Are passports a rip off?

M

MrKeane

Registered User
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257
€75 for a new passport, I know they are valid for 10 years and its only €7.50 a year but thats not the point.

What do people think?
 
The pricing is debatable, it's the service offered in the Dublin office that kills me. I renewed passports in overseas consolates without any bother and very quickly. When I left my passport into the Dublin office it still hadn't arrived after the 6 weeks processing time, so I had to go in and hound some inefficient and lazy civil servants. Makes me want to immigrate just to get a renewed passport.
 
MrKeane said:
€75 for a new passport, I know they are valid for 10 years and its only €7.50 a year but thats not the point.

What do people think?
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I think it's yet another stealth tax.

€75 must be way in excess of the cost of providing it.
 
Just be thankful it isn't €175 as they could probably charge anything they like due to the importance if the PP!
 
For comparison purposes. Adult passports only. Not sure of validity period - maybe 10 years is the norm?

USA US$97 ~ €70
[broken link removed] GBP£66 ~ €97
AUD$200 ~ €125
CAD$87 ~ €60
Germany €59
 
ClubMan said:
For comparison purposes. Adult passports only. Not sure of validity period - maybe 10 years is the norm?

USA US$97 ~ €70
[broken link removed] GBP£66 ~ €97
AUD$200 ~ €125
CAD$87 ~ €60
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Still, does it justify the price being so high? I don't know...
 
ClubMan said:
You mean the fee charged by any country? The Irish fee is not outrageous when compared to the ones above.
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The fees of all the countries do seem very high. But I meant the price of only the Irish passport. Does your previous post justify the Irish governments need for such a big fee? (i.e. just because other countries charge outragous prices, do we need to follow suit? Or is it some kind of govnt. policy thing which they (the irish govnt.) are obliged to follow. And likewise for the other countries.
 
€75 for a 10 year passport seems comparable to or below the costs in some other countries. A more extensive lists of passport charges worldwide would be interesting to see. I noticed that the UK passport site makes it clear that they don't (and cannot by law) make a profit on passport fees so I wonder if the same applies here and in other countries? Given the labour, quality of materials and anti-forgery technology required to produce a passport €75 for a 10 year document doesn't seem outrageous to me personally.
 
ClubMan said:
€75 for a 10 year document doesn't seem outrageous to me personally.
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Not forgetting the scores of euros spent on "incorrect" digital photos. Because of minor thing like, blurr, smile, hair covering forhead etc.. Some of them just get rediculous.
 
Sn@kebite said:
Not forgetting the scores of euros spent on "incorrect" digital photos. Because of minor thing like, blurr, smile, hair covering forhead etc.. Some of them just get rediculous.
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Last time I got a passport done the photo rules seemed clear enough to me and were easy to adhere to to avoid having to get them done more than once or having the application rejected (and this was for an 8 month old!).
 
Certainly in comparison to a driving licence (also valid for 10 years), it doesn't seem good value but it is a more important document. I don't have a problem with €75 for 10 years. Also: the price has not gone up much in the last few years. When I got my last passport (1998), it was around the £50 mark.
 
ClubMan said:
Last time I got a passport done the photo rules seemed clear enough to me and were easy to adhere to to avoid having to get them done more than once or having the application rejected (and this was for an 8 month old!).
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It could be a power trip on behalf of the administrators. But my mum was rejected twice, once for smiling (even though she wasn't and was on Prozac at that time) [maybe that would make you smile? I don't know]
And the second time it was still for petty hair coming down her forehead, just annoying. that's all!


Would it not be very difficult to reject a baby picture as it will look pretty much the same no matter how many times the pictures are taken? And what are the chances of an 8 month old hijacking a plane? So maybe they're just liberal with baby pictures?
 
Sn@kebite said:
Would it not be very difficult to reject a baby picture as it will look pretty much the same no matter how many times the pictures are taken?
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Have you ever seen an 8 month old and how their expressions change from one minute to the next? Thankfully we had a helpful and patient photographer (one of the places in an amusement arcade or cyber café on O'Connell Street).
And what are the chances of an 8 month old hijacking a plane? So maybe they're just liberal with baby pictures?
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Doubt it. What about kidnapping/child abduction?
 
ClubMan said:
Have you ever seen an 8 month old and how their expressions change from one minute to the next? Thankfully we had a helpful and patient photographer (one of the places in an amusement arcade or cyber café on O'Connell Street).
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well a 2 year old yes it is true lol
ClubMan said:
What about kidnapping/child abduction?
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would it be easy to notice a baby on the street, and compare it to a face photo you've seen on the news? Would you not be better off showing home photos of the child rather that a PP one? (Like little Madeline McCann) I'd never recognise her if i only saw a PP photo.

Hope im not taking this off-topic.
 
I liked the story about a woman in the UK who received a refusal for her baby's passport photo on the grounds that 'the baby is too shiny'
 
I just got a new one delivered today...posted on the 29th June...so 8 business days including delivery....pretty good turnaround given the time of year. It was Passport Express with An Post and cost €80.

Photo is now scanned in and a digitally readable representation of my mush embossed on it too.

Photo is very dark though so just flashing your photo-page at an immigration officer won't work anymore and they'll 'have' to take a closer look. Wonder if that's deliberate as my father-in-law had the same result with his recent passport ?
 
My point was simply that passports are used for more than just the type of security situation that you mentioned above and so I cannot see the passport office being casual about what photos are acceptable no matter how young the applicant.
 
ClubMan said:
My point was simply that passports are used for more than just the type of security situation that you mentioned above and so I cannot see the passprot office being casual about what photos are acceptable no matter how young the applicant.
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Point taken.
 
The NCT is €49 and in fairness includes a full health check for your car and about 20 minutes of a mechanics time. A passport presumably is just a scanning procedure and takes mabye 10 minutes, or is there more to it than meets the eye?

Perhaps for your first passprt a €75 fee but for a straightforward renewal it could be say €50 as they should already have your identification details, passport number etc. available?
 
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