Can you chase the Passport Office?

[Isthisreasonable]

Applied online for a passport renewal and sent off old passport signed for Royal Mail. Royal Mail delivered and have signature on the tracker early last week. The passport office tracker is still showing that they are waiting to receive the old passport.

Is this normal? Can't tell whether they are snowed under or if Royal Mail has cocked up. (Previously had a certificate claimed to be delivered but had been signed by postman not recipient).

Last family member to renew had old and new passports back within a week.

It probably depends a bit on the office, but last time I renewed my UK passport, the old one was marked delivered on a Wednesday and I didn't get the SMS saying they had started to look at it until the following Monday. So it can take a little while for the old one to get out of the mail room, or at least to the point where they acknowledge having opened the envelope. Anyway, once they started processing it, I had the new one by the end of the week.

I renewed mine online last month - I received the new passport after about 10 days.

Royal Mail may have updated at their end but it still needs to work its way through the passport office to the person who logs it as received on their system.

Both me and DS (child to adult renewal) have just had both done and dusted in 7 days.

As PP have said, passport office will only acknowledge receipt once they start processing the renewal. I renewed mine recently and got an email reminder the day after I did the online application, saying to send my old one back which I'd already done. That email mentioned the delay between Royal Mail delivering the old one and the passport office registering it as received.

So I wouldn't worry. Mine was sent to the Corby office. I got my new passport nine days after applying, with my old one coming back on the tenth day.

I renewed mine via a Crown post office and had the new one two weeks later. Never had a big delay. Suspect delays often due to application not being filled in correctly. Post office checks the form!

The Royal Mail tracker never updated when i sent mine in. It all worked out and my passport arrived quickly but according to the tracker they were still waiting for my old passport (which they obviously weren't).

I sent off mine and my sons old passports on 30 Jan (special delivery), they were received the next day and new passports arrived 5 Feb. I was amazed!

Thanks everyone - tracker now showing that they have received it.

when we renewed a couple of years ago we had this too… I was panicking but then it changed when they sent it back. So I didn’t seem to have any sort of ‘during’ tracking