OK, so a friend of mine needed me, at no notice, to countersign his son's passport application, for which (I discovered when I'd nearly completed the form) I needed my passport number. Where's my passport? I don't know. Must have put it down somewhere.

So, is there any way of finding it out without having it to hand? I know, why don't I ring the Passport Office Information Line?

When you ring the Passport Office Information Line, you get a recorded bloke talking incredibly slowly, saying "For advice on <list of about ten things read really slowly>, call the Passport Office Information Info Line <no, I swear> on **** ******. Calls cost £1.50 per minute."

So I ring the Passport Office Information Info Line, and there's this same bloke, reading equally slowly, at £1.50 a minute, a list of exactly what to do in all of the ten information-seeking scenarios he mentioned on the other line. He keeps saying "Address and telephone numbers of the relevant operators will be given in a few moments."

Then, after about four minutes, the line suddenly goes dead.

Fucking useless fucking cunt-faced cunts.

I still don't know where I've put my passport. In the end, I rang (a) a colleague I'd faxed a photocopy to before my UAE trip, and (b) the hotel I'd stayed in in Maastricht, and got the number to my friend just in time.

But, I mean, you know, what the fuck? Premium lines where they talk at half speed and you never get a chance to talk to an actual person? If I'd wanted that I'd have called one of those numbers Nishlord posted.

We pay these bastards you know.

Last time I'd lost my passport it had fallen behind the PC after I'd scanned it in to send a copy to someone... Maybe it's there?

As for the phone lines, yes they're absurd, I suppose they'd argue they're speaking slowly so you don't miss any important information while you're paying for it.

Sounds like a scene out of a Terry Gilliam movie.

Another thing I hate about the passport office is that they still have that regulation where you have to get your application countersigned by, you know, a vicar or a doctor or a teacher or a solicitor or something. Which is completely anachronistic and unrealistic. Loads of people these days live their lives without knowing anyone in those professions. Last time I had to get mine done, I needed to get Mrs Grundy, who is a qualified doctor, to countersign mine. Which was absolutely brilliant of her, and otherwise I'd have been fucked. (The irony being that she's Romanian by birth.)

I'd have sorted you out, mate. If I was able to lay my hand on my passport.

Wyatt Earp wrote:

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I'd have sorted you out, mate. If I was able to lay my hand on my passport.

Hah. OK, next time I lose mine, you'll be the first port of call.

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you know, a vicar or a doctor or a teacher or a solicitor or something. Which is completely anachronistic and unrealistic. Loads of people these days live their lives without knowing anyone in those professions

I would hazard a guess that not that many people applying for passports live their lives without ever knowing a teacher. Of course, whether they're still in touch with one when they need their application completed is an entirely seperate matter.

will dance for food wrote:

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you know, a vicar or a doctor or a teacher or a solicitor or something. Which is completely anachronistic and unrealistic. Loads of people these days live their lives without knowing anyone in those professions

I would hazard a guess that not that many people applying for passports live their lives without ever knowing a teacher. Of course, whether they're still in touch with one when they need their application completed is an entirely seperate matter.

Adult lives then, whatever. You know what I meant. People move away from where they grew up.

"So, boy, you expect me to sign this, do you? Don't think I don't know who put drawing-pins on my chair in 1978."

Just because you lowlife "Gentlemen" of the Press and associated trades are, in society's eyes, no cleaner than a weasel and so must rely on the good offices of we fine, upstanding professional classes to verify that the sordid little cameo presented to the Passport Office is in fact not, as it appears, a boss-eyed escapee from Bedlam (doubtless driven insane by persistent masturbation), but is in fact a sane, healthy human being (no matter how ill it behooves the description) should not be a reason for you to complain. Rather, you should rejoice that we are willing to lend our signatures to aid in your determination to leave this great country of ours, probably to scuttle off to some debauch with your favoured catamites in some rural backwater in Eastern Europe.

Harsh but fair.

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you have to get your application countersigned by, you know, a vicar or a doctor or a teacher or a solicitor or something

We've just had this stupidity lifted. Now it's anyone who's known you for at least five years.

WornOldMotorbike wrote:

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you have to get your application countersigned by, you know, a vicar or a doctor or a teacher or a solicitor or something

We've just had this stupidity lifted. Now it's anyone who's known you for at least five years.

Enigmatic drifters just can't get an even break.

He was dead anyway, so he wasn't really in line for a passport. Plus, he would have just shot the Customs officials if they got in his way.

Being a not very good accountant I will happily countersign passport applications without charging a fee.