Irish Passport Renewal

Mamamia22 said:

I just saw some stuff online about UK citizens and their passports being declined within 3 months of renewal date but I think it’s Brexit related.

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Yeah, they are no longer EU citizens and so the 3 month rule applies.

I'm actually confused and perhaps very lucky but mine was done in a week. My husband who is British got his renewed within 2 weeks. Admittedly they were not yet expired but it really doesn't take long. I really do think its down to mistakes on both sides. Actually the one thing I would have to give out about is the photo requirement. In my case I got a govt approved photo taken by a photographer rejected ...which I got refunded and yet a photo booth snap (costing peanuts by comparison) was passed with no issue.

My and my wife's passwords expired in February. I renewed them in April on line. Absolutely no drama, and the passports arrived practically overnight, the cards arrived after another day or so.
The only wrinkle is that it kept refusing the initial photo as there was a slight shadow due to overhead lighting. I went outside to a white wall and it accepted them fine.

Made application online last Friday for renewal of our passports. No matter what we did, our own attempts to take photographs failed so we went and got them taken in a chemist shop who specialise in this. Cost for 2 photos was €14 and before you leave they verify your photo is acceptable, give you a code that you put on your passport application form and up pops your pic. Sent off my completed application x 2 with €75 for each. Result of this is we got our passports in registered post this morning. So, 1 working day and we had our 2 passports. Well done to the public service.

I applied for a renewal passport online on Tuesday evening, it was delivered this morning.
Delighted with the turnaround time!

Trying to renew my passport today. A smartphone picture of myself doesn't appear to be satisfactory for the passport office.
Should I just go to a pharmacy or photographer and get a photo taken?
Thanks in advance!

If you're under time pressure maybe you should go to a pharmacy.
You'll get 4 hardcopy photos and a code to enable you to upload one of the photos to the renewal site. No need to self scan the photo.
Expect to pay €11, or maybe a little more for the service. I paid 11 less than a year ago.

RichInSpirit said:

A smartphone picture of myself doesn't appear to be satisfactory for the passport office.

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Did you get someone else to take it? You need to zoom out a little more than you might expect to get an acceptable picture.

I just did this on Monday. I managed to take about 6 photos of myself using the timer option and wedging the phone upright. I shuffled in and out and forward and back (Ohhh hokey cokey) slightly each time. The second one worked on upload and I got the passport today..

We just did it for a grandson, in local Tesco. They have a photo id machine which gives you the 4 required photos and a code to send same automatically to online passport application. The machine won’t process pics until they are acceptable to passport office. Costs €9. Brilliant service.

Last month one of my adult children flew from Dublin to Portugal, and back again, with Aer Lingus with an expired passport for both legs. Then they had to fly home here to the continent and were not let thru by Ryanair as they spotted the passport was out of date. So they had to get to the Dublin passport office, I told them to get there before it opened in case there was a queue, which there was, but they were processed really quickly. There's a photo machine inside, but I told my child to go to the pharmacy close by as they take better photos and we wanted no issues due to the mess they were in. Had the passport by 2.30 pm and they flew home the next morning. This is a costly service though. As I was paying and giving my credit card details I got to speak to someone in the passport office, I'd no idea they could produce actual passports in that office as I thought it was only a separate very secure place. Obviously this is for emergencies only.

Wow, they were lucky. If the expired passport had been noticed in Portugal they would have been stuck there until it was sorted out.

I wish they had been blocked in Dublin, for various parental reasons. Including an argument over getting their passport renewed in February !

Leo said:

Did you get someone else to take it? You need to zoom out a little more than you might expect to get an acceptable picture.

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Yes, got the photo taken in a pharmacy.

Leo said:

Did you get someone else to take it? You need to zoom out a little more than you might expect to get an acceptable picture.

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There are free and paid apps that make it very easy to take acceptable passport photos using a smartphone. This is the free one that I used most recently (this year) for my son's renewal and it took acceptable photos first time.