Passport chaos: Majority of countries will NOT accept emergency extensions

Emergency passport extension, which is provided for by the Home Office, isn’t recognised by three out of four countries.

12:56 23 June 2014

The Home Office, which was reported to be struggling with a backlog of 500,000 applications, has said last week that expats who require passport renewals will be given one-year extension. However, it has emerged today that three out of four countries will not honour this extension including USA, Portugal, Turkey, Holland, Cyprus, Mexico, Australia, Switzerland, India, Brazil, and China. However, Spain, France, Thailand, Canada, and Germany have agreed to accept extended passports. 

 

Because of this, Home Secretary Theresa May was slammed by Labour’s Shadow Immigration Minister David Hanson who said: “A week after she announced extended passports almost three-quarters of the world are currently not accepting them.

 

"It’s just not good enough.”

 

“People are still stuck without passports, unable to travel at what is the busiest holiday period of the year.

 

“This shows again that the Government still haven’t realised how serious this is.”

 

Meanwhile, Mrs May said that her office is dealing with the highest demand in 12 years and that the summer surge in demand has started earlier than expected. But she insists that only 11per cent are processed outside the accepted three weeks’ waiting time.