Passport fees Version 11 Her Majesty’s Passport Office policy on passport application and delivery fees and how to process fees when examining passport applications Page 1 of 56 Published for Home Office staff on 13 July 2020 Contents Contents ..................................................................................................................... 2 About this guidance .................................................................................................... 6 Contacts ................................................................................................................. 6 Publication .............................................................................................................. 6 Changes from last version of this guidance ............................................................ 6 Fees policy summary ................................................................................................. 7 Overseas passport applications .............................................................................. 7 Fee refunds ............................................................................................................ 7 Premium or Fast Track applications ....................................................................... 8 When customers must pay the fee ......................................................................... 9 ‘Gratis’ fees ............................................................................................................. 9 How to handle courier and postage fees: RM Special Delivery ............................. 9 Diplomatic service members ............................................................................. 10 Passport fees for non-standard applications ............................................................ 11 Diplomatic and official passports .......................................................................... 11 Emergency travel documents ............................................................................... 11 FCO-issued ETDs ............................................................................................. 11 HM Passport Office-issued ETDs ...................................................................... 12 Prisoners .............................................................................................................. 12 Specimen passports, including passports in fictitious names .............................. 12 HM armed forces .................................................................................................. 12 How to deal with HM armed forces fees ............................................................ 12 Payments by cheque ..................................................................................... 12 Declined or invalid payments ......................................................................... 13 Overpayments ............................................................................................... 13 Refunds ......................................................................................................... 13 How customers can pay ........................................................................................... 14 UK applications ..................................................................................................... 14 Overseas applications .......................................................................................... 14 If you receive cash in the post for an overseas application ............................... 14 Block applications ................................................................................................. 15 How to check the fee ................................................................................................ 16 Checking and correcting the service type ............................................................. 16 Page 2 of 56 Published for Home Office staff on 13 July 2020 Checking and correcting the service level on counter applications ...................... 16 Checking the fee on an application submitted through Check and Send ............. 17 Partnership Liaison teams ................................................................................. 17 Frequent Traveller passports ............................................................................ 17 Errors ................................................................................................................ 17 Checking the fee on an overseas application submitted through a Local Service 18 Local Services that accept mandates ................................................................ 18 Local Services that accept cash payments ....................................................... 18 Fee not collected ........................................................................................... 19 ‘UK delivery’ tick box ............................................................................................. 19 British overseas territories applications ................................................................ 19 How to process counter payments ........................................................................... 20 Role of the counter receptionist ............................................................................ 20 Role of the counter front office examiner .............................................................. 20 Customer has paid the fee ................................................................................ 20 Customer has not paid the fee .......................................................................... 21 Taking payment for emergency travel document applications when the system is down .............................................................................................................. 21 Role of the counter back office examiner .............................................................. 21 Reallocating fees ...................................................................................................... 23 How to reallocate fees .......................................................................................... 23 Upgrades .................................................................................................................. 25 How to process fee upgrades ............................................................................... 25 Free of charge (‘gratis’) passport applications ......................................................... 27 HM Passport Office errors and internal processes ............................................... 27 Crises, emergencies and other incidents .............................................................. 28 Customer’s circumstances .................................................................................... 28 Free of charge (gratis) service fees ...................................................................... 29 How to process ‘gratis’ applications ......................................................................... 30 Gratis-ing an application on the system ................................................................ 30 Gratis-ing reissues when HM Passport Office is investigating non-delivery of passport ................................................................................................................ 30 Fee refunds .............................................................................................................. 31 Refunds on request .............................................................................................. 31 Passport fees .................................................................................................... 31 Other costs ........................................................................................................ 31 Discretionary refunds ............................................................................................ 32 Page 3 of 56 Published for Home Office staff on 13 July 2020 Refunds without request ....................................................................................... 32 No refunds ............................................................................................................ 33 Service element fee .......................................................................................... 34 How we refund ...................................................................................................... 34 Who we refund ..................................................................................................... 34 How to do refunds .................................................................................................... 36 Refunds on the system ......................................................................................... 36 Overseas postal applications ................................................................................ 36 Tiered Application Service refunds ....................................................................... 37 Counter service fee refunds .................................................................................. 37 Processing the counter service fee refund ........................................................ 37 How to refund if there has been a system failure .............................................. 38 CSMT TAS refunds ..............................................................................................