Life With….

Over the past weekend, I have remembered exactly why I find bureaucracies inefficient and incompetent. For those who are planning to travel soon – here is a warning on the difficulties of renewing a passport. please learn from me and renew early!

(An upfront aside, the man who took my application in person and the two live people I have spoken to from the National Hotline were terrific. The people I have spoken to who do processing in the DC office were either unintelligible, incompetent, or both).

This all started so nicely, and hopefully it will conclude the same way. I was given miles for my 30th birthday to visit a friend currently living in Cairo. In February. I book the ticket through New York in the hopes of seeing some college friends, excitingly. My passport is set to expire in July so we assume it is fine, but then we realize that Egypt will not accept passports within six months of expiration.

Step 1: I trudge up to DC with another friend (who was visiting for my birthday but had to be in DC for work) and stay at her house two nights spending the Friday of the first DC blizzard rushing to the passport office to get the application complete. The people there are great and assure me it will be mailed to me and in my hands by Wednesday the 9th, the 12th at the latest.

Step 2: My brother (who was having his own drama all this time with the US Army) and I drive down to Fort Lee, VA in the blizzard, and then after a stop there to explore the base travel further through the Snow to Durham.

Step 3: The government closed for a week due to two blizzards. (which also meant little to no job postings – also fun).

Step 4: The passport agency reopened on the 12th, and at 8 am a man with an almost unintelligible Indian Accent called me and assured me there was no way for me to get it by the 16th. I asked about mail and he told me it was not happening and that I would have to pick it up in person.

Step 5: I asked if I could give authorization for someone to pick it up for me (so that I could then FedEx it to myself) and they said that would work. I arranged for a friend to send a courier through the snow and pick up the passport. With a faxed signed authorization from me.

Step 6. The Courier is denied for improper authorization, even after I was told it would work.

Step 7. I call the national hotline, and explain that I live five hours away and that the DC office cancelled my mail request against my wishes. The nice lady on the phone and I work out a FedEx request which is sent via urgent email traveling in 72 hours to the DC office.
The DC office closes at 4:30 that Friday, and is closed for a national holiday on Monday. Therefore I call back around 4:20, but do not get an answer on if it shipped out or not, nor did I get a call confirming that my package was delivered as I thought I had been told to expect.

Step 8: Last night I confirmed through FEDEX that they had no package coming to me. At which point, after looking at flight information, I knew I had to change the ticket as the only other ones that would leave later and get me to NYC, would have had me miss the dinner and seeing my friends – therefore it made more sense to leave from Durham to Cairo on Wednesday.

Step 9. I called the passport agency at opening. A nice man answered the national hotline that promised me that it was in DC and I could pick it up between 11 and 1 today in person.

Step 10. I explain I lived 4-5 hours away and that I already knew I could not make the flight I had for today I told them I had changed the flight to Wednesday. I therefore asked if I could have the package FedExed to me, especially given that even with driving I may not be there by 1. For the next 40 (and I am not exaggerating) minutes I was either on hold or confirming that 1) Fed Ex can do overnight delivery and be at my house prior to 4 pm (they did not seem to know about paying for morning delivery), that I had always wanted it mailed as I lived hours away, and that I was still on the phone, the man took my card information and said they were requesting an urgent response from the DC office and it was going out by email immediately to them.

Step 11. Someone from the DC office calls me to leave me a message informing me that I need to pick up the passport in person in DC today.

Step 12. I call the DC office back, it is the first time I have heard a number there for a person that is intelligible and not garbled. I inform them that I have always wanted the package mailed and twice requested it FedExed. I need it in my hand by 1 pm tomorrow guaranteed. She refuses to do that.

Step 13. I inform her that FedEx priority overnight guarantees delivery by 10:30 am. She again refuses to guarantee anything but informs me that all packages go out overnight through their office. I tell her that the man I spoke to earlier guaranteed delivery by 1, standard overnight only delivers by 3. She does not care.

Step 14. I call the national passport agency again who informs me that at this point they can do nothing and I need to deal with the person I spoke with in DC.

Step 15: I call DC to get the tracking number and confirm it went out priority overnight and not standard. They transfer me to two different people who are not the person I spoke with, finally one of them informs me that “Someone” will call me back with that information.

Step 16: “Someone” returns my call with a tracking number. Package is to arrive by 10:30 A.M.

Long and short of it – the Washington passport agency DID get me a tracking number and FedEx delivered it. I am on my way sitting in JFK.

Hopefully – I will next be writing you all from Egypt or about Egypt. I have some thoughts and recipies from the past few weeks but they may have to wait.

All text and copyrights preserved by the author 02csb For more information visit http://www.peebesalgy.com Courtney Brown

Create Your Badge  All text and copyrights preserved by the author for words and original pictures and may not be used without author's permission. For more information visit http://www.peebesalgy.com Follow me on Twitter @ http://twitter.com/peebesalgy or contact me directly through http://www.peebesalgy.com/blog/contact-me/ Courtney Brown | Create Your Badge