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Oh and forgot to add they took payment for the conversion to adult (£26.50) and the upgrade service (£125) over the phone! Cannot deny that a cynical thought crossed my mind as to whether this is all an additional revenue generating scam!
We did receive the passport through the upgrade service in time for the flight. The Royal Mail delivered the adult application and photos on Wednesday morning and I received a call from the Liverpool office early afternoon. They pushed the application through and it was printed the next day in Newport, collected in the afternoon. Very stressful process when you are heading into flights and holidays being cancelled knowing there is a fairly complex issue with your application i.e. needing to restart from the beginning!
A few observations from the process:
I spoke to four seemingly knowledgeable and understanding people who all said they had put my case through for an urgent call back from thee upgrade team. The only time actually I received an a call back was when the last person putting me for a call back confirmed that they had added my flight date on the system (noting she was surprised her previous colleagues hadn’t done this) – even though it has been discussed on every call with each of them. I would check this is being completed when you speak to the customer management teams or progression teams. I have to add that by the time I spoke with this final customer management lady I was getting upset (shaky voice and only just about holding it together not to cry!) and she did say she had put an ‘alert’ on the case as she could tell it was causing distress. I think there is something in this ‘alert’ for unlocking access to the upgrade team, other people on the forum have reported similar and there have been references to it in other discussions I had with the progression teams.
Another point of note, I only received an automated response to my upgrade email sent to Liverpool when I was 72 hours away from the flight. I very specifically only wrote ‘Flight 25th June’. I am not sure if it was the 72 hours element or the simple title of the email but I had never received one until that point. They are definitely using some sort of screening via the email titles with use of capitals or not/flight date so I would suggest following exactly what you are told to write.
Once you do get a call back from upgrade, reviewing the forum, I would say they do on the whole get your passport sorted but would suggest escalating hard at five days before flight to give yourself the best chance heading into the 72/48 hours prior with as much on your system as possible.
Happy to advise on anything else from my experience if needed.
Another update, not sure if it is helpful. I called again Sunday and got through to progression. They told me a form had been sent 15th June (received 21st), it was just another application form for an adult passport. She advised not to send it back oddly but wait until the upgrade team called – interestingly she said the upgrade team don’t work on Sundays so I couldn’t be put through. She put an ‘Alert’ on my records and someone did actually call on Monday from Liverpool upgrade (first time having been called).
They refused to take a scanned copy of the form and said they needed new passport photos as well as the other ones were digital and they couldn’t access them!? I was advised to get an application form from the post office (as the form they posted to me hadn’t arrived at this stage), which we did and sent recorded guaranteed next day before 1 to the Liverpool address they gave. Guess what… Royal Mail still have it in the depot 24 hours after the guaranteed delivery time. Seriously losing hope – 72 hours out from the flight now.
They also said they couldn’t take payment for the upgrade over the phone until they got the form.
I can’t understand why the processes sound different?Any advice gratefully received.
Could I check if everyone gets an acknowledgement after emailing the upgrade teams? I have not received one from the Liverpool office, but I did from the Newport office? Would be interested to know if anyone has been contacted by upgrade without receiving an acknowledgement email?
That’s practically the same timelines as our application. Very interesting that you have been told something completely different and great that they seem to be saying they will progress it. At this stage I’d take anything they offered, we are 7 days from flights and nothing back from them at all. Applied to Newport but apparently the application is with Liverpool now.
Hi, I have spoken to them a couple of times now as we went into upgrade on Sunday. The last two people said someone from the upgrade team will call and ask for additional payment, which they can take over the phone. They said they will then change it to an adult passport. I have been rather skeptical and pressed that I thought there must be more to it than that and both times they said it would just be the extra payment needed. The two people I’ve spoken to are a level above the initial call team and web chat team and seemed to be quite sure this was all that was needed. I think they are ‘gatekeeping’ the upgrade team to stop them being bombarded with incoming calls so they can manage the outgoing calls. Still waiting even though I have been told someone will contact in 48 and 24 hours.
Just a short update. I received an email from the customer management team from an email enquiry I sent. This response said my daughter will need to complete a new form for an adult passport and someone will be in touch.
Sadly, they had noted the wrong date of application and also called my daughter by another name in the email.
This is now the third conflicting piece of information we have received about what is meant to happen. I hope we can help each other through this by sharing the information and hopefully how we get a solution 🙁
I had the same double acknowledgment of documents being received and the application went into processing about 2 weeks later. I would think this might be an early warning sign that the application is not going to proceed in the digital route?
I have completed a web chat where they said I needed to pay extra to make it an adult passport but I needed to call the assistance line as they couldn’t arrange this. I didn’t feel the person on the chat was that knowledgeable. I called the number and got through to someone who said as long as the application was received on a date that was at least three weeks prior to my daughter turning 16 it would progress as a child passport as that was the cut off. He seemed more knowledgeable and sent an email to the ‘progression team’ to explain the situation and I presume escalate it. I haven’t heard back and it is well outside the 48 hour – 72 hour commitment to respond back.
I have submitted an online form raising the question but am not hopeful. If anyone has any further advice on how to achieve contact with someone who can take the query forwards it would be very gratefully received.
I am in the same situation. The application has just been placed in processing so I understand this to be the manual rather than digital route.
Reviewing the forum this does not seem good news time wise. We travel on 7th July.
Does anyone know if they will issue the child passport as the application was accepted more than 3 weeks before they turned 16?
Does anyone have experience of how you access the upgrade service if we get to the two week prior to travel mark?
