AIBU to be surprised that when you renew a British Passport, you have to send any passports off you have from other countries?

[PassportQuestionxoxo]

Just renewing British passport. In the last few years, have gained an Irish passport. I was surprised to find that in order to renew my British passport, I need to send my Irish passport to the British Passport office as well. The only alternative to sending off the Irish passport, is to do a colour photocopy of all the 30+ pages, which would be a massive task.
Is anyone else surprised by this or is it just me? I had thought that one of the advantages to having a second passport is that you can use it when the other one is not available. Yes, I know that I could photocopy the second passport if desperate, but what a faff, and why does the British Passport Office want my Irish passport anyway?

Do you not see the issue in it leaving you passport-less for a period of time that could end up significant? It's all very well to say 'don't do it right before your holiday', but some people have to travel more frequently, e.g. for work.

I think the UK passport procedures are crazy. The other country whose passport I have has this procedure: you go to a passport office (there's going to be one in your city), you sign the form, and only when you collect the passport do they invalidate your previous passport, so you're never left without a passport. They don't care about your other passports either, because they don't care about your other citizenships. No chance of anything getting lost.

That would make sense but, alas, is not an option. It would also be ok if they just wanted the photo page of the other passport, but every page is OTT.

Agreed!

Do you actually need two passports though? You are still a citizen even if you don't have a passport. My DH got an Irish passport and just hasn't bothered renewing his British passport. He travels on his Irish passport ( which allows all of us to go through the EU queue with him.

DD had to do this recently. Our home printer was useless, as usual, and I couldn’t find anywhere locally. I’m sure I did some photocopies at a local photo shop years and years ago but that shop’s no longer there, nothing at the Post Office, nothing at Tesco, she was on holiday from Uni so no access there. Where do you even look for this if you don’t have a colour printer at home? I know it’s a 1st world problem when you have 2 passports.

I'm sorry.... WHAT?

Having root canal is "a massive job", having a new roof fitted is "a massive job", cylinder head gasket on an E-type Jag is "a massive job" as I can't skim the head as the motor on the big Mill burnt out last week.

Photocopying 30 pages ......

HAVE A WORD!!!!!

@Tomatotater i expect my DDs will mostly use their Irish ones when they’re older, but only they have them at the moment (I can get one, but haven’t got round to it, DH can’t) and so for our recent holiday I renewed DD’s British one so we’d all have the same.

I have no idea if any eyebrows would be raised at immigration if we had one child with a different passport, but if they were DD would not take it well!

Probably wise not to risk it!

This happened to my son and they "lost" his other country passport for months. He had to contact his MP to get help to get it back. I'd say the colour photocopies sound pretty good in comparison!

They being the passport office 😊

You can't be.a dual citizen with three different passports...you'd have three citizenships. Your wording implies you don't see the Irish one as a real citizenship?

I was also told that I shouldn't have declared another passport to save the hassle, but I decided that it wasn't worth the risk. Passports are important things. Making false statements sounded potentially trouble.

I just sent copies of the bio pages. My UK passport has the details of my other passport in the notes section.

Oh yeah in that case not worth the risk. I can get a European passport but my kids can't so I haven't bothered. I didn't think about the complications of kids having a British passport and both parents with separate nationality passports. I may go citizenship and ID card if I do it then.

You should bother. If you're an EU citizen they can derive rights as the dependents of an EU citizen. You can also extend rights to your spouse as well as elderly parents in some circumstances.

Oh do they? It's quite complicated as I am entitled to Portuguese citizenship as my grandparents were born in a Portuguese colony but the citizenship only goes as far back as grandparents. DH has an Irish passport anyway so they presumably would get dependent rights that way.

Ok. Not 5 mins but only something you have to do every 10 years.

Well I've sent to Irish Passport off rather than photocopying the pages. Fingers crossed they get it back to me!

If you decide to copy it do it this way.

Take a photo with your phone of each page. Then using word or another word processor make a table with 30 slots.

Paste each photo into one of slots. You might need to resize the table or use more than one on different pages.

Make the table outline disappear.

Print out the 3 - 4 pages.

It isn’t 1976 - photocopying isn’t onerous or expensive. Most people have home printers or maybe jobs where you can do a quick bit of copying. It’s not cheap to renew a passport, just accept this is part of the cost. You are in a privileged position having two passports.

Nope. My son just renewed his British passport and had to send the paper copy of all the pages of his Canadian passport. They definitely wouldn't accept it electronically.

In my son's case, they let him do free colour copies at the library.

Yes. Canadians must enter Canada using their Canadian passports (no "I didn't bother getting/renewing," excuse), and when returning to the U.K. it's much better to re-enter with your British passport so the Border officers know you have a right to stay in the country.

@PassportQuestionxoxo Don't worry, the passport will be returned quickly. I send a ton off when my kids need renewals and the UK passport office is really fast. It's probably the most compétant gov service these days!

I never renewed the others. I just keep one passport. I also have three citizenships. One of them I use my ID card or British passport to enter and leave. I was able to queue as citizen even with only a British passport (when I have ID card renewed). The other I haven’t been back. DH had been back and used his British passport too, not sure if he queued as citizen or foreigner.

It’s also the reason I didn’t apply passports for my children when I got them citizenship by descent.

Too much faff with multiple passports. Mine isn’t useful and neither insists you enter with their passport.