Passport Renewal / Application - Time Taken?

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At Australia Post I was informed on enquiry a renewed passport would take 'six to eight weeks'.

Submitting an application, the same clerk said 'six weeks'.

I lodged it at Post on Tuesday 29 March. It arrived today (Tuesday 19 April 2022, the first business day after Easter).

Having it come in 13 business days is excellent. It suggests the extra staff put on by the Federal Government have seen (some?) processing times rapidly decrease. Pleasing.

As many know, first time applications take longer. I know others in this situation so will enquire.

However, DC3's advice to get in as early as possible is sound.
 
Yikes! I sent mine in at AusPost 3 weeks ago. Still "under assessment". Does this mean DFAT have received it? Hopefully I'll get it by the end of next week.
 
I decided to call the passport office despite the fact that I had heard that the passport office outsourced its phone calls to Centrelink. I waited for 1 hour and 25 minutes before the call was answered and I think the operator was having a bad day. I tried to be chill, even when she asked me to wait while there was a yelling match about another passport. She then said she would put a message on my daughter's notes saying that I had called, which reminded me of the type of stuff I used to say in call centres when there was nothing I could do.
All in all, I understand that there are a lot of applications at the moment but this was entirely predictable. We don't leave for over 7 weeks still so hopefully, we will get it before we go or they will provide a refund. My daughter has another passport, the only reason I renewed the Australian passport was to minimise arguments at check-in where they would try to tell me she has to leave on her Australian passport. The advice is you "should" leave on your Australian passport and I figured someone in a power rush would interpret "should" as a must.
 
Melburnian1 said:
At Australia Post I was informed on enquiry a renewed passport would take 'six to eight weeks'.

Submitting an application, the same clerk said 'six weeks'.

I lodged it at Post on Tuesday 29 March. It arrived today (Tuesday 19 April 2022, the first business day after Easter).

Having it come in 13 business days is excellent. It suggests the extra staff put on by the Federal Government have seen (some?) processing times rapidly decrease. Pleasing.

As many know, first time applications take longer. I know others in this situation so will enquire.

However, DC3's advice to get in as early as possible is sound.
Click to expand...
I lodged my renewal on Saturday 2nd April and Received a text and email last week on 12th it was being sent.
Arrived yesterday 19th, so about 2 1/2 weeks turnaround and having it in my hand.
 
lovetravellingoz said:
Yes I applied just over 9 weeks before departure for myself so as to provide a safety buffer on top of the 6 weeks that it is meant to be concluded within.
Click to expand...

Update:

So applied on 13 April.

Update received today, 20 April (So allowing for Easter public holidays, this is after only three full working business days, and has also been over the School and Easter Break which tends to have some staff head off on leave !):

1650439894017.png


My wife lodged her Passport Renewal at the same time, and we both received our update notification at the same time at about 5.30PM today. Both are for renewals of expired adult passports.
 
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Lodged my passport renewal at my local PO April 6th and received in the mail today April 20 - was notified it was being shipped a week ago April 13 so took AusPost longer to ship it than the Passport Office to process it :)
 
Mrmaxwell said:
Lodged my passport renewal at my local PO April 6th and received in the mail today April 20 - was notified it was being shipped a week ago April 13 so took AusPost longer to ship it than the Passport Office to process it :)
Click to expand...

To be fair, when the Passport Office notifies you 'it's being shipped', it doesn't mean Australia Post has received it.

The latter organisation can be inconsistent with delivery speeds of various types of mail but to give praise where due, I've no complaints at all about delivery speed of my passport. My very good postie knocked and hand delivered it.
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MH_fan said:
Yikes! I sent mine in at AusPost 3 weeks ago. Still "under assessment". Does this mean DFAT have received it? Hopefully I'll get it by the end of next week.
Click to expand...

I believe you're correct. 'Under assessment' won't appear unless the Passport Office has your application form.
 
lovetravellingoz said:
Update:

So applied on 13 April.

Update received today, 20 April (So allowing for Easter public holidays, this is after only three full working business days, and has also been over the School and Easter Break which tends to have some staff head off on leave !):

View attachment 275063


My wife lodged her Passport Renewal at the same time, and we both received our update notification at the same time at about 5.30PM today. Both are for renewals of expired adult passports.
Click to expand...

So late on 20th, is sent to or dropped off at post office.
Just over a day later it is processed at post office. So I should get sometime next week.

1650591882609.png
 
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mrs.dr.ron said:
Good luck with that - ours spent 6 days in Dandenong - every day I would check the tracking and no movement !
Click to expand...

I received the tracking number but was not updated as received by Aust Post and the next thing was on board for delivery then an hour later delivered.
I don't trust the tracking at all....
 
Children's passport applied 4th March, called passport office 20th April. Text received 21st April, so apologies for suggesting the call centre couldn't do anything. Tracking number is pending, the number won't be active until it goes through the machine at the mail centre in Brisbane and perhaps not until it's given to the PDO on the day of delivery.
 
lovetravellingoz said:
So late on 20th, is sent to or dropped off at post office.
Just over a day later it is processed at post office. So I should get sometime next week.

View attachment 275136
Click to expand...


Update.

Passport Status changed mid-morning to "onboard for delivery" and was delivered to our house late this afternoon today Tuesday 26th. Yesterday Monday was a Public Holiday.

So Passport Renewal lodged at local post office on 13 April.
New passport in hand on 26 April. Intervening period included 3 public holidays, and was also school holiday period. So just under 7 business days all up.

Both my, and my wife's, new passports arrived together, and both renewals were lodged together.
 
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