Hey, Thank you for the show of compassion. you know how it is the kids are gone, well almost! They are my babies now and us pet owners know how hard it is to leave them.Mricco

I am in the same boat (pun intended). My wife and I have our passports, but my children ages 6 and 8 do not. Our renewals went through faster than their new applications. All were submitted in March. We leave in 4 days. Our State Rep is on the case but with no promises. The telephone on hold for two hour rep says they can only send e-mails of urgency to the passport office. I have read all the back and forth on the need for passports on the STT to BVI ferry .... What is (or better yet ... where can I find the ultimate) law?

I has my 9 yr old on the STT to BVI ferry in February and did not need passports.

You can call the Customs office on STT and ask them. I did this before my tip. It is documented here on this forum somewhere (the day I called and to whom I spoke). The offier said we ewould not need passports...and we did not.

EEEEK! I'm leaving in a little over two weeks and my daughters passport is still not here! I applied at the very beginning of March and they even cashed the check in April. So, where is it? 🙁 Even when you call the passport agency you can't talk to a live person. A recording just tells you that all operators are busy and to call back later. What are my options?

Your option is to stop worrying and read the previous posts!

Darlene - On the state.gov website, you can check on-line for your passports. Send an email to the NDC (also on that page) that indicates the day you are leaving on your trip (I would fudge a bit :-). I sent an email everyday for a week solid. FINALLY got my kids' passports on Monday (I applied for them on 3/6) THREE months later. So, this worked for me!

Thanks LLB,

I started emailing them and I did receive one automated message from Charleston that states it is in process. My sister told me she would bring me into Boston for it when it gets to about 10 days prior. It just kind of stinks when you're supposed to be excited before your trip and instead you're worrying!

Hi everyone! I just found this online and did just what it said and almost instantly I was able to talk to someone. Hooray! He said it was printed yesterday and I should recieve it before my trip!!!!!!!!!! Here is the link! It was so helpful, at last a real live person!!!!

http://phigsaidwhat.com/Phigmentb/phigment.nsf/dx/05092007090008PMHOS4D6.htm

I just saw this on another message board and copied and pasted it here.

Gerie

Here's the article from the AP.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is poised to suspend a major post-9/11 security initiative to cope with increasingly angry complaints from Americans whose summer vacations are threatened by new passport rules.

A proposal, expected to be announced Friday, will temporarily waive a requirement that U.S. citizens have passports to fly to and from Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and Bermuda, provided the traveler can prove he or she has already applied for a passport, officials said Thursday.

The temporary lifting of the passport rule is aimed at clearing a massive backlog of passport applications at the State Department that has slowed processing to a crawl, they said. Rep. Heather Wilson (news, bio, voting record), R-N.M., said the suspension would last until the end of September.

The plan had run into opposition from the
Homeland Security Department, which controls U.S. border points and fears the move could make it easier for terrorists or other undesirables to enter the country, the officials said.

Instead of a passport, travelers will now be able to present a State Department receipt showing their passport application is being processed, and a government-issued ID such as a driver's license.

Homeland Security signed off on the proposal on Thursday after consultations with the State Department, the White House and members of Congress, who have been deluged with complaints from furious constituents, according to four officials at the agencies involved.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the decision has not yet been announced.

A Homeland Security spokesman declined to comment.

Under the plan, those without passports would receive additional security scrutiny when they travel, which could include extra questioning or bag checks, according to one official familiar with the discussions.

The suspension will give the State Department time to deal with a surge in applications that has overwhelmed its processing centers since the new rules took effect earlier this year.

The backlog has caused up to three-month delays in issuing passports and ruined or delayed the travel plans of untold thousands of Americans.

Frustrated lawmakers besieged with constituent complaints have demanded relief.

Rep. Thomas Reynolds (news, bio, voting record), R-N.Y., whose district lies near the Canadian border, said White House officials have been on Capitol Hill trying to work out a compromise amid what he called a turf war between State and Homeland Security.

"White House personnel have seen the problem and they've been on Capitol Hill working with members," said Reynolds. "I expect a plan to be forthcoming that ... would not require a passport as long as you had an application receipt for filing for the passport."

The State Department has hired hundreds of new passport adjudicators, put employees to work around the clock and opened a new processing facility in Arkansas but has still been unable to meet the demand.

Initial hopes that the delays could be overcome were dashed this month when more than a million requests for new passports were dumped at once on the facilities by banks contracted to clear application fee checks, a senior State Department official said.

The passport application surge is the result of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative that since January has required U.S. citizens to use passports when entering the United States from Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean by air.

The travel initiative, which next year will require either passports or yet-to-be developed wallet-sized passcards to be presented at land border crossings, is part of a broader package of immigration rules enacted after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

It has caused deep annoyance, particularly from those who live in border states and make routine, legal crossings into Canada and Mexico for business and pleasure.

Wilson, whose state is on the Mexican border, said she had been calling on State and Homeland Security to implement a suspension for two weeks.

"I said, 'You need to take action. This is completely screwed up'," she said. "To say people must have a passport to travel and not give people a passport is right up there in the stupid column."

Wilson said her office took more than 500 calls in May alone from constituents struggling to get passports and the problem has spread from border states to Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kansas and Colorado.

Between March and May of this year, the department issued more than 4.5 million passports, a 60 percent increase over the same period in 2006, but millions more applications are waiting to be processed, according to consular affairs officials.

The demand is such that the State Department has warned applicants to allow as long as 12 weeks for their passports to be issued and up to three weeks for expedited processing at an extra fee. Previously, the maximum wait was six weeks and two weeks, respectively.

In the meantime, would-be foreign travelers stew and fret.

Angela Pezzimenti, a recent college graduate from Allegany, N.Y., barely got her passport in time to make a trip to Europe last month.

"It was nerve-racking," said the 21-year-old, who finally received her passport three days before the trip. "I was really afraid that it wasn't going to come in time. We had everything planned, our tickets were bought, and I was pretty worried."

Wendy Berry of Franklin, W.Va., applied in March for a passport for her 18-year-old son, Jonathan. But the day he was to leave to visit his sister in Peru, his passport hadn't come.

"There are two things I wish they would do," she said of the government. "The only really responsible party is the Passport Office. I wish they would be held accountable. And I wish they would staff more people. The whole system is ready to collapse.

Darlene - That's GREAT!! Now stop worrying and start packin'!! You're going to the VI!

LLBL:

I don't know if this really is good news or not.

According to the article you will still need a State Department receipt showing that you have applied for a passport. As one Congresswoman stated (concerning the original passport issue delays) "requiring a passport and then delaying the issuance of it is right up there in the stupid column". Now we're going to not only require the State Department to issue passports (for which there is a 3 month backlog), but also add work (and further delays?) by having to issue some kind of a receipt......this puts it in the "really stupid column".

Now if I could only figure out what a State Department receipt is and how long it will take to get it??????

F.I.

FI - I meant GOOD NEWS that Darlene was able to get hold of a live person who said their passports were printed and would be received before they leave! I think the recent press release just adds to the confusion. I have no idea what it means really! We finally got all our passports after much pestering via email to the NPC.

I didn't get a receipt after applying for our passports, so IMO that is "stupid" by adding to the already back-logged workload!

Thanks LLB,

I just want it in my hand! I don't think my 14yr daughter wants to stay home, although she pretends that she's not excited! 🙂 Everyday I check the mail! Please be there, please be there!

Hey, quick question. For all y'all that have been waiting for passports ... did any of you apply for the expedited service, and if so how long did it take? Just trying to figure out if it's any shorter than the regular service. Sounds like they are backlogged all around.

Just double checking ... if we take a boat to the BVIs, we don't even really need it to get back into the U.S. right? It's just preferred, but not required until 1/1/08.

We have one person in our group who hasn't applied yet, and we're leaving in a few months. I think she should just take her birth certificate instead of trying to apply because of the delays. She just isn't going to get it back in time, and then she will be much more screwed than if she just travels with her birth certificate, from what I can tell.

I must be pretty lucky. I applied for my passport and my daughter's -- the first week of May. We received it back in exactly 2 weeks (we did pay for expedited processing). I assume we need it from STT to the BVI ??? Any ideas?