Renewal of British Passport

nomad97

nomad97

Resident Geek
For your information, within the past week I have sent my passport renewal paperwork to Hong Kong to obtain a new British Passport. Here are some observations for you to consider. Contrary to the advice given on the FCO website, if you do not live in a big city DHL is not a very good option for sending your renewal paperwork to Hong Kong. I live in Surin and the nearest DHL office is some 200 Kilometers away in Korat. I sent my application through the Thai Postal Service, Express Mail Service (EMS) which is a registered delivery with online tracking at a cost of 450 Baht. The envelope was delivered by Airmail within 4 days. Actually, you do not send your passport, only a photocopy of your picture and personal information page, plus photographs, plus the application form (filled-in on-line and printed off). Further, they ask for payment via Banker's Draft payable in Hong Kong Dollars. There is no bank in Surin Province, and I suspect most other rural provinces, that will give you a Banker's Draft payable in Hong Kong Dollars. I know, I was in Bangkok Bank yesterday when some other unfortunate soul was trying to obtain said banker's draft. It was the third different bank he had tried that morning. Fortunately I was able to point him in another direction. The ATM Card issued by the Bangkok Bank is a VISA direct debit card that will accept payments from overseas. I had filled in the Credit/Debit Card Authorisation Form, available from the FCO website, and included that method of payment with my application form. I posted my application on 27th June and my bank account was debited to the tune of 7,106.52 Baht on 4th July. As I do not use my debit card for any other transactions I must assume that this is the application fee plus return courier service charge deducted by the FCO Passport Processing Centre in Hong Kong. At 49 Baht to the £ this equates to a total charge of £145 (£125 to renew passport + some £20 return courier fees). This is in line with the scale of fees published on the FCO website. I hope some of you will find this information useful.
 
nomad97 said:
For your information, within the past week I have sent my passport renewal paperwork to Hong Kong to obtain a new British Passport. Here are some observations for you to consider. Contrary to the advice given on the FCO website, if you do not live in a big city DHL is not a very good option for sending your renewal paperwork to Hong Kong. I live in Surin and the nearest DHL office is some 200 Kilometers away in Korat. I sent my application through the Thai Postal Service, Express Mail Service (EMS) which is a registered delivery with online tracking at a cost of 450 Baht. The envelope was delivered by Airmail within 4 days. Actually, you do not send your passport, only a photocopy of your picture and personal information page, plus photographs, plus the application form (filled-in on-line and printed off). Further, they ask for payment via Banker's Draft payable in Hong Kong Dollars. There is no bank in Surin Province, and I suspect most other rural provinces, that will give you a Banker's Draft payable in Hong Kong Dollars. I know, I was in Bangkok Bank yesterday when some other unfortunate soul was trying to obtain said banker's draft. It was the third different bank he had tried that morning. Fortunately I was able to point him in another direction. The ATM Card issued by the Bangkok Bank is a VISA direct debit card that will accept payments from overseas. I had filled in the Credit/Debit Card Authorisation Form, available from the FCO website, and included that method of payment with my application form. I posted my application on 27th June and my bank account was debited to the tune of 7,106.52 Baht on 4th July. As I do not use my debit card for any other transactions I must assume that this is the application fee plus return courier service charge deducted by the FCO Passport Processing Centre in Hong Kong. At 49 Baht to the £ this equates to a total charge of £145 (£125 to renew passport + some £20 return courier fees). This is in line with the scale of fees published on the FCO website. I hope some of you will find this information useful.
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Very useful information indeed. ThumbUp6 The cost isn't that bad really, when I was last in the UK, I ordered and paid online around £120 for a ten year visa 40 page passport inc P+P. (July 2011).
 
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I would suggest that there is no need to send off the application by EMS, specially as you are not sending your current passport. Registered post will suffice, and costs around 120bt. Even that may be over the top and simple air-mail will suffice.

You will obtain no acknowledgement, so the only way you will know whether the application has arrived safely is to check your credit card debit.

Note that Hong Kong only acts as the passport acceptance office. Once they have checked the paperwork, and obtained payment, they forward the application to the UK, where the new passport is printed. It is then couriered to you from there.

The whole process generally takes 4-6 weeks, but sometimes longer.
 
I would disagree with you on that, Nick Yes, EMS is more expensive, but it's as secure as DHL. Registered post is NOT secure, and may result in your credit card details becoming accessible to some unauthorised person.
 
Agree with IB. In addition, the tracking facility is quite good and it allowed me to see what was happening to my letter. The day after I posted the letter I logged on to the tracking system and found no trace of my letter. I convinced my wife to return to the small private post office (opposite Big C) to see what was up. The desk girl had, for reasons best known to herself, changed the tracking number that she had given me the day before. Armed with the new tracking number I soon found my letter on the Post Office Tracking System. Panic over!
 
isanbirder said:
I would disagree with you on that, Nick Yes, EMS is more expensive, but it's as secure as DHL. Registered post is NOT secure, and may result in your credit card details becoming accessible to some unauthorised person.
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Why should we pay more for the inefficiency of the Post Office. If they cannot safeguard the post whilst in their possession they have no business handling it in the first place.

The credit card companies recognise this, and accept liability for fraudulent use of cards.

So back to square 1----registered post is OK
 
Prakhonchai Nick said:
Why should we pay more for the inefficiency of the Post Office. If they cannot safeguard the post whilst in their possession they have no business handling it in the first place.

The credit card companies recognise this, and accept liability for fraudulent use of cards.

So back to square 1----registered post is OK
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I don't see the logic, Nick! If the PO is inefficient, why should Registered Post be OK?

I admit, that means, why should EMS be OK as well... but experience says it is. I used to have dealings, many years ago, with someone who processed passports for illegal stayers. They would send him the passport with cash, and he would forward it to some remote border town, and when processed, send it back by EMS. All very illegal, but he never lost a passport (or the cash). He died several years ago, so there's no need to keep it a secret any longer.
 
I think they are all inefficient. EMS from Pattaya to Buriram takes longer than ordinary post - normally 4 days! However, loss of registered post provides for some payment from the Post Service which ordinary post does not. EMS is unjustifiably expensive!
 
Prakhonchai Nick said:
Why should we pay more for the inefficiency of the Post Office. If they cannot safeguard the post whilst in their possession they have no business handling it in the first place.

The credit card companies recognise this, and accept liability for fraudulent use of cards.

So back to square 1----registered post is OK
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Nick, your argument is "non sequitur" (does not follow). We live in Thailand and, therefore, we have to make do with the local services on offer. Its no good saying if they (the Post Office) cannot safeguard the post whilst in their possession they have no business handling it in the first place. The fact remains that we either use the Post Office to send our passport renewal papers to Hong Kong, as I did in this case, or we go the more expensive route and travel to Korat (1200 Baht of diesel for the return trip) plus maybe 1000 Baht to DHL the package to Hong Kong (as recommended in the FCO web site). Some 450 Baht versus 2000 Baht plus. Personally, I would rather pay the extra and use the EMS service, with which I can track the progress of my package, than trust to luck with the cheaper Air Mail service. At the end of the day it is "up to you" as the Thais would say.
 
Surprise! Surprise! My new passport was delivered to my door yesterday (by DHL at 1800 hours). For your information, I sent the application to Hong Kong by EMS on 27th June, the Bangkok Bank ATM VISA Card was debited on 4th July and the new passport received some 2 weeks 4 days later on 18th July. All-in-all, the renewal service was much quicker and easier than I thought it would be. The next step is to visit Immigration at Kap Cheown to get the visa and visa extensions transferred from the old passport to the new passport. I will do this on 10th September when the next 90-day report is due and post my experiences on this forum FYI.
 
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nomad97 said:
Surprise! Surprise! My new passport was delivered to my door yesterday (by DHL at 1800 hours). For your information, I sent the application to Hong Kong by EMS on 27th June, the Bangkok Bank ATM VISA Card was debited on 4th July and the new passport received some 2 weeks 4 days later on 18th July. All-in-all, the renewal service was much quicker and easier than I thought it would be. The next step is to visit Immigration at Kap Cheown to get the visa and visa extensions transferred from the old passport to the new passport. I will do this on 10th September when the next 90-day report is due and post my experiences on this forum FYI.
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Congratulation. Job will done. Coffee is waiting.
 
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