Passport expiration
 

I know I am being paranoid. But I have never cut things this close before.

I will be traveling internationally this year. My return is 6 months and 6 days before the expiration on my passport.

I know the rules are usually you have to have an open visa page and the passport must be valid for 6 months.

Has anyone ever run into an issue when their passport is close to expiring (but still valid)?

You'll be fine, don't worry.

The 6 month requirement is meant to be a buffer in case you need to delay your return.

The six month rule does not apply to re-entry to the US. It applies to entry to various countries which require it. Hence, it is 6 months from the date that you arrive in one of those countries, not when you leave it.

If by return you mean as a US citizen you return to the US, your passport does not have to have six months left on it, you can come back on the day before expiration day if you want.

No worries at all for six months and six days.

Someone will be along shortly to correct me if I'm wrong, but I understood that the passport of a US Citizen could be expired and they would STILL be allowed entry.

Dave

I was just worried about an over-zealous immigration official on entry to Thailand. I am sure that abuse of authority is not limited to our TSA and could occur elsewhere.

But in face of the overwhelming response here, I will put it out of my mind.

Thanks to all.

US citizens do not need a passport to re-enter the country. However, to get on your plane in Thailand, you would want to have a valid passport, to avoid any hassles. So, make sure you have at least one day of validity when you show up for your flight home.

As far as six months, the rules are different for different countries. Many don't care, as long as it's valid. Others require certain lengths of validity to be left when you enter.

Even for those countries which have a three or six month validity requirement in some form or another, it rarely applies to all persons with a passport with less than that amount of time remaining on the passport. But six months remaining validity and two or three sets of blank visa pages is an extraordinarily safe way to play it.

Is the OP's travel that of travel on an ordinary US passport?

Yes. But the issue in advance of that will be that the airline may not allow such a person to board a flight to the US. Also, DHS/CBP may make a bit of an issue about it on arrival at a US port of entry.

US citizens at a US port of entry should not be turned away from the US by DHS. However, in some rare instances -- due to misunderstanding, incompetence and/or malice -- DHS has turned away US citizens in the US, at a US port of entry and/or on the way to a US port of entry.

Well used, extra pages, tons of visas. But a regular passport.

That sounds right (or at least sensible). A passport is a request from the US government to allow you to enter other countries and an (implicit) guarantee that you are a reputable person and should be admitted.

For purposes of reentering the U.S., it is proof of identity and citizenship. Neither of those things should expire.

That said, just like TSA thinks an expired driver's license means you no longer are the person depicted on the license, it would not surprise me to learn that CBP takes a similar view with respect to expired passports. Indeed, a previously issued passport is not sufficient to prove entitlement to a new passport if you are a minor--you need a birth certificate each time.

But for renewal of an adult passport, you can not only use a previously-issued passport, you can use a passport that's recently expired (and, as I discovered, a passport that was not only expired but had been superseded by another renewal).

However, as my daughter learned, an expired passport is not valid identification for getting a Social Security number.

Hence, when she went to the Consulate in Haifa with a passport which had expired a month or so earlier, and asked for both a new passport and a Social Security number, she was told she could only get a new passport -- but as soon as it arrived she could present it to get the Social Security number. :rolleyes:

At first I agreed with your :rolleyes:, but then I realized that there is a possible explanation; the issuance of a passport verified your daughter's identity. Had the passport application been rejected (by the DoS in the US), then she would not be able to get the SS number.

A bit far fetched, but it seems logical.

That would be right -- if a passport were never accepted as proof of identity. However, if she had brought it in a month earlier, when it was still valid, she would have gotten the SS number.

Her passport may have expired but not her identity.

For a US citizen without a SSA number, even if their US passport application is rejected, it may still be possible to get a SSA number once in the US. I'm not sure if it is still the case or not, but before it was possible to get a SSA number even for US citizens outside of the US without a current US passport -- not always a walk in the park, and not without some resistance often enough, but it was done.

[While it may be absurd that an expired US passport is not always ordinarily accepted as evidence of identity, it's no more bizarre than some European governments accepting valid foreign (e.g., US) passports for entry and for proof of identity in some cases but then refusing to accept the valid US passports as proof of identity for other purposes. For example, the Swedish government rather routinely refuses to accept non-EU/EEA passports as evidence of identity of the foreign citizen parent(s) named on Swedish birth certificates but they will accept the non-EU/EEA passports as evidence of identity for other purposes. [To see an example of this nonsense courtesy of governmental bureaucracy, check out the Stockholm police station where Swedish passports applications are accepted in person. Then try to see how minor Swedish citizens with foreign parent(s) may involve the parent(s) asking some person -- random or otherwise -- to sign a document attesting to the identity of the foreign parent(s).]