Mar 1, 2022, 6:35 am
Last edit by: CKDGM
Passport Agency Appointments (same day expedited service)
Appointments for same-day expedited service often go quickly. It is best that you schedule your appointment with the passport agency exactly 14 days before your trip. You will want to call the passport number before the center opens at 8am EST as they will have just opened up one day (14 days out) of appointments at all agencies. Appointment times start at 8am. It is important that you have enough buffer in your travel schedule. For example, if you make an appointment for a new passport at 11am and your time of travel is at 2pm, there will not be enough time for you to get your passport. If you book the 8am slot you may have to wait until the end of the business day to get your new passport or it may only be a few hours.
You will want to have your date of travel, time of travel, your flight itinerary number, name of destination, full name of applicant, and applicant's birth city, and the zip code of where you live (to help them find the closest available center with open slots). Use the following steps to increase your chances of success to booking an appointment as they can go very quickly:
Credit: chgoeditor
Known office locator numbers (not complete)
Note: The office code (first two digits of your application locator number returned by Passport Status) is the office reviewing your documents and approving your application. It isn't necessarily the address you mailed the forms to (always Irving or Philadelphia for renewals) nor the facility where the book is physically printed and mailed (often Tucson or Hot Springs).
10: Boston
11: NYC
12: Honolulu
14: Stamford, CT
15: Portsmouth, NH
17: Aurora, CO
18: Chicago
19: Washington, DC
20-29: Portsmouth, NH
34-39: Charleston
40-42: New Orleans, LA
45: Portsmouth, NH
50: Los Angeles, CA
51: Miami
53: Seattle
54: Minneapolis
55: Dallas
56: Detroit
57: San Francisco
58: Philadelphia, PA
61-64: Tucson
65: Hot Springs, AR
67: San Juan, PR
68: Portsmouth, NH
69: Portsmouth, NH
71: US embassies/consulates abroad (possibly Portsmouth, NH)
74: Atlanta
75: St Albans, VT
76: San Diego, CA
77: Buffalo, NY
78: El Paso, TX
79: Houston, TX
80: Special Issuance Agency ("Issues diplomatic, official, service, and no-fee regular passports, and facilitates visa processing for those traveling on behalf of the U.S. government.")
95: Online
A list of agencies and their locator numbers is listed on this page under the heading, "List of passport agencies and centers with locator numbers."
H/T Nayef, txviking, and various individual posts both here and on Reddit. If you have a locator not in the above list, check the return address agency name or postmark/ZIP on your returned citizenship docs, or passport card if you applied for one, which may be the processing office, although the address itself is likely to be a PO Box in Sterling, VA in all cases (which appears to be a lockbox location that processes mail for all locations). The passport books are printed in fewer locations, often Hot Springs and Tucson, and may not correspond to the agency where the processing steps occurred. If it doesn’t match the list above, please add or correct.
Appointments for same-day expedited service often go quickly. It is best that you schedule your appointment with the passport agency exactly 14 days before your trip. You will want to call the passport number before the center opens at 8am EST as they will have just opened up one day (14 days out) of appointments at all agencies. Appointment times start at 8am. It is important that you have enough buffer in your travel schedule. For example, if you make an appointment for a new passport at 11am and your time of travel is at 2pm, there will not be enough time for you to get your passport. If you book the 8am slot you may have to wait until the end of the business day to get your new passport or it may only be a few hours.
You will want to have your date of travel, time of travel, your flight itinerary number, name of destination, full name of applicant, and applicant's birth city, and the zip code of where you live (to help them find the closest available center with open slots). Use the following steps to increase your chances of success to booking an appointment as they can go very quickly:
- 14 days before your trip, you need to schedule an appointment with the passport agency.
- At 7:55 am call the passport number 877-487-2778 (This have to be exactly 14 days before your plane ticket or less. If less, it will get harder to find an appointment)
- Click 1 (For English)
- Click 2 (New Passport)
- Continue to Click 7 to repeat, and keep doing this while watching your watch or using Time.gov to get the exact time down to the second.
- When your it hits exactly 8:00 am Click 2 (for traveling within 14 days option)
- There will be a delay of 3-4 second and you will wait for the next available agent. If you are very lucky, you will be put straight through to an agent. You may be waiting few minutes or maybe as long as 15-20 minutes.
- If you did not click 1 exactly at 8 am, you may have to wait for more than an hour and half
Credit: chgoeditor
Known office locator numbers (not complete)
Note: The office code (first two digits of your application locator number returned by Passport Status) is the office reviewing your documents and approving your application. It isn't necessarily the address you mailed the forms to (always Irving or Philadelphia for renewals) nor the facility where the book is physically printed and mailed (often Tucson or Hot Springs).
10: Boston
11: NYC
12: Honolulu
14: Stamford, CT
15: Portsmouth, NH
17: Aurora, CO
18: Chicago
19: Washington, DC
20-29: Portsmouth, NH
34-39: Charleston
40-42: New Orleans, LA
45: Portsmouth, NH
50: Los Angeles, CA
51: Miami
53: Seattle
54: Minneapolis
55: Dallas
56: Detroit
57: San Francisco
58: Philadelphia, PA
61-64: Tucson
65: Hot Springs, AR
67: San Juan, PR
68: Portsmouth, NH
69: Portsmouth, NH
71: US embassies/consulates abroad (possibly Portsmouth, NH)
74: Atlanta
75: St Albans, VT
76: San Diego, CA
77: Buffalo, NY
78: El Paso, TX
79: Houston, TX
80: Special Issuance Agency ("Issues diplomatic, official, service, and no-fee regular passports, and facilitates visa processing for those traveling on behalf of the U.S. government.")
95: Online
A list of agencies and their locator numbers is listed on this page under the heading, "List of passport agencies and centers with locator numbers."
H/T Nayef, txviking, and various individual posts both here and on Reddit. If you have a locator not in the above list, check the return address agency name or postmark/ZIP on your returned citizenship docs, or passport card if you applied for one, which may be the processing office, although the address itself is likely to be a PO Box in Sterling, VA in all cases (which appears to be a lockbox location that processes mail for all locations). The passport books are printed in fewer locations, often Hot Springs and Tucson, and may not correspond to the agency where the processing steps occurred. If it doesn’t match the list above, please add or correct.
Current US passport wait? (Merged Threads)
Jul 17, 2020, 6:55 am
#631
Suspended
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Watchlisted by the prejudiced, en route to purgatory
Programs: Just Say No to Fleecing and Blacklisting
Posts: 102,095
The publicly announced backlog in passport applications was showing yesterday as being a bit over 1.3M. In other words, the rate of the 7-day bite into the running backlog was a bit over 100k even as passport issuance volume for the period was closer to double the rate of the prior few 7 day period. If the coronavirus surge in the US doesn’t put a halt to this kind of eating into passport issuance volumes, then a lot of the March application people should be good to go with passports within weeks at most.
Jul 17, 2020, 7:59 am
#632
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: WAS
Programs: enjoyed being warm spit for a few years on CO/UA but now nothing :(
Posts: 2,507
that is encouraging. But I am not holding my breath. I will most likely rely on the "return on an expired passport" tactic for hoped for holiday travel.
Jul 18, 2020, 1:45 pm
#633
Join Date: Sep 2013
Location: SoCal
Programs: UA Gold, Marriott Gold
Posts: 186
My wife submitted her renewal by mail on 3/15. This week she received “Approved” and “Shipped” emails with an expected delivery date of 7/23 - and it actually came today (7/18).
Mine, submitted at the local post office just after that still shows “In Process”.
Mine, submitted at the local post office just after that still shows “In Process”.
Last edited by LAX2Anywhere; Jul 18, 2020 at 5:00 pm Reason: New info
Jul 20, 2020, 11:55 am
#634
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: LAX
Posts: 10,912
so what are current considerations for such? i can imagine talking my way through CBP with some interview etc delays but would an airline allow one to board a flight back to US with expired passport?
Jul 20, 2020, 12:58 pm
#635
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: WAS
Programs: enjoyed being warm spit for a few years on CO/UA but now nothing :(
Posts: 2,507
well, that's a good question; I hadn't thought about that - would be quite a problem if they won't. Instead of taking chances with the airline and since the boys don't have passport cards, I guess the best tactic will be to apply for renewal passport at the embassy soon after getting in-country.
Jul 21, 2020, 11:05 pm
#636
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: SW Michigan, ex SF Bay Area
Posts: 833
Renewal, routine service, express return.
Mar 6: mailed to Philadelphia processing center via Priority Mail 2-Day
Mar 9: delivered to passport processing center
Mar 11: check cleared bank via ACH, status “In Progress”
July 7: status changed to “Shipped”, passport shipped Priority Mail Express 2-Day from Hot Springs, AR, estimated delivery July 11
July 8: received passport!
July 11: received passport card via first-class mail
July 20: received old passport and passport card via first-class mail
Funny thing is I received a status update email on July 7 at 3:47 pm saying that my application status was Shipped. Almost 10 hours later, at 1:30 am on July 8, I received another email saying that the status was Approved. (Oh, good!
)
Mar 6: mailed to Philadelphia processing center via Priority Mail 2-Day
Mar 9: delivered to passport processing center
Mar 11: check cleared bank via ACH, status “In Progress”
July 7: status changed to “Shipped”, passport shipped Priority Mail Express 2-Day from Hot Springs, AR, estimated delivery July 11
July 8: received passport!
July 11: received passport card via first-class mail
July 20: received old passport and passport card via first-class mail
Funny thing is I received a status update email on July 7 at 3:47 pm saying that my application status was Shipped. Almost 10 hours later, at 1:30 am on July 8, I received another email saying that the status was Approved. (Oh, good!
)
Jul 23, 2020, 8:10 am
#638
Suspended
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Watchlisted by the prejudiced, en route to purgatory
Programs: Just Say No to Fleecing and Blacklisting
Posts: 102,095
The publicly reported application backlog is still at 1.23 million. The week prior the reported backlog was 1.31 million. The number of issued passports for the period plummeted down by a large five figure amount while the newly received application count increased by a relatively low five figure amount.
This should mean that most of March applications are done at this point.
This should mean that most of March applications are done at this point.
Jul 23, 2020, 8:51 am
#639
Join Date: Jul 2020
Posts: 16
Strange that passports processed are down 76k this week. Offices going back to Stage 1 perhaps?
Jul 23, 2020, 9:44 am
#640
Join Date: Nov 2010
Posts: 580
Does anyone know why they processed fewer passports this week than last week?
Last week, they processed 274000 passports. This week, the number went down to 198000 passports. This is a significant drop, although it is still fortunately more than what was issued the prior week.
Last week, they processed 274000 passports. This week, the number went down to 198000 passports. This is a significant drop, although it is still fortunately more than what was issued the prior week.
Jul 23, 2020, 10:57 am
#641
Join Date: Jul 2020
Posts: 16
Does anyone know why they processed fewer passports this week than last week?
Last week, they processed 274000 passports. This week, the number went down to 198000 passports. This is a significant drop, although it is still fortunately more than what was issued the prior week.
Last week, they processed 274000 passports. This week, the number went down to 198000 passports. This is a significant drop, although it is still fortunately more than what was issued the prior week.
I was hoping to see another 250k+ processed this week.
Jul 23, 2020, 12:28 pm
#642
Join Date: Nov 2010
Posts: 580
I think it is down to some offices going a step back lockdown wise. The week before was due to the holiday. "Passports issued July 2-8 were lower than the previous weeks because of the July 4th federal holiday."
I was hoping to see another 250k+ processed this week.
I was hoping to see another 250k+ processed this week.
I am hoping and praying that they will get through the passports quickly. It is very frustrating as it seems that so little can be done regarding this and as though many people waiting for passports are in such a helpless position.
Jul 23, 2020, 12:56 pm
#643
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jun 2010
Location: TOA
Programs: HH Diamond, Marriott LTPP/Platinum Premier, Hyatt Lame-ist, UA !K
Posts: 20,061
