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How Much Is A Passport?

This blog is posted by Avdesh Bhardwaj

If you are looking to get your first passport, or just looking to renew your existing one, you are probably wondering how much it is going to cost you.

So here is our guide to all things related to passport fees, including the difference in cost between paper and online applications, extra charges if you want to expedite the process and the fees involved if you are applying from overseas.

Online application fees

For most, the simplest way to apply for a new or replacement passport is to do it online, and this is also the cheapest option available.

Online passport fees are broken down by adult (16 and over) passports, child passports and frequent traveller passports. If you were born on or before 2 September 1929 then you can get your passport online for free.

An online application for an adult passport will cost you £75.50, while a child passport is £49. If you require a 50-page frequent traveller passport, then it is £85.50 for adults and £59 for children.

Paper application fees

It will cost you slightly more to apply via a paper application form. Adult passport fees for paper applications are £85, while child passport fees are £58.50.

If you require a frequent traveller passport, the fees are higher still: £95 for an adult 50-page passport, and £68.50 for the child equivalent. Those born on or before 2 September 1929 do not have to pay a fee for a paper application.

Premium services

If you require a new passport quicker than the stated three week wait time, then you can choose to use the online premium service or paper premium service.

The online and paper premium services both cost £177 (or £187 for a frequent traveller passport). Using the online service, you can apply and book an appointment at your local passport office, and then receive your new passport at your appointment. Using the paper application service, you’ll typically receive your new passport four hours after your appointment.

Overseas British passport applications

If you are applying for a British passport from overseas, then your fee may be slightly different depending on what country you are in. If you visit the gov.Uk webpage for overseas applications, you will be taken through a set of questions which will help to determine how much you will be required to pay.

Be aware that you may be required to pay a courier fee in addition to your passport fee in order to cover the cost for the return of your new passport.

Post Office Check and Send

This is not a requirement, but if you want to ensure that your passport application is filled in correctly, you can chose to use the Post Office’s Check and Send service. The cost of this service is added to the cost of your new passport. The paper application check and send service is £16, plus the cost of your photos. For the digital check and send service you will be required to pay £16 and this includes the cost of your photos.

Supporting document fee

One other little added extra that you may choose to pay for is the supporting document fee. Supporting documents like birth certificates are typically sent back free of charge by normal second class post. However, if you would prefer a secure delivery option, then you can choose to pay an extra £5 for this service.

Educating yourself on personal finance and understanding the financial products that you use everyday can make the difference between comfortable finances and constant stress. At MyWalletHero, we aim to make learning about personal finance rewarding and fun.

VERIFY: Yes, The Passport Office Really Is Calling You

WASHINGTON D.C., DC — QUESTION:

Is this letter about a study from the Passport Office legit?

ANSWER:

Yes, the Passport Office is studying the demand for passport products, and the letter, which one of our viewers received, is legit.

SOURCES:

U.S. Department of State

"Passport Demand Study"- federal register

PROCESS:

Verify viewer Sharon from Fort Washington, Maryland got a letter in the mail that she found suspicious. It had a U.S. State Department emblem and said the Office of Passport Services is conducting a study.

It directed her to a website called "passportplanning.Com" and cautioned "we will give you a call if we don't hear from you" in big bold letters.

That's exactly what happened to Sharon when she ignored the letter.

Over the years, others have received the letter too, posting online for more information.

Sharon asked us to verify if the Office of Passport Services really was conducting a study, and if the letter she got was real.

Our Verify researchers went directly to the State Department for answers.

A spokesperson confirmed that yes, they are conducting a study.

They're trying to get an estimate on the demand for adult and child passports, which is one of the reasons they'll ask you how many people in your household are under the age of 18.

The Passport Demand Forecasting Study is voluntary nationwide, and the information is used to improve customer service, allocate sufficient resources and innovate new products.

Each month, the passport services office is sending this letter to 35,000 addresses at random. Addresses are pulled from the U.S. Postal Service's list of residential addresses.

This is a mock letter of the study.

Our Verify researchers compared the mock letter to the letter Sharon received.

The two are nearly identical, except for the phone numbers.

Our Verify researchers went back to the State Department, who told us that the subcontractor in charge of the study changed the phone number back in December.

So we can confirm that both letters are legitimate, the Office of Passport Services is indeed doing a study, and this letter that Sharon got is real.

RELATED: VERIFY: Apple Support is not making calls about your iCloud account being breached, beware of scam

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Download the brand new WUSA9 app here.

Brexit Passport Rules: What Happens To My Passport After Brexit? Will I Need To Renew It?

The UK will officially leave the EU at 11pm GMT on Friday, January 31, 2020, more than three years since the 2016 EU Brexit referendum. Under the deal negotiated between the EU and UK, this will trigger an 11-month transition period, during which both sides will negotiate the future relationship between the two.

So what happens to your passport?

During the transition period, which is due to run from February 1, 2020, to January 1, 2021, all current rules on travel to the EU will remain the same as they are now.

This means all holiday plans and other travel to Europe will be unaffected for 2020, and your passport will be valid.

ABTA travel association said: “If Parliament ratifies the Withdrawal Agreement before 31 January 2020, which it is on track to do, the UK will enter a transition period, meaning everything will remain the same and you can continue to travel as you do now until at least the end of December 2020.”

READ MORE: Brexit deal EXPLAINED: What does Brexit REALLY mean for you and me?

Brexit passport rules: What will happen to your passport? (Image: Getty)

As long as your passport is valid for the whole of your trip, you will be able to use it under the transition period.

You do not need to have six months left on your passport to travel to the EU during the transition period, according to ABTA.

There will be no changes to EHIC cards, driving licences, data roaming or taking pets abroad under the transition, as the UK will still technically be an EU member state.

However, what happens after the transition period remains to be seen.

Brexit passport rules: During the transition period all current rules on travel to the EU will remain the same as they are now (Image: Getty) Will your passport be valid after the transition period?

According to the House of Commons Library: “Whether or not British passport holders would be subject to third country national rules, or other rules, after the transition period, would depend on agreements on the future relationship.”

If the UK ends up leaving the EU without a deal after the transition period, rules for passports could change and you may need to take action.

In the event of a no deal exit, your passport will need to have at least six months left before it expires, and be less than 10 years old (even if it has six months or more left).

If you do not renew it in time, you may not be able to travel to most EU countries and Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland.

These rules won’t apply when travelling to Ireland - you can still use your passport as long as it’s valid for the duration of your stay.

To double-check, you can use THIS tool to check whether your passport is valid for the country you’re visiting.

How do you renew your passport?

You can either renew your passport online, which costs £75.50, or via a paper application form for a pricier £85.

Remember that it normally takes three weeks to renew your passport.

If you need your passport more urgently, there is a two-day premium service costing £177.

Brexit passport rules: A new blue passport design will be phased in from early 2020 (Image: Getty) Will your new passport be blue?

According to Gov.Co.Uk, a new blue passport design will be phased in from early 2020 over several months, and by mid-2020, all new British passports will be blue.

If you renew your passport during this initial period, you may be issued with either a blue or a burgundy British passport, and you won’t be able to state a preference for either colour.

All styles of passport will be equally valid for travel.

Two Text Alerts On Passport Expiry

The external affairs ministry has started a service of sending two text messages to passport holders, nine and seven months before the expiry of passports.

Many forget to renew their passports on time and often miss the opportunity to travel abroad because a person cannot travel abroad unless his/her passport has a minimum validity of six months.

“We have come across hundreds of such cases where passport holders forgot that they cannot travel even if they have a valid passport unless it has a validity of six months,” a senior official at the passport office in Calcutta said.

“People usually wait for their passports to expire thinking they have time.”

But problem starts when someone needs to travel abroad in an emergency.

“Suddenly an opportunity comes and they realise the validity of their passport is less than six months,” the official said.

The text messages to be sent to all passport holders will read: “Dear Passport Holder, Your Passport Kxxxx949 will expire on such and such date. Apply reissue at www.Passportindia.Gov.In or on mPassport Seva App. Please ignore, if applied.”

Officials at the passport office said the rules for renewing a passport six months before its expiry are similar to renewal rules of an expired passport.

Police verification is not needed in cases of reissue up to three years from the date of expiry unless there is any “adverse report” against a passport holder.

EXCLUSIVE: NRC-like Drive In Bengal To Curb 'Bangladeshi Passport' Menace

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has been at the forefront of political opposition to the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and National Population Register, declaring she won't accept these Central initiatives in her state. However, a 'silent' exercise similar to the NRC is in progress in West Bengal.

The police department in West Bengal has swung into action after getting a Central government report that large number of Bangladeshis has entered West Bengal and passports had been issued to them, using which they have gone out of India.

These 'Bangladeshis' have been working abroad as Indian citizens based on their documents like Aadhaar, voter ID card and passports, all of which authenticate citizenship. The Central government wants all such passports to be scrapped.

The West Bengal police has asked all its branches across the state to verify the passport holders when they would come to them for renewing their passports.

A slew of measures are being undertaken based on the guidelines of the Union home ministry. As a result, it is virtually an NRC-like exercise being done by the police to verify the passport renewal cases.

According to guidelines set by the Union home ministry three months back, a dozen police commissionerates in West Bengal, along with all district police units, are not only verifying the documents of the passport holders, but also roots of their parents.

The guidelines say, “Apart from the birth proofs of the passport holders, the person would have to submit documents like land deed, information related to jobs of parents before he or she was born, identity proofs of parents, school-leaving certificates (in case they are not highly educated) of parents, pension certificates of parents etc.."

If one does not possess any birth certificates or birth proof, then a first class magistrate would have to authenticate the applicant as being born in India.

All such documents are similar to those that were required for Assam residents to prove their citizenship during the NRC exercise in the state.

As a result of this exercise by the West Bengal police, around 3,000 passport holders have been unable to renew their passports as the police held back the verification.

A senior police officer of special branch said, "For fresh cases, it's easy for us to issue passports. But we have been asked specially by the Central guidelines to verify and scrutinise the old cases as, according to them, around 60 percent of old passports in Bengal are believed to be of Bangladeshis.”

This stringent verification exercise, however, has, in effect, become applicable for every community and is resulting in harassment.

Sunil Singh, a native of Jharkhand, who is now settled in North Kolkata, has been asked by a police commissionerate to bring land documents from his own state. "I don't know what to do. They want land documents along with my parents' job or any other certificates. My parents passed away long back. I don't know what to do," said Singh.

According to intelligence officers in Kolkata, Bangladeshis chose India as their destination because they get easy job recruitment proposals of Middle East countries from various states of South India, especially Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. "The recruitment agencies from these states have direct links to companies of Middle East nations. So they [Bangladeshis] come in large number. This is what was reported by the central Intelligence Bureau," said an officer.

Out of these cases, which have been held back, many of the applicants had already been issued passports based on tatkal service of passport authority.

Many officers alleged that the ministry of external affairs has taken its hands off in these cases.

"They charge extra for tatkal service and take the money. But people would not get visa unless we clear the verification," said the officer.

Scrapped UK Porn Law Sees ‘Blocking’ Firms Seeking Damages

Around this time last year, the UK Government rubber-stamped a law that would require anyone accessing ‘adult’ material online to undergo an age verification check. It was, colloquially, referred to as the ‘passport to porn’. There was, however, one small (well, actually, rather huge) problem. Namely, that while the law was issued, nobody really knew exactly how it was going to be implemented. Not even the government who issued it!

Cutting a long story short, after months of dilly-dallying over how this could be done, the law was eventually (and rather quietly) dropped. It seems, however, that the companies who were developing age verification methods are not too happy about the decision.

They’re so unhappy, in fact, that in a report via the BBC, they are currently seeking around £3,000,000 in damages from the UK government.

Age Verification Companies Seek £3m Over Scrapped UK Porn Law

The companies, AgeChecked, VeriMe, AVYourself and AVSecure, have lodged an official Judicial review at the UK high courts over whether the government was legally able to overturn the law. What they’re really after is the mandate to give the government a bill for their time and expenses.

While I feel that the decision to scrap the law was (mostly) correct, I can understand the anger from these companies. It’s like being asked to bake a wedding cake only to have the order canceled the day before!

What Do We Think?

The system was, of course, doomed to failure from the start. Firstly, even now, there wasn’t any firm information on how the verification would be made. Secondly, under the presumption that the details would be stored online, there were clear security worries. Thirdly, people (quite frankly) didn’t like the idea of the government potentially knowing what their ‘kinks’ were.

The trump issue, however, was the fact that, by and large, it wouldn’t have been too difficult to bypass. There are, after all, plenty of free (and surprisingly good) VPN applications out there.

So, maybe the government should pay them the money. Simply on the basis of them making such a ridiculous ‘porn’ law in the first place!

What do you think? Was it right to scrap the law? Do you think the companies should be compensated? – Let us know in the comments!

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