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Passports, get them ordered now


Anthomaniac
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How quickly passports are processed also depends upon the time of the year. Spring and early summer seems to be the worst time since so many people will be traveling. We ordered a passport in late December and received it within two weeks.

 

Since passports are good for 10 years, iMO, there is no reason to wait. Get it ASAP - just to be on the safe side.

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Speculation. If the hiring went on for years, maybe a problem. But 2 months from now, good chance the staffing would be the same, unless there was a sudden exodus.

 

Informed deduction, actually. The US govt started requiring passports for travel in 2007, they are good for 10 years, that means that millions of passports are expiring this year. to give you an idea, in 2006 there were a little of 12 million passports issued. in 2007, there were over 18 million.

 

Passport services expected 16 million last year and actually received 18.6 million. Passport services expects over 20 million applications this year, and had hiring plans in place to handle the extra influx.

 

increased volume added to planned hiring not happening generally leads to longer processing times.

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Informed deduction, actually. The US govt started requiring passports for travel in 2007, they are good for 10 years, that means that millions of passports are expiring this year. to give you an idea, in 2006 there were a little of 12 million passports issued. in 2007, there were over 18 millions.

 

2007 was not the first year passports were required, maybe for cruise travel. Many others have had passports prior to 2007, so their's have already been renewed and have different expiration dates. Also not everyone travels often enough that they routinely renew either.

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2007 was not the first year passports were required, maybe for cruise travel. Many others have had passports prior to 2007, so their's have already been renewed and have different expiration dates. Also not everyone travels often enough that they routinely renew either.

New regulations, scheduled to take effect Jan. 8, 2007, require passports for air and sea travel to and from Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean and Bermuda. U.S. citizens now only have to show a driver's license and birth certificate to travel in the Western hemisphere. Otherwise, officials warn, you won't be getting on that plane or cruise ship as planned.

 

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

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The good news is that even though passport applications apparently were significantly in excess of expectations (trusting your numbers since I don't independently know what the numbers are) turnaround time for passport processing was significantly shorter throughout 2016 than even the State Department generally advises. From threads here and elsewhere they have been running under three weeks when four is the normal expectation. There also wasn't a significant increase in turnaround during the normal busy months.

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Speculation. If the hiring went on for years, maybe a problem. But 2 months from now, good chance the staffing would be the same, unless there was a sudden exodus.

 

Exactly. The hiring freeze will prevent adding more employees. The current number of employees will still be the same as yesterday, minus any retirements or quits.

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Given the hiring freeze, I would suggest that if you are thinking about ordering a passport, do it sooner rather than later.

 

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

 

What hiring freeze? :confused:

 

Informed deduction, actually. The US govt started requiring passports for travel in 2007, they are good for 10 years, that means that millions of passports are expiring this year. to give you an idea, in 2006 there were a little of 12 million passports issued. in 2007, there were over 18 million.

 

Passport services expected 16 million last year and actually received 18.6 million. Passport services expects over 20 million applications this year, and had hiring plans in place to handle the extra influx.

 

increased volume added to planned hiring not happening generally leads to longer processing times.

 

:o Oh, U.S. passports might take longer. You had me worried there for a minute, eh.

Edited by DirtyDawg
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Totally anecdotal, but I renewed my 2007 issued passport in Nov/Dec of 2016 in anticipation of an upcoming cruise. I did a mail-in renewal. Mail-in renewals are done through the Philadelphia passport processing center. Not including the mailing time, it was about 4 weeks turn around. I did Priority Mail with Signature Confirm when sending my application and docs to Philadelphia and they in turn sent the new passport and docs back through Priority Mail.

 

My toddler needed her first passport for the same cruise. We took her to the local county auditor for her application. The nearest passport service center is Seattle. We had her passport in 2 weeks. The only explanation I have for the shorter turn-around time on a new passport vs. a renewal is the passport service location that processed the application. Certainly the Seattle office probably is less busy than Philadelphia since Philadelphia is used as the only processing center for mail-in renewals, and the regional offices handle the local traffic along with the scheduled walk-in applications.

 

Depending on how you renew the process may be as little a 2 weeks or as great as 6 weeks.

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Totally anecdotal, but I renewed my 2007 issued passport in Nov/Dec of 2016 in anticipation of an upcoming cruise. I did a mail-in renewal. Mail-in renewals are done through the Philadelphia passport processing center. Not including the mailing time, it was about 4 weeks turn around. I did Priority Mail with Signature Confirm when sending my application and docs to Philadelphia and they in turn sent the new passport and docs back through Priority Mail.

 

My toddler needed her first passport for the same cruise. We took her to the local county auditor for her application. The nearest passport service center is Seattle. We had her passport in 2 weeks. The only explanation I have for the shorter turn-around time on a new passport vs. a renewal is the passport service location that processed the application. Certainly the Seattle office probably is less busy than Philadelphia since Philadelphia is used as the only processing center for mail-in renewals, and the regional offices handle the local traffic along with the scheduled walk-in applications.

 

Depending on how you renew the process may be as little a 2 weeks or as great as 6 weeks.

 

We mailed in our passport renewals Jan 6. My husband's passport came Jan 23, and mine Jan 26. 2 1/2 weeks.

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Speculation. If the hiring went on for years, maybe a problem. But 2 months from now, good chance the staffing would be the same, unless there was a sudden exodus.

 

Could happen. I know some agencies are offering incentives for older/higher paid employees to retire. I am a state employee & they have already offered 2 rounds here.

 

My son needed a new passport. We did it earlier this month. It only took about two weeks for it to come back.

 

Same here. We had a oops with DSO's passport when we found his was expiring. We sweated the turnaround but took about 16 days.

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Could happen. I know some agencies are offering incentives for older/higher paid employees to retire. I am a state employee & they have already offered 2 rounds here.

 

 

The incentive they offered last round only gave extra bonus money to people who were already retiring!

Edited by Reader0108598
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I would not be surprised to see an executive order requiring passports for all people entering and leaving the US by any means.

 

I wouldn't rule anything out, but the current regulations came about following legislation to tighten border entry controls for those entering the country. Even in light of that legislation DHS still provided several exceptions to the requirement to present a passport and of course closed loop cruises is the most commonly talked about on here. DHS determined that a US citizen on a closed loop cruise presents a low risk to the national security, hence the exception. The President might sign an Executive Order asking DHS to re-examine the issue, I'm not sure that an Executive Order would actually supersede existing law and regulation.

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I wouldn't rule anything out, but the current regulations came about following legislation to tighten border entry controls for those entering the country. Even in light of that legislation DHS still provided several exceptions to the requirement to present a passport and of course closed loop cruises is the most commonly talked about on here. DHS determined that a US citizen on a closed loop cruise presents a low risk to the national security, hence the exception. The President might sign an Executive Order asking DHS to re-examine the issue, I'm not sure that an Executive Order would actually supersede existing law and regulation.

 

Keep dreaming if you think the executive order would not at least attempt to supersede existing law, and then wait the two or three years while the courts decide that the order is invalid.

 

Just get a passport.

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Keep dreaming if you think the executive order would not at least attempt to supersede existing law, and then wait the two or three years while the courts decide that the order is invalid.

 

Just get a passport.

 

Already have one, thanks anyway. (But if I didn't have one I wouldn't be panicked into getting one.)

Edited by sparks1093
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I'm not sure that an Executive Order would actually supersede existing law and regulation.
From what I know about regulation (as opposed to laws) an EO would likely override any interfering regulation.

 

Unlike laws, regulations come from within the particular executive department.

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From what I know about regulation (as opposed to laws) an EO would likely override any interfering regulation.

 

Unlike laws, regulations come from within the particular executive department.

 

Those regulations came from enabling legislation though and have the force of law. Current President may try to modify the regs, he may not. Only time will tell. I'm not really going to let all that he might do dictate my day to day actions.

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