Cutting Line at the Passport Office…

[Win2Win]

http://www.marketmanila.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/1147.jpg My passport is expiring in 6 months so I figured it was finally time to get a new one. Excited that we finally have these new "e-passports" that are machine readable and which bring us up to "world standard" and shall facilitate processing when visiting foreign lands, I started the process some 3+ weeks ago. I turned to our travel agent to arrange the passport renewal. As with all applicants, they applied for a date for a "personal appearance or appointment" at the spanking new DFA Consular Office that processes passports located at the reclaimed area beside S&R in Baclaran. I was given a date 3 weeks later, and today, I showed up at 7:20am for an 8:00am appointment. I was met by the travel agent's representative, given the completed and checked forms, deposit slips to show previous payment, and brought to Gate 1, where all applicants assisted by agencies line up. Here's the first tip. Use a respectable and trustworthy travel agent that does this regularly. The lines at Gate 1 were significantly shorter than going at this yourself through the other gates. The agent simply gets you to the right door and leaves you to wait your turn while comfortably seated until the processing windows open for business at 7:30am. What follows next can only be described as a uniquely Pinoy (or simply third-world?) bureaucratic government office game of musical chairs. If filmed at fast speed for youtube, it could have been called "How to clean your waiting chairs by having hundreds of clothed butts wiping them throughout the day..."



Content from... (http://www.marketmanila.com/archives/cutting-line-at-the-passport-office)

[sars_notd_virus]

Glad I'm done with the Epassport before I leave the PH,...I believe its more difficult now as DFA doesnt have enough machines for the E-passport and it usually hung up and have its down time...and also, the cutting line of some highly recognized people like the politicians celebrities and lots of travel agencies working under the table with some DFA staffs makes it all worthwhile..:rolleyes::angry:

[raynaputi]

Things like this really pisses me off..:cwm23: Why can't they be the same with the foreign embassy's here? When I was applying for my US visa, one famous celebrity was applying too..and yet she didn't get or even asked any special treatment and just waited like the rest of us..mind you, even the pinoy staffs there who obviously know her didn't give her any special treatment..That's how it should be done!

[johncar54]

MY wife made her application in December. We had made an appointment on line, she turned up early (more that 30 mins early) and very jet lagged. Waited and waited.

Eventually they did the application. She paid extra for rapid processing and delivery.

About a week later she got a call to go back as there was an error (the DFA expert did the processing). Waited and waited.

Well to cut the story short, she made five visits to DFA. The Last time was the last day the office was open before the Christmas break and it would not open again until after her departure date for Spain.

13 hours later, and several calls from me to a senior person, she was eventually given her new passport. (They did sing Happy Birthday to her when they gave it to her, as it was her birthday that day).

Hopefully in five years, when she would need to renew again, she will have a Spanish passport and can save herself the pantomime all over again"!!!!

[jimeve]

What bugs me they are only valid for five years, then have to do the procedure again.