YIKES! What a mess. Texgirl, I hope you and your husband have your passports and are well on your way to your trip.

I suppose I should begin the process of renewing my dad's passport, but we might have to run off in September... and the passport expires in December... We may never get it in time considering everything going on!

I feel so lucky that I doubted the website time estimates for an expedited passport and waited forever on hold for an agent to tell me in person not to even try it.(I needed it in 19 days) I was told to fly to Chicago was my best bet.I called around and AAA got it for me in 10 business days for 140.00 more...well worth the money after hearing your nightmare!

Monk21, what do you mean by AAA got it for me in 10 days. I am waiting for my daughter's passport. We applied in Feb, told 6-8 weeks, and the agent helping us advised against expediting. Supposedly, it is being processed now in Charleston...Whatever that means... I am getting a bit nervous after reading texgirl's saga.

Gee, I never thought about bothering my Congressman! My solution...plan ahead when I need to add pages/renew passport.

since texgirl hasn't been back - maybe it means things worked out and they are somewhere over the Atlantic as we speak

"This means all those people who go to the carribean and Mexico are now competing with the European travelers for passports. "

i don´t see what the European competition for passports means.

?????

lincasanova:

Six months ago, the only Americans(almost) who needed passports were those travelling to Europe.

Now most Americans travelling to Canada or the Caribbean need passports too.

So the two people in, say, Dallas, who handled the ten passport applications a day from intending travelers to Europe are now inundated with applications from the 500 intending travellers to Mexico.

If I were a congressperson getting all these calls from angry worried constituents with money for travel (and maybe for donations) I think I'd get a lot of points if I'd get the passport agency more money for hiring up (and made sure everyone know that I sponsored the legislation). Perhaps the passport agency is on a continuing resolution this year as are many other fed agencies. That would make it difficult to hire more people.
Good thing we saw it coming and got our passports before we went to Canada last August. I feel bad for the folks who are traveling for the first time and didn't have this passport stuff on their radar screen at all. Met someone in SF who was looking for the passport office. She had flown in form Tucson and was leaving 2 days later for Europe. Yikes!

Hope you and your DH are in the air and having a restful flight!

"Good thing we saw it coming and got our passports before we went to Canada last August."

I agree.

AA - when was the last time you renewed your passport at a foreign consulate?

When my DH renewed his in Egypt 5 years ago, it just took a couple of days because it was all handled in Cairo (with a "US Embassy - Cairo, Egypt" noted under the issuing "Authority").

But when the kids and I renewed ours 2 years ago in Egypt- it took almost 2 weeks because it had to be sent back to the US for processing. And the issuing "Authority" is listed as "US Department of State."

We are going down to the US embassy next week to add pages to all our passports and that will be a simple 30-60 minute process (very small consular office where we are now).

Hi all,

I am guessing one of my kid’s passport can’t be found at CHARLESTON Passport Center (???). I was told that the passport was completed on April 19th, and has been in quality control since. I have been calling the toll free number for the last two weeks (application submitted on March 5th). We are leaving on May 31st, and do need visas. For all the inquiries the agents made, I was told that there was no response. We are planning to go to Chicago to get a passport. Has anyone know anything about the passport agency in Chicago? I was told to bring the kid and no appointment is necessary. Anyone know when I should be there? Is Chicano place as crowd as the one in Houston?

janisj - that's what I was thinking, and hoping. As much as the passport issue, I was concerned about the schedule after he got it. Assuming it was ready right at 2:30, that's really cutting it close to get from the federal building to the airport in time for a 3:55 flight. Lots of international flights leave around that time with hundreds of people, and the lines can get really long. Hope it went OK.

"Gee, I never thought about bothering my Congressman! My solution...plan ahead when I need to add pages/renew passport"

Well, planning ahead may NOT help. If the Charleston passport office "loses" it in quality control for over a month what good would your planning have done? I don't think we should have to plan on 4 months to get a passport, but if we should that's fine. However, the agency who is in charge should TELL the public that. Saying 10 weeks and not delivering in them just makes people angry. If the new "reality" is 16 weeks or whatever then TELL folks. The website still says 10-12 weeks. There are several posts on this board where we are moving more towards 14-16 weeks.

And for those of you thinking this is a one time thing... next year we get to do it ALL over again as cruisers don't actually have to have a passport if thier ship departs and arrives at a US port until NEXT year......

I applied for a new (Canadian) passport in Paris earlier this spring. I was worried about processing times, too, because the Canadian website said it could take up to 5-6 weeks and I knew that the Canadian embassy had to send the paperwork to Canada, where the passport would be issued (a new process now that machine-readable passports are issued). I couldn't apply earlier because I travel at least once a month for business and I had a birthday trip booked for 5 weeks after the application deadline. Well, hooray - my application only took 2.5 weeks and I didn't ask for expedited service. It seems they have a different "processing stream" for applications filed abroad.

oddessy4:
I opted NOT to go the expedited gov't route when I heard how long it was taking and used AAA who uses a private company called TRAVISA to get it in 3-9 days. You still pay the expedited gov't fee and TRAVISA's fee, but they go to the passport office for you and get it done. It is too late to choose this option if you have sent it in to the government yourself.

Since we haven't heard from texgirl yet, I'm hoping all turned out well...or that they were at least able to get on the next flight without much delay.

I have been in direct contact with the Charleston passport office over the last two days and managed to get mine expedited myself. What I learned is that my congressman's office never contacted them to get the ball rolling although I contacted them several times. So, if Kenny Marchant (DFW area) is your congressman, don't count on Amanda to get your passport for you on time. I managed to find the phone number to Charleston that is set up for congressional inquiries and they were happy to help me directly. They always answered the phone and were very prompt and polite. The person that I first spoke to escalated my application to EXPEDITE status while I was on the phone with her and she said that she would walk over to the rep handling the quality control portion and get them to process it yesterday. When I called back yesterday afternoon for status, the passport had been printed and was just waiting to be packaged for FedEx. This morning, they called me back with a FedEx tracking number.

My plan B was going to be to have donuts or pizza delivered to the office at 1269 Holland Street Charleston, SC 29405 with a note with my locator number and phone number asking them to please rush my passport. Don't know whether it would have worked or not, but I was ready to try.

I would like to be able to cancel my appt in Houston tomorrow so that someone else can take that scheduled spot, but I can't get back through on the appt line. I have redialed 25 times in a row with no luck. I'll try again later.

Mrkindallas,

I would just LOVE to see the scrambling that will go on when a delivery guy brings in a big box of donuts to a secure Government building. I'm sure it would eventually get to the intended agent, but I'll bet the donuts would be a bit stale after wending their way through the security procedures.

It would certainly get their attention, though!

:-)

That was my thought, too....I was ready to accept that the delivery might not make it in, but was certainly willing to go through the expense to try.

Monk21, Thanks for the info, it may help someone else reading this thread.

Mrkindallas, my daughter's passport is in limbo in Charleston. Could you share how you got the phone number to Charleston? I would like to try that route to speed up the process as it has already been more than 10 weeks- applied 2/23! We leave in less than a month.

You need to call an 800 number and get an appt time for the Chicago office if you're trying to get an expedited passport. My husband managed to put his thru the laundry in london and was able to get home with it but needed a new one very quickly. He spent almost a full day at the dirkson federal building but was able to get the replacement within a day.