Can anyone give any advice on how to get a British passport quickly now that Paris service no longer available. If i send my passport to UK it will take 3-4 weeks to get a new one , leaving me without a form of ID and unable to travel. As it is illegal to be without a form of ID in France, i can't understand HM gov for this situation. many thanks
Why don't they put such details up on the website? As for the online passport forms, only the NEW one is valid, the old ones still come up but are not. But then, they don't want to confuse us do they?
hi Brian. What the Passport office phone representative didn't tell me, but have since found out, is that you CAN send in your application form, photos and colour photcopy of existing passport with a cover letter explaining why you cannot send in the original. There are signs up in the passport office in London confirming this detail.
thx for your comments. i am now an expert on passport renewal thanks to you and friendly passport uk office! It does take at least 4 weeks for postal method, or you can choose 1 week fast track if you'rein UK long enough (and near a passport office). The alternative i chose is to go to London ,having obtained an appointment with them, and for 128 GBP can pick one up in 4 hours. Beware that the online forms are no longer any good, so you either fill in a form in their office or get someone to send you one (available from UK post-offices). Simples(but expensive)
your driving licence or permit if you've changed is usually ok. No idea on the passport problem though, will watch the discussion as mine's up for renewal in a couple of years ;-) Sorry just read that Brian's already beaten me to it on the ID!
It is not a service available to us living outside of the UK. Look at the new application forms whereby it can be done on line bar sending in the photographs and old passport together. As soon as one fills in the country they live in then it narrows down to a single option. I would have been personally very happy to be able to have used some kind of express issue in the (optimistic) hope of getting some work that required a bit of travel which is sometimes within the week. But no deal. I get the feeling that asking somebody in the UK to do that for us has been stamped out too.
OK, we had a six and a half week wait for one daughter's passport before Christmas which was ordered using the 'old' application process. I have now had to renew mine that would have run out two weeks from now. Being without the ID is apparent no problem if you have other evidence of who you are. A driver's licence, even a carte vitale or a photocopy of your expiring passport are fine. If you can identify yourself you are fine. However, I am in the same position, I cannot travel. UK citizens have no ID card which would be an alternative within the Shengen countries and a few others, however we could not travel to the UK without the passport on entry! If mine does not turn up in three weeks I can't go for a family visit in Switzerland because we still need them to fly without the ID card option.
As for chasing the UK passport office, after our daughter's passport renewal we have learned that to even try will mean a delay will somehow happen. Mind you, renewing her Swiss passport is worse, so perhaps we should not grumble.