corporate-wage-slave

If you live in a marginal seat and haven't been bugging the MP too much, a quick telephone call to the MP's office in the House of Commons may yield results, depending a bit on what his/her caseload is like - some MPs have a near permanent hotline to the Border Force due to their constituents' travel needs. If this is an important business trip creating jobs / yadayada, well you know what to say.

ahmetdouas

Yes exactly. My father lost his passport, booked the appointment, and got 2 new passports within 4 hours.

I booked the 1 day service to replace my really worn passport, they were fine with it as well (although they were telling me that my passport wear state is a disgrace and that I should look after them better as they are important documents, and that i had to write in teh remarks section that it was damaged due to 'wear and tear')

So the gist is even if they tell you it can only be 1 week, a bit of charm and face to face contact to prove what happen (supporting evidence helps), then chances are quite good to get the passport on the spot.

Best of luck!

And really, if you are a frequent traveller, just get 2 passports so you always have one in reserve.

jms_uk

Isn't there a requirement for the travel to be work related [with a supporting letter from the employer], or to the countries not liking each other, or having to get visas often while still needing to travel?

I don't think just being a frequent traveller is enough of a reason [for the Passport Office, I think it is ].

Nikko5

Thanks again, will report back how I get on. Although I travel a reasonable amount - but nowhere near as much as most on here, as it's 80% leisure! - the slight laminate peel in the corner was genuine wear and tear. Doesn't help that every airline check-in and border agent worldwide now seems to scan your passport page sideways through a very narrow scanner without too much care and attention!

Passport is (was) five years old. As to the chip also failing I have no idea, although even the border agent himself said the chip in his own passport failed after only a month!!

As to MP we live in one of the safest Tory seats in the country, but could be a useful option. Funnily enough I was thinking of contacting him about an Asian friend of mine being refused a UK visit visa (perhaps UKBF just have it in for me generally at the moment! )

ahmetdouas

Well what we did (we are self employed) for my father is write a letter saying that he travels frequently and usually has to keep a passport with the embassy for a week or 2 for visa applications, which affects his travel plans elsewhere so would like 2 passports to prevent this happening. I signed it myself and my father took it to the interview; no questions asked!

So i don't think it has to be for work, if you can prove you travel often (visa stamps etc.), just write a letter saying why you would like 2 passports! Or just convince your boss to write you a letter if you really do travel often.

navylad

Do go in person tomorrow and plead your case.

Don't report it as lost unless HMPO tells you to when you explain what has happened. If you get 3 lost or stolen, they will start only issuing you with 1 year passports. If they tell you to report it as lost, you can do it there and then.

'andad

Not easy indeed. I tried to get a second passport with a supporting letter from a large British oil company, that I needed to travel every week whilst my passport was occasionally in for visas. Not a good enough reason.

jms_uk

Just shows how inconsistent bureaucracy is

ahmetdouas

Mind you that was 2010. So maybe they got tougher with all thats happening in the world these days!

UKtravelbear

The safeness and party of your MP should make no difference in them helping you should you contact them

Though I was thinking of you contacting them more to assist in your complaint / claim for the cost of your new passport from UKBF than been able to expedite a new passport.

Ber2dca

The first responses in the thread could have been written by a bad customer care department, didn't address the issue at hand, gave out unhelpful information .

OP is unlucky but truth be told, the laminate of the photo page is probably the one page they really should pay a lot of attention to!

GUWonder

The RFID readers used by UKBF aren't always working very well. I've been repeatedly told my passports' RFIDs aren't working and then the next time the same passports' RFID are working. Go figure.

On one of my US passports with the laminate peeling on the corner of my biodata page, I traveled with it for many hundreds of thousands of miles with no issue with it except perhaps a couple of times -- but no show-stopper.

techie

On the wider subject of wear and tear, I continue to be surprised how many people do not have their passport in a cover-type holder. Perhaps it's not until they get stung like OP that they start to consider it.

stifle

Because getting it in and out of the cover as UKBF requires causes wear and tear too.

Swanhunter

No problem renewing a second passport with a employers letters stating frequent travel in 2015. I've had a few so perhaps more lenient on renewals than new issues.