You've packed your bags, you've booked your cab to
the airport, you've checked your passport and - oh my God! - it's
expired.
First thing: Get down on your knees and give thanks
you live in the Bay Area, one of 13 metropolitan areas where it's
possible to get a U.S. passport issued or renewed the day you apply.
Normally it takes six weeks through the mail; those
in a serious hurry can pay an extra $35 for two-week expedited service.
Phone the San Francisco Passport Agency at (415)
538-2700 and follow the voice mail instructions. You will be required to
tell them when you're planning to leave the country (don't lie; they'll
ask to see your airline tickets) and, based upon that date, you will be
given an appointment to come into their office on Hawthorne Street in
downtown San Francisco office, fill out the paperwork and receive your
new or renewed passport.
Do not show up without an appointment, waving your
expired passport in the air and shrieking hysterically. The guards won't
be impressed.
Devin Jindrich's vacation was saved by this service.
The 30-year-old Berkeley resident and his fiancee were "just
shopping around (on the Web), and we found these really cheap tickets to
Amsterdam. We got them and I realized my passport had expired."
Jindrich phoned the passport office and told them he
would be flying out the following Tuesday. He was delighted to be
granted an appointment for noon.
Jindrich showed up an hour early to fill out the
application form, available from a box outside the passport office
entrance on the fifth floor at 95 Hawthorne St. He brought the required
items: two 2-by-2-inch photos of himself, his old passport, his airline
ticket, itinerary and checkbook.
The same fast-track service is available for
first-time passport applicants,
who must produce proof of U.S. citizenship (a birth
certificate or, for immigrants, naturalization or citizenship papers) in
place of an old passport.
Jindrich had picked a quiet day. Only a handful of
applicants were inside the large waiting room when he was permitted to
pass through the metal detector and stroll straight to a check-in
window. He was assigned a number and was directed to sit down and wait
for an available clerk.
Before he could reach a chair, his number was
announced on a public address system and a lighted sign told him to go
to window No. 8. There, Jindrich told passport clerk Vivian Najaro he
needed a passport as soon as he could get one.
The process took less then three minutes. Najaro
looked over his papers and accepted a check for $75.
"If he had done this six weeks ago, he could
have got it for $40," Najaro told me as I peered over Jindrich's
shoulder.
"Six weeks ago I didn't know a lot about my
life," he replied with a smile.
Najaro instructed Jindrich to return at 2 p.m. the
following day to pick up his passport. She said applicants who appear on
the day they are departing and those who travel more than 200 miles to
keep an appointment can get their passports on the same day they apply.
Or not.
"Sometimes we have to say no," she said.
That's because applicants show up without the necessary documents.
Photocopies are not acceptable; you've got to bring the originals.
While making an appointment at the passport office is
the cheapest way to obtain a last-minute renewal (or new passport), it's
not always the easiest. Some people prefer to use a commercial service
like Travisa, which will deal with the passport office on your behalf -
for a price.
"We can do it in a day if we need to," said
Pete Kirchgessner, manager of the Travisa office at 41 Sutter St., Suite
215, San Francisco 94104 (phone: 415-837-0771 or 800-421-5468; fax:
415-837-0775). Travisa also handles mail applications. Customers can
have the new passports delivered to their doors within 24 hours of the
time the application (with photos and documentation) arrives at Travisa,
said Kirchgessner.
The service is popular with people who live out of
town or who can't afford to take time off work to stand in line at the
passport office.
Using a service like Travisa almost triples the
passport cost. On top of the $75 passport fee, Travisa charges $134 for
a 24-hour turn-around (plus cost of overnight package delivery each
way), $69 for one week and $49 for one- month service.
Travisa is a national operation, so it's a great deal
for people in, say, Wichita, Kan., or Laramie, Wyo., who need passports
in a hurry. Other Travisa offices are located in New York, Chicago,
Puerto Rico and at company headquarters in Washington, D.C. The
corporate Web site is www.travisa.com.
For your procrastinating cousins far away, the State
Department's other same-day-service passport offices are located in
Boston; Chicago; Honolulu; Houston; Los Angeles; Miami; New Orleans; New
York; Philadelphia; Seattle; Stamford, Conn.; and Washington D.C.
