My dear husband is planning to go to Mexico this weekend for his friend's 50th birthday. For some reason (maybe the obsessive compulsive nature I have) I call him and ask :honey, when does your passport expire?

The answer...last March.

What do we do now? Short of driving to Houston and applying in person. Has anyone had this problem? Do they really check the experation date that closely?

This is why I make the travel plans.

Lauri from what I know your hubby would not be allowed to leave the U.S. with an expired passport and if they didn't notice it and they caught it on his way home I'd hate to be left in Mexico. If I were you I'd call my local passport office and ask them to be 100% sure.

I'm getting the feeling he's going to make a quick trip to Houston.

The State department site says expidited service takes 3 weeks. If he were driving, sailing or walking across the border...no problem for now. Flying is an entirely different matter.

Lauri, you might want to enlist the aid of your U.S. Senator or Congressperson if they have an office in Houston. Before the notorious backlog, I have used them to get passports in one more quickly than standing in those long lines at the passport agency in D.C.

Thanks for the tip Olivia.

We have a local office for our Senator and Congressman and they have been responsive in the past.

If we still lived in Houston, this would be no big deal, I got my original passport in 2 days by going into the office. Unfortunately DFW is not one of the places government deems important.

Well, it's his problem...like I said this is why I make the travel plans.

There are passport expediters who can walk these things through in a couple of days---for a fee of course. Check your yellow pages or on-line.

Lauri - as a practical matter, he should call a local passport service (I found several doing a google search for 'passport service dallas tx') immediately and see if they can meet his deadline. You are correct - the closest place to do it himself is to see if he can even get an appointment in time at Houston's passport agency. If so, he needs certain documentation and forms ready to go, along with payment for the new passort. For the fee the passport service would charge, it's probably still cheaper than an unplanned trip to Houston.

Cheers, Anne

Our passports expire next July, and the timing will demand that we use expedited service (Scotland in May, then S. Africa in September) if I want to avoid a nervous breakdown. When we went to New Orleans in October, Mark got the incredible idea of just renewing it while we were there; after all, the passport office is directly across the street from Harrah's (diagonally). I checked the website to make an appointment, and discovered that we would have to be traveling within a very short time period or they wouldn't see us. If it wasn't so terribly hot in NOLA that time of year, it could call for another trip down.

Lauri, have him start finding a place and making an appointment tomorrow!

Pam - you can renew them before you go to Scotland if that will save wear & tear on your nerves.

Cheers, Anne

Anne, we may very well do that, we've thought about it. Maybe just after the New Year. I had forgotten that we had that time window, everything seems to be moving so fast lately.

Pam,

I have always heard your passport must be good for at least six month after your return. I have never figured that out, but if that is the case you would have to have it renewed before you leave for Scotland.

He's getting up at 4 am and driving to Houston. Supposedly they will have it to him that day or at least overnight it to him.

again....this is why he doesn't make travel plans

How did this work?

It is pretty easy to get a same day passport in Houston IF you go early in the a.m. AND you bring your trip itinerary. That is a must, and you have to have the $$, of course.

I'm not sure how it worked, he left at 4:15 this morning and I haven't heard from him yet. I think he should be getting to Houston around now.

It worked!!

Steve got to Houston at 9 am, had his appointment at 10 am and should have his new passport in hand by 2:30.

Whew!! :ohmy:

Wow glad he got that taken care of! :app:

Congratulations Lauri. Great work. I wasn't sure it could be done in such a short time.

Pam, Yallcruise is correct. I wouldn't chance going to Scotland in May with a passport that expires in July. The six month rule is pretty standard. For all intents and purposes passports really expire six months before the date on the passport. Tom.

Wow, Lauri, your husband really cut it close! Glad to hear everything worked out.

I agree to always check on the six months. This just happened to Grant's parents last month. They had been in Hong Kong for a few days and were going on to Bali. When they went for their flight HK-Bali, they were turned away as they didn't have 6 months validity remaining on their passports. It all worked out OK as they were able to get their passports renewed by the consulate in HK, but they did have to rearrange plans and spend time dealing with the passports.

Dena

Lauri, I am thrilled that he got it!

We'll definitely renew ours right after the first of the year. I think we had planned to do that, then got into a whirlwind of other activity and that dropped off our radar.

We're going to Scotland in May as well. My passport expires in May, 2008.

I sent my passport request overnight to the office in Dover, DE.

Had a new one back in less than two weeks.

This was in October.

I think the big crunch is over now. Send it to be renewed in January, you'll be fine.