Ordinary Gweilo

Having finally caught up with the story about changes to the way British passports are being issued, the SCMP are not letting go.

Local jobs to go as Britain closes passport operation

Keith Wallis
Dec 07, 2011

Up to 24 staff working at the British consulate in Hong Kong will be made redundant when all passport operations move back to Britain in a revamp of how passports are handled.  They are among 166 people working in the seven regional passport processing centres around the world, who are likely to lose their jobs when the centres close.

No date for the redundancies has been announced, but Britain’s Identity & Passport Service is aiming to have all applications handled in Britain by 2014.

Jo McPhail, head of the overseas passport management unit at Britain’s Foreign Office, said: "The centres will close and most will lose their jobs. Almost all are locally employed staff." During a visit to Hong Kong last week, she said people were fully aware they would face the sack. "We have been honest with them," McPhail said, adding people would be "treated fairly" and helped with future employment.

Those affected are involved in checking and verifying applications for new and replacement passports and sending documents to Britain.

Since August, new British passports have been issued in Britain and sent to Hong Kong by courier, although applications can still be made in person at the consulate. Because passports are cancelled as soon as the new application is made, and new passports can take up to four weeks to arrive, the change – highlighted by the Sunday Morning Post – is leaving British citizens marooned in Hong Kong.

Well, yes, but this change was introduced early last year.  The dozy journalists appear to have become aware of the story by reading a letter in their own paper last Monday:

Renewing UK passport a costly chore

Beware the new and improved efficient passport renewal process at the British consulate.

Expect to spend about two hours waiting to be told that your photographs are rejected (two teeth showing in my case), renewal will take four weeks (it used to be one week), and the cost, at GBP200 (HK$2,420), is more than double the previous price.

The good news is that if you have to travel during the processing period, you can obtain an emergency travel document valid for one trip only and costing GBP100 each time. Of course, you are again required to queue up for this privilege and not earlier than one day before you need to travel.

This system is inefficient and not user-friendly.

Bryan Carter, Pok Fu Lam

On Sunday came this:

Danger of hold-ups on British passports

Thousands may be left in limbo after rule changes on renewals mean applicants are waiting up to four weeks, prompting calls for ‘express service’ in HK

Keith Wallis
Dec 04, 2011

Thousands of British passport holders in Hong Kong and on the mainland face being marooned because of little-known changes in renewal procedures.  Regulations introduced last August mean that the applications are dealt with in Hong Kong but the passports are issued from Britain.

Little known?  Maybe to SCMP newshounds.  And some of the change came in long before August.

Previous passports are cancelled as soon as the person applies for renewal, and the new passports are taking up to four weeks to arrive.

That means business people across Asia can be stranded and unable to travel while they wait.

One Hong Kong businessman was forced to spend HK$15,000 travelling to London to renew his passport or risk losing key deals in China and India because the Hong Kong processing centre could not guarantee the new passport would arrive before he travelled.

The regulations are also severely affecting British passport holders who commute between Hong Kong and the mainland on an almost daily basis. They have to renew their 10-year passports as often as every 10 months because they are full.

Officials in London say the move was prompted by security concerns and the need to save money.

Maybe more of the latter than the former.