Durham Passport Office

[OneGlamMama]

Rang passport office was told passport has been in Durham since beginning of June. Applied in April.
Processing team can't tell you when it's being sent or where it is exactly. They log an urgent call for another team to contact you within 24-48 hours. That was Monday. Heard nothing.

• you can't drive there to get it you need an appointment
• Durham doesn't do appointments

We go on holiday on the 01-Aug - when do I start panicking????

It's awful being stuck in the 'black hole'. Failed promises to call back, failed promises that your application is being expedited, failed promises that they've noted your travel date and WILL get to you before then.

They might have told you that you can't go to the office without an appointment but it's not actually true. If you turn up within 48 hours of travel they will almost certainly be able to approve and print the passport for you that day. You will have to queue and the queue will be dealt with by travel date. If you get there early in the morning you'll maximise your chances as there's a limit to the number of people they can get to each day. It's not an absolute guarantee that you'll come away with your passport as there have been some people who've been turned away, but it's very likely they'll be able to help.

I went to the Durham office at 6am the day before I was due to fly (after waiting 13/14 weeks), was about 5th in the queue and by 9:00am had my passport approved and sent to print.

What @asnoot said. Dont fonuntil its 48 hours to your flight or they won't do anything until then.

Don't go until that is meant to say. Stupid fat fingers.

My point is, don't panic, but do make some sort of plan so that you can get to your nearest office as one or two days before your travel date. I see you're travelling on a monday and the offices are closed on sundays. Some of them are open on saturdays but Friday 29th might be your safest date.

There's a facebook group called 'Passport Chaos 2022' which is very active and might be your best bet to get the most up-to-date information about how helpful/busy any given office is at any given time.

Durham don't do appointments because nobody is there, they're still fighting about not coming into the office. It was on the news a while ago.

I really hope it turns up for you in time.

I used to be a supplier to PO. It doesn’t surprise me they are still trying to hide at home. They were truly a disgrace to work with.

Have sent you a pm. We were in same position (15 week wait) and we got it sped up by having certain details though I think it does depend on who you speak too. Also the callbacks showed up as Slough on my phone just in case you expecting it to say Durham - meant I missed the first one.

Durham does do appointments but you need to be persistent as fuck . We got an appointment by literally refreshing the thing to book appointments every ten mins or so and then grabbed one (presumably a cancellation) as soon as it popped up.

Thank you guys. It’s so frustrating that we have had an email to say it’s in Durham and been that way since June so WHERE IS THE BLOODY PASSPORT!