Son's passport expiring - family hols in ruins

[blueshoes]

Dh and I were looking forward to our family holiday in Crete, Greece for the October half term. We watched the covid-19/PCR situation closely not realising that my 15 year old son's passport has less than 3 months. Just found out today. This is our first foreign holiday since covid struck.

The government website says that for entry to Greece, your passport must be valid for at least 3 months after the day you plan to leave Greece, or any other Schengen country.

We leave on 30 October and my son's passport expires just short of 3 months on 22 January 2022. It is too late to renew his passport as we are leaving in less than a week.

Ds cannot come with us, can he? We f_ked up.

Anybody recently travelled to Greece with Ryanair with less than 3 months left on their passport? Is it a bad idea to turn up and chance it or bite the bullet now and plan on the basis ds cannot go.

uk has never been in schengen.
but now uk is neither in the eu nor in schengen.

There's absolutely no way you'll get it back in time if you do it the normal way. You can't send off your old passport until you know which office it's gone to and they won't send out the new on until that's returned to them. You say the regiment for an appointment is slowing things down, but it's only a face to face appointment that will speed things up ...

Not all teenagers and young people want to spend their time avoiding their parents or enjoying things as a family. Most of DD's friends growing up were similar. All enjoyed family holidays throughout their teens and still now.

I agree, I'd never heard of teenagers staying home till mumsnet. I happily holidayed with my parents well into uni and still go on family holidays altogether now occasionally, as a teenager I loved going abroad, I was very grateful to go.

We’ve needed 6 months left on passports for years, well before Brexit.

Not for EU countries. We have travelled with less than 3 months remaining in passports many times for short haul EU holidays in the last.

And even now, we don't need 6 months remaining for most countries. It's usually only 3 months.

I’d have loved being at home for a week at 15 hanging with friends! In fact, my mum was a single parent and when she went on convention or travelled for work, I was left at home at age 15/16. Didn’t even stay with friends! Mum’s office was at home, so her employees would come in each day and one would take me to school (lived rurally,
No bus), but otherwise I cracked on.

He’s seen enough of his parents over the last 18 months.

Try to get the passport sorted and then if it doesn’t work, just let him have his bit of independence. It’s a week, not a month. It will be fine and he’ll have a great time.

Or chance it at airport and see what happens!

We’ve needed 6 months left on passports for years, well before Brexit.

Not for EU countries.

@Quartz2208

Because we are no longer in the Schengen Area due to Brexit (so yes this is due to Brexit) we are allowed visa free travel to those within it (in effect Europe) for up to 90 days within a 180 day period (in effect the 3 months and the 6 months) and therefore you need a valid passport to cover this. And the 90 days is for all countries.

It also has to be less than 10 years old which is why time cant be added on

Except not all countries that are part of it are in the EU, and it is a separate agreement we have opted out of previously I suppose. Are you confusing it with free movement between EU member states that we no longer have?

@blueshoes

If it was my passport that expired I would not want to prevent the rest of the family from travelling and would wave them off. I would quite enjoy being alone with myself for one week but that is just me.

Ds said he would not want the rest of the family to lose their holiday because it is an even bigger 'waste of money'. It is a Ryanair flight so we won't be getting anything back I assume. We might get some of the hotel back. I don't think he is that gutted.

My bigger fear is he gets a taste for this and won't come with us on our next family holiday. Blankspace good idea to suggest the next holiday will be his choice.

Keep telling yourself that

This happened to us this week. My DDs passport had run out, we are going away on Friday. Not sure how we missed it, I think mentally my DH thought we were still in 2020 when he looked at it! Anyway initially we were in a real panic because leaving her (also 15), not an option. So my DH flew to Belfast on Thursday (only passport office with appointments) and got her passport renewed, now waiting for it to arrive…fingers crossed.

I think this is completely different to 'son we are thinking of going to Greece do you fancy it'
'Not on your Nelly I will stay at Wills house'

This was until a few days ago a family holiday which he will have been expecting to go on and no doubt looking forward to. Now all of a sudden well sorry kid you snooze you lose. See you later.

Also he is 15. I would not be happy leaving a fifteen year old that length of time with mates. Family maybe but not a friend . He's not old enough to be responsible for himself whilst you are in another country

Ex immigration lawyer here. Contact Simon Beadle at passportservices.co.uk/, who are based in Victoria and they will know what (if anything) you can do. Simon knows everything. They have access to slots in the Passport Office. Good luck!

50sock it is what it says for entry into Greece! But yes we opted out of it, still opted out but when we were in the EU it didnt make a difference.

That is the reason though you need 3/6 months and why you can only have a 10 year passport.

I'm quite surprised by the majority of responses on this thread! I remember being so happy the first time I was considered old enough not to have to go on a family holiday, or a bit before that, when I was allowed to do my own thing during the day on the holiday or stay in the hotel rather than being dragged around. I'm sure there are some teenagers who relish every moment of a family holiday (maybe? somewhere?), but do you all really think they see "family time" in the same way as their parents?

Just to stick up for you a bit op. I have a year 11 child, she is already 16 though. She doesn't want to go away on holiday with us, even if it's only for a few days because she wants to study for her GCSEs. She said we can all go abroad if we want and leave her home, as long as we don't go to a country she hasn't been to already.
We have nothing planned this half term but don't rule it out for other school holidays this academic year. If we did go it would be for four days at most.

(Although I think I was slightly older than the OP's son.)

Must check passports since this post Brexit 3/6 month bollocks just to hop across the channel.

Fast track it

My passport years ago. Needed 3 months

I went there for the day. Which was so stressful

Got the passport two days later.

@Stickystickystick

Having gone through the trauma of the massive delays of getting a passport renewed recently, I urge anyone who needs a new passport to get it done ASAP. The passport is overloaded with applications at the moment and they suggest expecting 10 weeks to get a new passport. Take a look at my thread in travel. Even fast track passports are taking over a week and that's if you can get an appointment. There are more restrictions on appointments due to Covid. I just didn't want anyone to end up in a position like many others.

I must have been really lucky then as mine took only 10 days - wouldn't want to rely on that of course though!

I was a single parent. When DD was 14 I took her to New York, as she really wanted to go. DS was 15 at the time and really didn’t want to go. So he got some money instead and I went with DD. I have since gone away with just DS. From that time there’s only been one holiday where all 3 of us went. My DC have different tastes and interests so their wish list of places to visit is not the same. They always had the option of coming along but they would rather miss out on a place they’re not bothered about, to be able to then go somewhere they really want to.

We don’t know OP’s DS. He may be inwardly gutted or he may be inwardly rejoicing! OP can only go by what he’s telling her and presumably she knows him best. Ultimately it’s just a week in the sun. They’re not going on the trip of a lifetime and leaving him behind. There will be plenty of other opportunities for him to go on a very similar trip. For that reason, I don’t see it as that big of a deal.

So what happens if he falls out with one of the friends? Or a parent can't host at the last minute? Will all the parents know what the plan for the week is and have each others contact details? Who will be responsible for rearranging plans if something changes last minute? Will they take it on trust if ds says he's made other arrangements? Who gets the blame if all the boys stay at yours having told the parents conflicting stories about where they are? Are any girls likely to be in the mix?

If my dc was staying with my friends (our kids being friends too) I know that they would organise it all and we might reciprocate. With new friends dc has gained in high school where you don't know the parents in the same way there's no way I could contemplate handing over responsibility to them.

You say time together as a family is precious and running out due to their ages but then just shrug and say ds can come with you another time if you can't fix the passport. Which is it?

If you can’t get the passport I really do think you need a radical rethink of how your DS is staying with friends.
You need to approach the friends parents in person not on WhatsApp for goodness sake. Someone overall needs to be responsible for the whole period you are away and surely he can’t keep moving from place to place.

You need to give in person money to the relevant hosts and surely this should only be split between say two lots of parents splitting the week into two sections. I do think this is quite a big ask since you don’t actually know these people personally as you have admitted especially with Covid being prevalent.

Really he needs to go to family if you are going and he is staying. I would have happily had one of my nephews in this situation, but to be fair I don’t think my sister would have considered going without both sons.

I think your idea of sofa surfing is just too loose and would need much greater thought and planning. I think you would be judged very harshly by other parents involved if you allowed that plan to go ahead.

@CourgetteGlutTony

THTS HAS FUCKALL TO DO WITH BREXIT!

Bet you voted REMAIN. The most crushingly ludicrous and ill informed comments come from Remainers.

Every.

Single.

TIME.

It has everything to do with Brexit. When we were in the EU, a passport just had to be valid on the day you returned to the UK from another EU country.
Now we are not in the EU, there must be a minimum of 3 months validity (or 6 months in some cases)

That's incorrect, it's been standard for most countries that you must have 6 months validity on your passport from date of return for years. The odd one was 3 but most was 6, this is very common countries like Spain, France , Italy , USA

@whyamidoingthisamimad

I think this is completely different to 'son we are thinking of going to Greece do you fancy it' 'Not on your Nelly I will stay at Wills house'

This was until a few days ago a family holiday which he will have been expecting to go on and no doubt looking forward to. Now all of a sudden well sorry kid you snooze you lose. See you later.

Also he is 15. I would not be happy leaving a fifteen year old that length of time with mates. Family maybe but not a friend . He's not old enough to be responsible for himself whilst you are in another country

Absolutely this. The holiday was planned with him in mind, completely different to him saying from the start that he didn't want to go. It's so sad that there are posters thinking it's fine to exclude him because the parents messed up.

OP it is clear where your priorites lie, but as the mother of an 18 year old son, in my experience 15 year old boys do not show their feelings readily, and will mask them very effectively.

You are sending a clear message that your son is really not that important. He is going to feel incredibly hurt by that, and it is not something he is ever going to forget or really forgive you for.

At a guess, his friends and their parents are rallying round because they are feeling very sorry for him, unlike you.

OP I think people are being overly critical here. Your DS is 15, not 12.

He sounds like he has his head screwed on and I'm sure he'll be fine for a week. If there are any fallouts or change of plans when the OP is away, she's already said other family members are on standby and he has a key to the house. He's not gonna be sleeping on the streets and begging for food.