Child passport renewal times

[Stickystickystick]

I think we've made a huge error. My son had just shy of 6 months left on his passport and we were due to travel to Spain on 22nd October. Having read the government advice it was stated he needed 6 months left on his passport. I sent off the application and old passport last week and have now read horror stories of passports taking at least 5 to 6 weeks. Has anyone renewed recently. I will be gutted if we can't travel. Apparently you can't switch to fast track services now either.

I think its 3 months you need for Spain rather than 6. Did you do the application online or by post? (Online is faster)

I know! I've since seen that it's 3 months but when I initially checked on Uk government website they said 6 months. I notice there have been lots of people complaining. I wonder now if I cancel the application, could I get the passport back in time as it's valid?

I did online but some people have been waiting 8 weeks for a simple renewal on the passport office Twitter site

I can’t give you any reassurance but we’re in a similar situation (and stress!) waiting for our daughters renewal to come back. I’m a week ahead of you in the process so will let you know how it goes for us. We’re also travelling soon so have everything crossed it comes back!

Someone shared this which gave me some hope! - www.passportwaitingtime.co.uk/

I did it in August for my child and it was four weeks from my application to receiving the passport. They texted to say "received old passport", then next text was three weeks later "approved". Passport landed 2 days after that.

My DS's took exactly 4 weeks - applied 31 Aug and got the new one yesterday

Thank you all. Yes please keep me posted on progress. Which office are you going through Junip?

I did DS's passport earlier this year and it was back in about a week.

I sent the old passport to Bootle, assume that’s my office?

I sent my old passport back on Friday and it's still not showing as recieved

Junip mine is Durham

I sent mine on a Monday and it was acknowledged on the Thursday, nothing since yet though. Fingers crossed for you

When do you travel?

16th October!

For my 2 ds passports, we were over 2 weeks before it was acknowledged they had been received, , we have waited another 2 weeks and no passports.

The application was online, we had to send the old passports as they had expired.

We are on a very similar timeline then. I can't take the stress. I'm seriously thinking about cancelling the application so that I can actually get the original one sent back and travel on it as it will actually be valid for Spain. In order to do that I have to wait until they register the old passport as recieved. Then I have to write a letter and send it!!! Apparently an email won't do and then god knows how long it will take to get back anyway

Oh that's annoying. I hope you get news soon. My was online too

We're on a similar timeline flying 23rd October. Sent passport back Sunday before last and showed as received last Thursday. No further update since then

Fingers crossed for you all

Keep me updated on progress

Ours took 10 days from posting here to getting new one back - that was in May

Will do Sticky. That’s a tricky decision you have to make about recalling the application,
I’m not sure what I would do in that situation. Hope you get confirmation of the old passport being received soon so you can make a decision

Yes they did say that if by the time they get the letter and the passport has already been printed, they will continue to send the new one so I feel it's best to cancel. If by some miracle the turn around is quick then I may even get the new one. We live in hope!

We just got the mail that a child’s passport has been approved. We’ve sent it in 4 weeks ago.