Don't take my passport yet, please!

October 4, 2011 9:30 AM

Canadian Passport Renewal: If I go down to the Passport Canada office and renew my passport in person, will they take away my old (still valid) passport, leaving me passport-less until the new one arrives?

I'm eligible for and will be using the 'Simplified Renewal Application' process. My passport expires in November, and I have plans to travel to Mexico in December, so obviously I need to renew sooner rather than later.

The hiccup is that sometime soon (in the next two weeks I'm guessing) work will require me to fly into the US - which obviously I need a passport for. Hence, it would be very bad for me to be without one right now. I don't have provable travel plans yet though, so I don't think I'm eligible for the Urgent or Express pick-up.

Does anyone have any experience with renewing their Canadian Passport in person? Do they take away your current passport if it hasn't yet expired?

posted by cgg to travel & transportation around United States (6 answers total)

They will punch holes in the old passport and it will be good until the new one gets to you. My wife and I applied on a Friday afternoon and the new passports came in the mail Tuesday morning.
posted by arse_hat at 9:40 AM on October 4, 2011

They're pretty easygoing about what counts as proof for the urgent pickup -- I went with plane tickets and stuff, and they didn't even ask to look, I would bet a letter from your employer with a "will be going on a business trip the week of X, exact date yet to be determined" note would be enough to get it.

Or you can just wait until after your business trip, and then get the passport afterwards. It gets busier as you get closer to Christmas holidays, though, so I'd probably try to do the first.
posted by jeather at 9:58 AM on October 4, 2011

Yes, they'll take your current passport. (They have to invalidate it- otherwise you'd potentially have two valid passports for a period of time, and it would be way too easy to commit identity fraud.

Take your passport in for updating after you get back from the business trip. Either you'll have time to get it back in the normal process before you go to mexico, or you'll use the express/urgent process, using your Mexico flight as proof.

Stop worrying.
posted by Kololo at 11:22 AM on October 4, 2011

It won't take that long to get your passport anyway. I think I got mine on a renewal after a week.
posted by pised at 12:49 PM on October 4, 2011

> They will punch holes in the old passport and it will be good until the new one gets to you.

Don't they punch 'VOID NUL' into it? They sure did to mine once, and I wasn't about to test my luck crossing a border with it.

Another time they cut the top right corner off all the pages. Both times I got it back. I didn't even have to say 'please'.
posted by matlock expressway at 8:52 PM on October 4, 2011

Just to follow up in case anyone find this via google, they cut the corner off my passport and put a big huge CANCELLED stamp on the first page. I asked if I could use it like that (until it expired) and although they didn't say no specifically, the guy suggested I'd be wasting my time trying.
posted by cgg at 2:45 PM on October 11, 2011