Blank Page Requirement in Passport
#1
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Blank Page Requirement in Passport
I am traveling to Italy and just realized that I don't have two completely blank pages in my passport. I have one completely blank page and the adjacent page has only 1 stamp and then there is another page that only has two stamps. In total there are enough spots to make up two pages, I just don't know how picky they are and the stamps never seem to be exactly in the squares. Does anyone know if this will be a problem when entering Italy?
#2
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Not in my experience. The Schengen passport control agents have been efficient about page usages so as not to use up pages in vain. Sometimes they squeeze in 5 stamps on a page. Schengen passport control are not like some SE Asian countries which require seemingly excessive number of blank pages.
I wish the US immigration agents would do the same. On several trips, they put stamps on the spine of the passport! That killed two adjacent blank pages in one shot!
I wish the US immigration agents would do the same. On several trips, they put stamps on the spine of the passport! That killed two adjacent blank pages in one shot!
#3
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I've never actually had a problem with this, and even have had some customs agents not stamp at times or place some stamps over stamps. I don't think it will be an issue, unless someone wants to give you a hard time for some reason!
#8
If your passport doesn't expire for a few more years and you have more trips planned in that time frame, you can have blank pages added to your passport. But I wouldn't bother until you return from your upcoming trip.
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Yes, Jean, for $82 you can get pages added - as long as you hurry and add them by the end of 2015, because the State Department is discontinuing this service:
http://www.jaunted.com/story/2015/3/...are+Going+Away
or just renew it for $110. I'm tempted to renew my six-month-old passport now because, on my recent trip to Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Montenegro, I crossed borders numerous times and I think I burned five or six pages already! I hate the picture anyway.
http://www.jaunted.com/story/2015/3/...are+Going+Away
or just renew it for $110. I'm tempted to renew my six-month-old passport now because, on my recent trip to Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Montenegro, I crossed borders numerous times and I think I burned five or six pages already! I hate the picture anyway.
#14
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Parents, I wouldn't give it a second thought. But, then we are pretty relaxed about travel. Never seen anyone have a problem. We go to Italy every fall, sometimes coming into Europe first from someplace else. We have few stamps that we can find. We also think they often have no ink, sometimes stamp over other stamps and basically see a US Passport (in our case) and just go through the motions. Once we flew into Venice, and the Passport guy seemed annoyed that we didn't just bypass his desk. The only odd thing was that we went through Paris last fall with our daughter (and then on tp Switzerland). We thought they stamped, but there was no sign of it on any of our passports. When our daughter returned to the Paris airport from Munich, they suggested they might not allow her entry into Paris because they could not observe any entry place on her Passport. She told them that was their problem and she would be happy to provide them flight emails, and they simply shrugged and motioned her through.
Last edited by whitehall; Feb 20th, 2019 at 04:18 PM.
#15
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@ parentsi2019: If you are about to go to Italy and do NOT have the requisite number of blank pages, you might want to contact both (a) your state department and (b) the Italian embassy in the country where you live. No matter how well intentioned, t's one thing for someone to offer anecdotes and tell you not to worry; it's quite another to face the consequences if there are any.
Last edited by kja; Feb 20th, 2019 at 05:00 PM.
#16
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@ parentsi2019: If you are about to go to Italy and do NOT have the requisite number of blank pages, you might want to contact both (a) your state department and (b) the Italian embassy in the country where you live. No matter how well intentioned, t's one thing for someone to offer anecdotes and tell you not to worry; it's quite another to face the consequences if there are any.
#17
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#20
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