Passport Renewal.....

[drumpfsucks]

I mailed OLD passport to Philadelphia, PA from Gilbert, AZ on Jan. 30th. It was received on Feb. 2.
In today's mail (3/6), to my surprise was a brand new, shiny, good for 10 more years (Probably all that I'll need), AMERICAN PASSPORT!!!
More to thank JOE for..... the former guy had screwed up so much stuff.
Joe has things running again.
Thanks, JOE.

[brooklynite]

1. Got my renewal in a week.

[Earth-shine]

2. The passport situation has cleared up greatly. Renewals were only a bit delayed if your application was in good

standing.

The backlog was mostly new passport applications.

It took four months for me to get my "new one," and that was a few months ago. They cleared much of the backlog while I was in the queue.

[DFW]

3. The timeline of passport renewal is an eternal crapshoot

My old one was set to expire in January, 2021. I was in the USA in the summer of 2020, at the beginning of Covid, and was told to forget renewal for a year. I said I lived in Europe and had to have a valid passport no matter what.

State in DC told me on the phone that the best advice they could give me was to go to the American Consulate in Frankfurt and plead for a temporary emergency passport, which would be good for one year. Better than nothing, I thought. So I went down to the Consulate, after first gathering up everything they told me to bring. When it was my turn, I told the guy from the Consular division that I wanted the one year temporary passport. He looked at my passport, and asked why I didn’t renew the one I had. I told him Washington told me I couldn’t. He gave me a puzzled look, and said, “well, WE can!” OI asked how many months? He said three to four weeks, not months. I said, OK, well in that case….

Twelve days later, a fedEx envelope arrived at my house in Düsseldorf. The application had been sent to Washington, where my new passport had been issued, and sent back to the consulate in Frankfurt, from whence it was sent up to me. TWELVE DAYS. The German office responsible for renewing my permanent residence permit couldn’t even get my application from one end of the Düsseldorf office to the other (my wife found it for them!!) in FIVE WEEKS, much less get it to Berlin and back.

[Ms. Toad]

4. Expedited or regular?

I'm heading to Italy in a little over 2 weeks . . . and 2 weeks ago I discovered my spouse's passport had expired.

So we're biting out nails hoping it gets here in time. They received it (expedited mail and processing) 2/26, and we paid for 2-day mail to get it back. It will be close. Hoping to avoid an in-person visit to get it in time.

(My daughter checked and renewed hers back in November, and my spouse was razzing her about not doing it soon enough . . . It came back with about the same timing as yours.)

[drumpfsucks]

21. Passport

I mailed my old passport and paperwork in a PRIORITY MAIL envelope.

[Ms. Toad]

22. I was asking if you paid for the expedited processing service

(for an extra $60 they will process the renewal in an estimated 2-3 weeks; for another $20 they will mail it back to you via UPS so it gets back to you in 2 days).

We just got ours back - we had 29 days to an overseas trip when we realized my spouse had forgotten to check her passport . . . it expired in September. It took 15 days from handing it off at the post office to it arriving at our front door today. It cost an extra $100 ($60 for expedited service, $20 for two-day service to the agency and another $20 for two days to get it back). Worth it to save the trip, but I don't recommend it as best practices.

[mitch96]

5. Mine took about 5 months to renew. They cashed the check very quickly and took about a month to

send me a notice that I had to fill the form out in BLACK ink. I filled it out in Adobe, printed it out and then signed it with black ink in the signature spot...Jezzz picky picky picky I did not know printer black ink is different than Bic pen black ink. Re did it the same day and sent it back...
Four months later it came in... That was during the big slow down...I'm glad it's been cleared up..
m

[Vinca]

6. That happened to us, too. They arrived long before we expected them!

[Bristlecone]

7. My family all renewed ours not too long ago.

Also super fast.

The hard plastic ID card portion is a super nice upgrade to them.

[Demobrat]

8. Mine took 2 weeks.

I had planned for 2 months, minimum.

[DENVERPOPS]

9. You would think,

that the document which requires the most security of any U.S. Gov't Document, would be made here in America.......

Last I heard, the U.S. Passports are produced in Thailand/???? or some other Asian country.........Seriously

[HandmaidsTaleUntold]

10. Me Too

Unfortunately a lot of people will be fleeing if Trump wins.

[surfered]

11. Yes, we got ours...

…last March after only a short time. We applied early because of all the horror stories. Like you, these will probably be our last. It’s been fun.

[AZLD4Candidate]

12. Four years for my wife's IR1 green card visa and we needed John Fetterman to get involved

State Department needs to really clean up its act dealing with American citizens.

[AllyCat]

13. We had to renew a youth passport last year

Before a class trip. We paid for it to be expedited and the two-day mailing. It still took 9 weeks. We were days away from having to apply for an emergency passport.

So glad things are better now!

[Ms. Toad]

14. Ouch . . . not what I want to hear.

We only had 4 weeks and one day when I discovered my spouse's passport had expired. I'm hoping the 2-3 week processing time for expedited passports is a reality. Otherwise we'll be making a road trip to someplace in the 5 days before our trip.

[AllyCat]

15. I hope the traffic has slowed. Sounds like it has.

We realized our kid’s passport would expire while he was overseas. Figured he wasn’t leaving for 3.5 months and we’d be okay. Took 3 weeks just to get the appointment at the post office!

I bet you’ll get it in time! Fingers crossed for you.

[Ms. Toad]

16. We weren't even allowed to make an appointment.

All renewals have to be done by mail, unless you are under 14 days from travel. So we had to decide whether to risk 4 weeks and one day on a mailed renewal or wait until 14 days out. Since we decided to risk the mailed option, now our only option is that if it isn't in our hands by 5 days out is to try for an appointment about 150 miles away (if they have one) within the last 5 days before travel.

Not my idea of fun.

But at least she'll have it in hand long before our sumer travel.

[Old Crank]

17. We renewed ours this fall.

At the consulate in Munich. Ten days later they came in the mail.
Now we need the Burgher Bureau to update our residence cards.....

[OAITW r.2.0]

18. Did mine. 2 years ago. While I don't travel much anymore, I find it convenient for ID purposes.

I went through 2 other passports with added pages. The latest might never get a stamp. Unless I take that trip to Scotland/Ireland that's been talked about inside the family.

[I_UndergroundPanther]

19. Wish I could afford one

If I have to flee for my life.

Too poor I guess I am stuck here. But a passport would make it easier to cope. Just knowing I could hide out in another country if I had to makes me feel that if the shit really hit my fan I could run.

Maybe someone could set up a way to donate passports to poor people with no options.

Just a thought.

[Ms. Toad]

20. My spouse's just shipped -

It took from Thursday 2/22 through 3/8 (assuming the delivery estimate is accurate) for the renewal. Fifteen days door to door. Fourteen days to spare before our trip overseas!