Help - Does anyone work at the Passport Office at Durham

[janeb204]

Im at my wits end...I need to speak to Durham Passport office, I am going on holiday Saturday and my daughters passport renewal is stuck in a backlog at Durham. I will pay for accelerated service but can't get through to ask for it. The general phone number takes hours to be answered, the call back service doesn't work, the 48hr email reply service doesn't reply. Can I drive to Durham and sit and wait. I'm frantic to resolve this...but what can I do? Has anyone got any suggestions of what I can do....apart from cry? Does anyone work there and can tell me something I can DO

I think it depends where you live as we live in lancs and all of ours always go to liverpool and always have done. Someone earlier said Durham takes a greater percentage so I expect anyone not local to a particular office goes there maybe?

Was that recently tired? I'm worried about friends of ours whose kids first applications went to liverpool. They allowed five weeks so hopefully be okay. The PO said they were not allowed to fast track (they tried to) as for emergencies only so they'd better be on time for our holiday in four weeks!

I got up at 3:30am this morning to cal the Durham office and was told that no-one has even started looking at the 2 applications in any detail let alone them being ready for printing!!!
The guy promised he would get someone from the international department to call me... they havent yet but it is only 7am here so fingers crossed.
This whole thing is a S**t Show!

Finally got through to Durham on the 0845 number as 0300 were unable to help (they couldn't even find my application on 6 separate calls, which Durham did no problems). After 5 weeks DS's passport still "awaiting examination". Have requested an upgrade as travel early next Thurs - they can do it but not until early next week as they prioritise them on date of travel so we've got to go down to the wire and pay an extra £60 into the bargain.

I'm really really cross. Why say it takes 3 weeks if after 6 weeks it's not even been looked at? Why have an advice line that can't advise? It seems like there is a lot of cost cutting at the same time enabling them to charge a premium for urgent turnaround to desperate folks. They must be raking it in getting double for every passport because people don't allow enough time on their official advice

Just got off the phone from a callback from the Durham Office (0845 number) after a painful morning!

Applied for an adult renewal on 6th May, going away 4th June. Had no text message to say it was recieved and emailed the enquiry line on 15th May and was told it was recieved on the 8th May and that it is currently in the examination process and ETA is 3 weeks. Waited 3 long weeks and phoned the 0300 number this morning only to be told that the application is still being examined and will not be with me until 7th June and when I asked are there any options for me to fast track he said 'unfortunately note, however we will call you back in 48hrs with an update'. I wasn't prepared to go any more sleepless nights and decided to call the 0845 number, was only on hold for 15minutes! And Rachel was very helpful! Understood my stress and said she will walk to up the stairs to the upgrade room where it will be a £55 charge and any extras regarding delivery will be dealt with by the courier. Got a call back 10 minutes later expecting it to be for the payment but was told that actually my passport had been printed and that there is no need to upgrade as it will be sent out for delivery tomorrow!

I'd give them a call and wait through the painful messages to find out where your application actually is! As I could have paid an extra £55 for nothing or even worse driven up to Durham!

Just got back in from taking Ds2 out and both passports are here. 24 hours exactly from taking payment yesterday.

Thank goodness :)

Hi ALl,

I just thought I would share with you my story so far. We are travelling to the Dominican Republic on 7th June for a wedding and Thomas Cook advised us 4 weeks ago that we needed 6 months on our passports. I had already sent off my husbands passport as it was due to expire. It came back within 3 weeks not even through the check and send. I then realise that my daughters ran out in September so I didn't want to risk it so sent it off through the post office check and send. It was received by the passport office on the 8th so I thought it would come back in plenty of time. Yesterday I suddenly realised that I had not heard any more from them so decided to phone the 0300 number as it had been 3 weeks. They obviously were no help at all so I contacted Durham direct who then told me that the passport had not even been checked! I asked then if it could be fast tracked but they said that they could not let me know until next week! Obviously I could not risk the fact that it would not be back in time so asked if I could have the old one back and risk that it would be ok. There response was that it could still take the same amount of time so to stick with that it should be fast tracked. I then decided to contact my local Mp to see what they could do.

Today I decided to call the Durham office again and see if anything had changed but again they could not give me any more information. I then contacted Thomas Cook to see the definite rules for travelling to the Dominican were. They said that I would be ok with the old passport, obviously I was a little bit mad with them as they stated in the first place that I send it off. Since then I have had a call from my local MP's office and they have been in contact with Durham. She called me back about 30 minuted ago and said that the passport is in for printing and that I should receive it by the weekend. We will wait and see if that happens but at least now I have got my MP on the case and they were told what is happening. If that fails then I will ask to pick up the old passport and hopefully we will be going on holiday.

Hi, just wondering if anyone on here did a renewal throughout the gov.uk site and sent it off to Belfast. It been nearly 3 weeks now, which I know is nothing compared to some on here. Was wondering how long it is currently taking.

Hi all just got to say thank so much Durham just got passport do not phone the 0300 number they are shit we can go on holiday now yes yes yes

Does anyone have an up to date number for Liverpool please? They called me back monday saying I could upgrade and that someone would then call me that afternoon or tuesday, still waiting! Tried calling a number I found online but seems to be going to the same place as the 0300 number so no help! A couple of numbers on this forum for them seem out of date as no longer in use.

Have just come back from a 7hr round trip to the airport having dropped off DD2 with my mum so that she can go and stay with them abroad. Unfortunately DD1 hasn't gone despite 3 promised call backs to upgrade, Durham has failed to do so and after an email this morning to try and track online I have just received an identical email to the one I received over two weeks ago, "that DD1 passport is still going through the examination process"

It is a child renewal and was sent through check and send over 4 weeks ago. DH has taken 2 days off work to get through to Durham on the 0191 number and despite promised 48hr call back we are still waiting.

There is a possibility for DD to travel at the end of July but I daren't book the flights until I am holding her passport.

Good luck to you all

Hi u can get Liverpool on 08456012058 good luck

Thank you, i'll try that number tomorrow!

Hiya was just wondering if anyone could send me the durham passport office number after sending my lo passport off 6 weeks ago and bein told huge backlog we travel 8th June I'm fretting it won't come in time

Reading this with interest as we are in the same position as UkinUsa. Bizarrely we renewed DH's passport from the US via Durham in March and it came back to us within two weeks.

The fact we have to send everything to the UK really annoys me too as we have German friends here and they have been to the embassy in Washington, and within 48 hours had a German passport for their daughter born here. Meanwhile we are stranded in the US until someone at Durham pulls their finger out.

0845 6015175 Durham phone them there are so much better then 0300 number we phone them Tuesday passport came yes day good luck

This thread is such a roller coaster of emotions. Some people having success and some not.
Its killing me now as we chased up again yesterday and were told don't bother calling back till Tuesday now. I just have no idea what else to do!

I had a phone call from someone from the passport office yesterday, in response to one of the 3 email requests for a phone call that had been placed on my behalf by the advice line.

Guess what? She knew NOTHING about my case, despite me having explained it at least six times to various people. I once again explained was was quite infuriated to be told that she couldn't access any systems, resolve anything blah blah blah. Anyway, she told me she would send an email to someone who could and someone would ring within 48 hours.

You couldn't make this shit up. I am starting to think the whole passport service is trolling the UK.

I've just registered on mums net specifically so I can add to this thread. I sent DD's passport by check and send at the PO on 29th April. I was told in the PO that it would take 7 - 10 days!! To date, I've received nothing from the passport office despite chasing and chasing. I'd been keeping an eye on this thread and just spoke to Durham who told me that our application has still not been examined but that they would push it through for examination ASAP as we are due to travel on June 7th. The chap I spoke to (who was very helpful) said that I won't hear back from them until the middle of next week at the earliest and that today they are working on passports for people who are travelling this weekend coming. This whole system is a complete joke, why advertise a 3 week turnaround if you can't stick to it. I am so stressed about this, I don't think I've ever been so stressed about anything in my life. I bitterly regret not sending the application off as soon as my daughters birth certificate was in my hand but I genuinely thought that 6 weeks was plenty of time and I'd have had it back weeks ago.

I have just spoken to a very rude lady at Durham , after being told on Monday that my kids renewals had past through security and were near on ready to print and would be with me by today, told this morning they have NOT even been checked yet and they basically will not hurry anything along for me until I have 1 week till my travel date which is 18th June because in their eyes I still have just under 3 weeks to go and that's plenty of time for them to come. So I have to basically sweat my nuts off till a week before then they will gladly take my £160 and get them to me in the week. I think personally they plan that all along to sit and do nothing with application cos they know full well your gonna pay anything to get them at the last minute. But then as the lovely lady told me this morning it was my choice to book a holiday.

So we all didn't have to worry so much about getting it so late in advance - we should just move the date of travel forward a few days i.e so instead of saying we are travelling on the 14th June maybe so travelling on the 7th. If they ask why just tell a wee porky. Extremely unfair on other people but if it stops us worrying.. why not..

Hi am new no mumsnet but been following this thread frantically but theres light at the end of the tunnel. I sent 2 renewals and one child first via check and send on the 8th may recieved txt 14th may to say recieved and just a txt this morning to say in print yay :) so three weeks from applying for ours , no calls or emails. We fly on the 10th june :) . I hope u all waiting have some luck soon x

@cbrunton was thinking exactly the same , @amarasnow count yourself very lucky cos one of mine has been with them 5 weeks and one 3 weeks and neither been looked at yet and all very straight forward applications with plenty of documents and info

Can anyone tell me how you know which passport office has your application?

I applied online and sent the signed form and supporting documents off, just not sure where to!