Desperate holidaymakers take their own DECKCHAIRS to join hours-long queues at passport offices as they scramble to get travel documents amid huge application backlog
- Britons have been bringing their deckchairs for queues to get their passports
- Dozens have been showing up hours before the passport offices even open
- Staffing issues, a Covid backlog and a summer holiday rush is causing delays
Huge queues of Britons desperate to make their holidays have formed outside passport offices ahead of the Jubilee weekend, with several bringing deckchairs for their long waits.
Passport offices in London, Liverpool, and Newport have all seen long lines of frustrated people waiting in all weather trying to get their travel documents ahead of the summer holidays.
Some ignored calls to stay away if they didn’t have an appointment, concerned they may miss their holidays with reported waits of up to two weeks for a booking.
Dozens of people have been arriving at passport offices hours before they even open in a bid to get their documents quickly.
A post-Covid rush for people to renew or get new passports combined with staffing issues has lead to massive delays.
Though reports show that ministers were aware of the growing passport problem as far back as six months ago.
Holidaymakers lined up outside Liverpool passport office today brought deck chairs with them (pictured), knowing they would be in for a long wait
People camped out the passport office in Liverpool with chairs hoping to get an appointment, but barely moved for hours at a time
The huge queues have been caused by a surge in demand as people delayed applying for passports during the pandemic due to travel restrictions (pictured: People queue outside the Liverpool HM Passport Office)
Opera singer Charlotte Hoather, 28, applied for a passport nearly seven weeks ago after she was invited to a casting call for an opera in Germany.
She travelled to Liverpool from London hoping to collecting it, she told The Times: ‘We’ve sat here through the pouring rain this morning, and there were a lot more people sat with us this morning who have lost out on the chance to go because of childcare and work commitments which is rather sad.’
She is due to fly out on June 8 to a final audition for a performance of the Coronation of Poppaea.
Joseph Jones, 28, and his family are due to travel to Menorca next week for his children’s first holiday.
He arrived at the Liverpool passport office at 6.45am yesterday, having not received his son’s passport which he applied for on March 10.
He said called the situation ‘distressing and upsetting’ and said there were people queuing from 4am while others brought deckchairs.
Desperate holidaymakers have said that some people have queued outside a passport office from as early as 4am, while others have had to endure five hour waits
One man was so tired of checking hourly for appointments to the passport office that he created a computer script to do it for him.
Max Kruger, 31, from London, then made a Twitter account for the script which automatically checks for available slots and tweets them out.
A Home Office spokeswoman said people should allow ten weeks. ‘The overwhelming majority of applications are completed within ten weeks, with the latest figures showing 90 per cent were completed within six weeks. But we cannot compromise security checks and people should apply with plenty of time prior to travelling,’ she added.
A growing army of work-from-home, minimum wage contractors brought in to answer calls and ease the strain are only making matters worse through poor service and lack of training, say insiders
Some of the frustrated customers who have been struggling to get through on phone lines and turning up to offices have been abusing staff and demanded to be seen, according to whistleblowers and union leaders.
‘Our members are being jeered into work by the public who are queuing because they can’t get through on telephone lines,’ said general secretary of the PCS trade union, Mark Serwotka – a point confirmed by worried Passport Office workers who spoke to The Mail on Sunday anonymously.
One Passport Office worker said staff were being threatened and abused both by people turning up in person and callers on the phone.
‘People have huge concerns because they are going in and out of work and they are being jeered at,’ the source said. ‘There are hundreds of people turning up from six o’ clock in the morning.
‘We heard how someone slept overnight outside the Durham office last week.
‘Usually the only way you have ever been able to get into a passport office is to book an appointment and go through an airport-style security system.
‘Now they have started sending people to deal with people outside which is disgraceful because you are putting staff at risk – and these are queries which should have been dealt with elsewhere.’
There has been a large increase in the number of fast-track passport applications this year, as people rush ahead of the summer holidays
Staff at passport offices have also warned that the situation is likely to deteriorate before it gets better.
Travellers’ concerns over passport delays were so high, they paid a total of £5.4million in April alone to use the fast-track application, The Times reported .
Labour MP Nick Smith obtained figures from the Home Office showing that 44,386 people used the fast-track service last month, compared to 21,124 in December. It costs £142 for an adult and a £122 for a child.
Over the next six months, another 240,000 one-week applications are expected, which will see applicants pay out an extra £29.2million.
Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper said: ‘People shouldn’t have to shell out more money during a cost of living crisis to speed up the process. It should be Priti Patel’s job to get a grip and sort this out.
‘[The Home Secretary] knew more than six months ago that the Passport Office was having problems but did nothing to prevent the complete misery to families across the country.’
Calls to the passport advice line are handled by staff recruited through Teleperformance, a French outsourcing giant that has received government contracts worth more than £430million since the early days of the pandemic.
Teleperformance is believed to be hiring 500 extra staff in the next few weeks.
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