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Original poster

Has anyone ever had a passport go wrong? Or any kind of passport drama?

66 replies

SnoozeAllDay · 19/02/2022 21:37

Renewing passports today and I always go really slowly with the application and then stress for the next month that it’s going to be rejected (no actual reason to feel like that)

And it got me wondering if anyone has any passport tales to tell? Like you received your passport and THEY made an error.
Or you didn’t receive them in time for your trip and were left stuck at home etc.

BTW I am NOT daily fail scum. I’m genuinely just curious.

OP posts:

PugInTheHouse · 19/02/2022 21:47

Teenage brother forgot his was in his jeans pocket and put it through the wash and the photo page had come apart. He didn't tell anyone and was hauled off the plane before holiday (no idea why it wasn't mentioned at security). They let him travel in the end as he was with my parents.

Friend sent her DS on a school trip with her passport by mistake. He ended up going but I can't remember how they sorted it.

Another friend lost her DDs passport in a cab a week before a school trip. Called the cab company several times and they denied they had it. She couldn't get a passport appointment to get a new child passport so she booked an appointment anyway. I did the ID verification before she left but completed it wrong (I've done loads but think the pressure got to me lol). She just turned up 80 odd miles away to the passport office and cried. They did it for her, she stayed overnight and it was ready lunchtime the next day. The day after she got home the cab company called her to say they had the passport after all.

PugInTheHouse · 19/02/2022 22:06

There is a thread currently re a DCs passport being out of date just before holiday

LabraDabraDoo · 19/02/2022 22:09

No. But BIL, aged 20 lost his passport in Athens and (rather than getting an emergency document from the embassy like normal people) managed to hitchhike to his father’s house in France without it. The last leg of the journey involved a van letting him out at the Swiss/French border, where he wandered into the mountains and crossed the border Sound of Music style, walking the final twelve miles to their house, greeted by a great big bollocking from his dad!

earsup · 19/02/2022 22:12

Dh came back once with some children on it....!!...sent it back for a new one...!!

ruthypfdraper · 19/02/2022 22:15

DH mixed up the numbers on his height (not uk passport) and had himself 20cm shorter than he actually is. Had to send it back or squat through airports until it expired.

2tired2bewitty · 19/02/2022 22:17

I sent off for a new driving licence after I got married, so had sent ID documents, and they sent me back a random bloke called Gerald’s passport.

ItWorriesMeThisKindofThing · 19/02/2022 22:22

I was a teacher on a school trip to France years ago. We’d told the children that they didn’t need passports as we were travelling on a group passport - I don’t think this can be done anymore? Anyway my head of department thought this group thing included the adults and didn’t realise she needed to have brought her own passport till we were in the coach and a couple of hours down the road. She thought we were pulling her leg at first. Somehow her husband brought it to us at a service station and we made it in time for the ferry.

BertieBotts · 19/02/2022 22:24

DH's middle name can be spelled several different ways and it is spelt differently on his passport to his birth certificate. Nobody had ever noticed this until we went to register DS2's birth in Germany and the German official immediately pointed it out and asked us why they didn't match and which was the correct spelling and he didn't know :o

They did let us register the birth but it was a bit of a worrying moment.

I also once was going through passport control on my way to a flight and the passport control officer looked at me for ages and ages and then said "you need a new passport, this photo doesn't look like you any more but I'll let you through this time." I think it had about 18 months left on it.

When we drive through passport control to go on the ferry the French officials see that we have British passports and just wave us on through without actually looking at them about 50% of the time well - haven't been since brexit, but assume it's still the same.

BlackLambAndGreyFalcon · 19/02/2022 22:28

@ruthypfdraper

DH mixed up the numbers on his height (not uk passport) and had himself 20cm shorter than he actually is. Had to send it back or squat through airports until it expired.

Yep my DH got confused between his height and his weight measurements and managed to put his height down as 2cm shorter than he actually is. He noticed the mistake, but didn't bother correcting it as he didn't actually think they were going to put this info in the passport (as it is not printed in UK passports). We joke that when he comes to renew the passport he is suddenly going to have his long awaited growth spurt at the age of 46!

eurochick · 19/02/2022 22:30

I once dropped my passport down an airport toilet...

Top tip: do not keep your passport in your jeans back pocket.

lilao · 19/02/2022 22:32

My sister had a passport renewed and they had misspelt her middle name Emily as Emlly. It was correct on the original!

She was due to go away shortly after and then forgot about it so we didn't actually change it until the next renewal 5 years later!

queenofcauliflower · 19/02/2022 22:36

I was travelling alone from Canada to Scotland at age 14 and a dog ate a large corner of my passport. They let me through as it wasn't the photo side and it was 1994, so before everything was massively tightened up. I can't actually believe it now, but do have the dog-chewed passport somewhere! I had to endure a lot of jokes at the airport (mortifying when you're 14) e.g. "were you a bit peckish on the way here?" etc.

NameTypo · 19/02/2022 22:36

Yeah my name is Virginia and my first ever passport came back calls me vagina.

They apologised profusely and somehow managed to reissue the new passport in record time!

bumsnett · 19/02/2022 22:38

@ruthypfdraper

DH mixed up the numbers on his height (not uk passport) and had himself 20cm shorter than he actually is. Had to send it back or squat through airports until it expired.

Where do they ask for height?

BertieBotts · 19/02/2022 22:39

DS1 needed an emergency passport once, that was exciting, although a sad occasion as we were trying to get to FIL before he died (we didn't make it sadly). The emergency passport was gold, and it was a bit of a crazy trip because I was on the phone to the consulate and they said "Can you get here by 4pm?" Looked at the clock and it was 12 midday. It was about 3-4 hours drive away so DH said yes. We literally threw clothes into IKEA bags, grabbed 9yo DS and assumed we'd get a drive thru on the way although I grabbed some ham and bread as well just in case. When we go into the car it said something like 600km, 4 hours based on current traffic. Fuel gauge was at 600km remaining. DH and I just looked at each other. It was like some kind of top gear challenge.

As we were in Germany we would be going at something like 160, 180km/h on the empty bits of autobahn and the time would go down but then the fuel km remaining would go down too. So we'd slow down a bit and the fuel efficiency would go up and it would look like we'd make it but then we'd get really hot and sweaty and put the air con on for a bit as there was a heatwave. None of us had eaten all day and I was six months pregnant and not supposed to hold onto my wee because I was having kidney pains, but we didn't have any time to stop. I was getting updates from the family group so that DH could concentrate on driving.

We got near to Dusseldorf and hit rush hour traffic. I had to phone the consulate and hope they would wait for us, they did. We didn't make it there until 5pm. I had to hand my phone in to security and we went in to do the passport interview.

When I got out victorious with the passport I had about eight missed calls and loads of messages. FIL had passed away just as we got into the consulate. He loved his top gear challenges. I like to think he set us one and was watching it one last time before he turned the TV off, satisfied we'd made it, and went to bed.

follygirl · 19/02/2022 22:41

Not my mistake but the embassy’s mistake.
It was my daughter’s first Dutch passport (I’m Dutch, dh is British). We had to bring her birth certificate, our marriage certificate and loads of documents.
When her passport arrived I noticed that they had put the right day but the wrong month for her date of birth.
We had to go back to the embassy, bring all the documents again and restart the application so that they could re-issue it with the correct month.

TheSillyMastiff · 19/02/2022 22:43

DS's first passport and he was only 8 months, came back with his name but a different baby in the picture!!

I phoned them to say and no lie the advisor said "yeah but all babies look the same, so don't worry"

I did worry, and I hung up and spoke to another advisor who apologised and asked that I send it back, I did and the correct one arrived about 2 weeks later.

I did however want them to double check that My DS's picture wasn't on anyone elses, and they confirmed it was not.

FlossMoss · 19/02/2022 22:44

My dh got arrested on our honeymoon in a Malaysian airport because he had ridiculously put some bank notes in his passport and then handed them over to passport control.

He was arrested for attempting to bribe the passport officer and the whole thing descended into a French farce. It didn't help that we travelled a lot then and our battered passports contained endless stamps.

TW9resident · 19/02/2022 22:44

When I arrived at my honeymoon hotel in Italy the receptionist commented that I looked very good for my age. My new passport had a date of birth of 1907 instead of 1967, which I hadn't noticed at all. Luckily I got home without incident and sent it back for correction!

drspouse · 19/02/2022 22:45

DS passport went through the wrong door on our street because the writing on the envelope wasn't clear.
I have crossed two borders without a passport. Once was in 1990 and it was one of those borders where if you are a citizen you can cross with an ID card (I was a resident and had an ID card). The other I had my passport stolen and the closest place to get a new one was just over the border so the immigration office gave me temporary travel documents.

HerRoyalNotness · 19/02/2022 22:47

I was flying off somewhere with friends for the weekend. HR held the passports and as I had another I thought I’d just use that for the trip. Got to the airport and of course needed the other one. Missed the flight, had to chase done the HR guy and get the other one, took a flight later that day. What an idiot. Didn’t even occur to me it wouldn’t work

FangsForTheMemory · 19/02/2022 22:49

Former colleague of mine was going overseas for a month with her partner. The day before they were due to travel, he couldn't find his passport. They spent the whole night looking. No passport, no trip!

VitaminBCDE · 19/02/2022 22:50

My DS locked ours in the hotel safe on New Year’s Eve while abroad. We were due to leave hotel at 8am next morning. There was a grand gala happening at the hotel and we were worried that a handy man/woman wouldn’t be available. They did turn up and my DS is now strictly forbidden to even look at hotel safes.

dizzydizzydizzy · 19/02/2022 22:50

Got to passport control in Beijing and the Chinese police officer was not happy with DP's passport. He called some colleagues over and they had a very animated conversation about it. At that point, I thought DP was going to get arrested!

The problem turned out to be that his passport had got damp and the picture was smudged so you could no longer see his face. They eventually let us on our way.

ChiefWiggumsBoy · 19/02/2022 23:08

I got a HUGE bollocking from my mum for bunking off to accompany a boyfriend to get an emergency passport .

Other than that, nothing hairy has happened. Yet. Now I'm worried I've jinxed it!

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