That’s the sad news that I learnt this week following an unfortunate incident that essentially involved me not checking the pockets of a pair of trousers.
Interestingly, if you need a replacement in a rush and you check the relevant section of the Direct.gov website, you are told that the Premium one-day service is not available for replacement passports.
In my case, a forthcoming trip meant that timescales were tight and I opted for the one-week service. But that still means an interview in a passport office. And when I phoned their hotline, the London office had no available interview slots in the period I needed to get to it.
So it was off to sunny Peterborough, where the friendly staff were very efficient, and my application was swiftly processed. Then – very surprisingly – I was asked if I wanted the same-day service. That is, the service the website said wasn’t available.
Given all the fun of having to be around when a courier delivered the new passport, I said yes. And just over three and a half hours later, I had my new passport.
I thought it was worth sharing this information in case you, dear reader, ever face something similar.
PS A certain DJ of my acquaintance tells me that he’s put his passport through the washing machine on no fewer than three separate occasions!