Australian Lost Passport: getting back to Australia [without it]

[eric2011]

...
https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/airlines-air-crew/Documents/app-arrivals-departures-manual.pdf

That document shows the current rules and procedures for airlines and on page 11 it clearly tells the airlines what the procedures are and how to process and check-in the passenger.

Lost Australian Passport

 

[slinky123]

Assuming you have lost it in Australia :

Contact Passport office and report it lost

Reporting lost or stolen passports- Australian Passport Office

Go to passports.gov.au and apply for a new passport.

Apply for a passport

 

[eric2011]

I am in serious stress mode, Sorry

My wife went to NZ last friday to visit family. Scheduled to come home tomorrow on EK 435. She rang me today to say she lost her passport, don't know how but you all know how ladies handbags and purses work ????
She was travelling on a AU passport so after 1 hour on hold to AU consulate she had got nowhere, she contacted EK and was told if she didn't have passport there was no way she could travel. She had a copy of the document, but no, that didn't help. AU consulate told eventually told her she needed to go to consulate and get an emergency passport, will take 4-5 days.

Getting screwed already, long story short, I am flying to AKL tomorrow with her NZ passport, so she can at least come home and we are both coming back tomorrow night.

Does anyone know what is the storey with lost passports while overseas, obviously having a electronic copy is not good enough

 

[eric2011]

Assuming you have lost it in Australia :

Contact Passport office and report it lost

Reporting lost or stolen passports- Australian Passport Office

Go to passports.gov.au and apply for a new passport.

Apply for a passport

Sorry so stressed I stuffed up my original post

 

[Hvr]

Does anyone know what is the storey with lost passports while overseas, obviously having a electronic copy is not good enough

Go to the nearest embassy with two photos and a filled out form. Embassy staff can witness it. A police report that you've lost the passport is also required.

The electronic copy will be handy so they know who you are. Also have sufficient funds to pay for the replacement.

 

[Pushka]

Go to the nearest embassy with two photos and a filled out form. Embassy staff can witness it. A police report that you've lost the passport is also required.

The electronic copy will be handy so they know who you are. Also have sufficient funds to pay for the replacement.

Theyll be back in Australia shortly so should sort it at home.

 

[eric2011]

Go to the nearest embassy with two photos and a filled out form. Embassy staff can witness it. A police report that you've lost the passport is also required.

The electronic copy will be handy so they know who you are. Also have sufficient funds to pay for the replacement.

Yes thanks, thats pretty much what she was told however the emergency passport would take 4-5 days (or so she was told

 

[eric2011]

Theyll be back in Australia shortly so should sort it at home.

Yes I am going over in the morning on EK434, clearing customs and then checking us both in for EK435 back to BNE

 

[slinky123]

Glad to hear you are sorting it out. Nothing worse than losing a passport overseas. When you get your emergency passport be sure to take note of the date in the text opposite the main BIO page. You will need to apply for a new replacement passport ( since emergency has limited validity). Make sure you do that before the date stated, otherwise you will have to pay again.

 

[RooFlyer]

It won't help you, sorry, but my understanding is that a passport is NOT a pre-requisite for entering Australia, for an Australian citizen. For boarding an aircraft overseas, it may be a different story, though, and I suspect the EK agent was just giving the auto-answer to get rid of the caller, but arguing on the phone wouldn't have got anywhere.

A passport is really just an identification document. If you don't have your passport to identify you in the way they expect, it would take longer to get through immigration (you would have to identify yourself another way, to their satisfaction), but I would challenge the notion of "no passport - no entry" (for citizens).

 

[henrus]

It won't help you, sorry, but my understanding is that a passport is NOT a pre-requisite for entering Australia, for an Australian citizen. For boarding an aircraft overseas, it may be a different story, though, and I suspect the EK agent was just giving the auto-answer to get rid of the caller, but arguing on the phone wouldn't have got anywhere.

You are 100% correct here. As an Australian Citizen, you don't need a passport to enter into Australia. It'll take longer and require a lot more checks then the simple smart gate entry but it's entirely possible.

Obviously when you check in your passport is scanned by the airline where it then gets checked against a system called "Advanced Passenger Processing" (Australian passport holders typically are ok otherwise it checks for ETA/Visa's) and sends back an "ok to board" to the airline who then prints your boarding pass. Obviously, when you don't have a passport it's impossible to check in as the airline won't get the automatic ok to board in their system.

It's possible for this to be waived "uplift approval" by border staff in Australia provided that the border staff in the originating country are willing to let you out without a passport then a phone call to Australian immigration will solve the problems with the check-in "ok to fly" system. This approval typically takes a few hours and in theory, if you show up at an airport early enough it can be done on the spot and you'll be able to travel (there are many stories of this happening online).

The whole phone call to get boarding approval is a bit of an out of the box approach which EK obviously isn't very good at. I've heard success with carriers such as NZ, VA and QF so I guess it just depends on who you're flying and the staff on the day.

 

[eric2011]

Thanks, especially the last 2 people, RooFlyer and henrus for the information. The really annoying thing is that when she was away and had problems no one seemed to want to help. The AU Consulate, when they finally answered the phone 64 minutes later told her to something which involved getting in touch with Emirates airport duty manager and then the run around started. Not 1 single person in all of Emirates has heard of this uplift thing and so therefore it doesn't exist.

To cut a long story short we are all sorted now. I flew over yesterday morning with a spare passport and checked her in and flew home last night. Total time spent on New Zealand territory between immigration inbound and immigration outbound = 18 minutes.

The only good thing was at such short notice when booking, ~ 15 hours, Qantas had points awards available on the EK A380, F on the way over and J on the way back + taxes was $215 so the whole exercise didn't cost much financially plus 90000 points which will take me about 2-3 months to make back

The moral of the storey.......Don't lose your passport while travelling

 

[Quickstatus]

@eric2011 , 90000 points lost but countless brownie points gained!

Though with an indeterminate expiry date
Does any one know the T&C attached to brownie points?

 

[Denali]

@eric2011 ..Does any one know the T&C attached to brownie points?

Its like Fight Club.

Husbands are not allowed to mention the brownie points unless the spouse is in the mood to hear about it.

 

[henrus]

Not 1 single person in all of Emirates has heard of this uplift thing and so therefore it doesn't exist.

It's good you've got it all sorted but it just shows how slack emirates in not knowing the current rules. Quite frankly it's unacceptable but I guess that's what happens when you've got a large airline who couldn't care about doing anything different from the ordinary.

https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/airlines-air-crew/Documents/app-arrivals-departures-manual.pdf

That document shows the current rules and procedures for airlines and on page 11 it clearly tells the airlines what the procedures are and how to process and check-in the passenger.

 

[Quickstatus]

If the destination immigration has given the green light, would the airline still be up for a fine/ return flight of said passenger to origin if at the destination for whatever reason the “green light” turns to red on arrival?

...Husbands are not allowed to mention the brownie points unless the spouse is in the mood to hear about it.

Yes as I had suspected. BP are not redeemable for anything.

 

[Boca68]

Glad to hear that you got her home.

I have been through the experience of losing a passport overseas. 2003 in L.A. Like your wife, I had a photocopy of the passport , and went to the consulate in LA, had a new emergency one in 24 hours. So, I was surprised you were told 4 to 5 days. It was stressful, but the consulate staff were brilliant. So much so, I sent an email to the Australian Ambassador in Washington and their boss in L.A. praising both of the staff that helped me. Always remember being told by them that having the copy made it much easier.

Anyway, after all that, the next day my lost passport appeared...

Had fallen out of pocket whilst been driven from LAX to the hotel. Driver found it under the seat a couple of days later when cleaning his car. It was where I thought it was, in his car. But he was unable to be contacted by the company, due to haven taken a few days off to go skiing. Anyway, lesson learnt. Bought the driver a bottle of wine to say thanks,because I remembered talking to him about the Napa Valley (which was where I was going in a few days)and he expressed his love of the place.

 

[henrus]

If the destination immigration has given the green light, would the airline still be up for a fine/ return flight of said passenger to origin if at the destination for whatever reason the “green light” turns to red on arrival?

In the OP's situation that wouldn't have happened as it was an Australian returning to Australia (not possible for border force to reject/not let the person into the country). Countries don't typically give airlines approval to "uplift" a passenger without a travel document unless it's their own citizen traveling home so I doubt a red light on arrival situation would ever happen. But if it did, the airline would most likely have to return the passenger but as prior approval had been given I doubt any fine would be issued.

Fines for airlines typically are around $5000 so they want to be 100% sure that you're allowed entry before they board you on the flight. In the rare event, they get approval and you're denied upon entry then the fine can either be waived or the airline can appeal. For an airline like Emirates, they wouldn't be willing to take that risk (as it's more difficult for them to keep up with regulations in the 75 countries they fly to) whereas QF and VA, especially across the Tasman, are.

 

[jgm]

I lost my passport in the US a few years ago. We were in FL and had a DL flight to LAX and the VA to MEL. The Australian consulate was absolutely useless, and didn't even seem to know where offices were - wanted me to go to DC and wait a min 2 days to get an emergency passport. We decided that we would just wing it, and if necessary would stay a few days in LA to get an emergency passport. DL allowed us to fly to LA with just my Aust driver's licence as ID, but wouldn't check bags through. With a delayed arrival and having to collect bags at LA, we didn't have time to make the VA MEL flight, but the VA check in staff were excellent. They put us on the following day's flight to SYD (we could have waited an extra day to get the next MEL flight), found us a motel for the night, and told us to come back as soon as check in opened the next day. The next day, they spent around 30 minutes on the phone arranging our Australian entry with border staff. When we arrived in SYD, the border security held us up for about 15 minutes (presumably checking details) and that was the end of it.

I think that if the Delta staff in FL had been a bit more conversant with Australian arrangements, we could have had it all sorted out there.

 

[eric2011]

@eric2011 , 90000 points lost but countless brownie points gained!

Though with an indeterminate expiry date
Does any one know the T&C attached to brownie points?

In this particular instance, the BPEC (Brownie Points Entitlement Certificate) comes with an extremely long use-by-date plus it has an extension clause in the T&C's