a try.