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rivkaIn IM conversation with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
eck, he mentioned that his passport was about to expire, and suddenly I realized that I had had mine forever and maybe I should...
Shit. My passport expired 12 APR/AVR 02.
I'm flying to Canada on Wednesday.
I've found a couple of U.S. government websites here and here suggesting that an expired passport is considered valid proof of US citizenship. On the other hand, this airline website explicitly states that a US citizen can no longer travel between the US and Canada on an expired passport. Ordinarily, I'd trust the US State Department over Alaska Airlines; on the other hand, I can't exactly afford to be sanguinely confident that I'll be allowed entry and re-entry.
For $225 a private company promises to get me a passport renewal in 24 hours. The official Washington DC Passport Agency says they provide service for people travelling in less than 14 days, by appointment only, Monday through Friday, but they don't say how long it takes or how much it costs.
I e-mailed my mother to see if she still has an official copy of my birth certificate. I have a hazy, and horrible, memory that she may have sent it to me once before, and that it's maybe supposed to be in my care. I hope I'm wrong, because if she can express-mail me my birth certificate that solution will definitely be simplest, cheapest, and most obviously acceptable to the participating governments.
You'd think my expired passport would be just as valid as my birth certificate. It's an official US document that clearly lists my place of birth as "Ohio, USA," and it has to be harder to forge than a flimsy little pictureless slip of paper stamped with the Cuyahoga County seal. If it weren't for that airline website, I'd feel perfectly confident.
Argh.
Update: Yay, mom. She has my birth certificate, and she's sending it today.
eck, he mentioned that his passport was about to expire, and suddenly I realized that I had had mine forever and maybe I should...Shit. My passport expired 12 APR/AVR 02.
I'm flying to Canada on Wednesday.
I've found a couple of U.S. government websites here and here suggesting that an expired passport is considered valid proof of US citizenship. On the other hand, this airline website explicitly states that a US citizen can no longer travel between the US and Canada on an expired passport. Ordinarily, I'd trust the US State Department over Alaska Airlines; on the other hand, I can't exactly afford to be sanguinely confident that I'll be allowed entry and re-entry.
For $225 a private company promises to get me a passport renewal in 24 hours. The official Washington DC Passport Agency says they provide service for people travelling in less than 14 days, by appointment only, Monday through Friday, but they don't say how long it takes or how much it costs.
I e-mailed my mother to see if she still has an official copy of my birth certificate. I have a hazy, and horrible, memory that she may have sent it to me once before, and that it's maybe supposed to be in my care. I hope I'm wrong, because if she can express-mail me my birth certificate that solution will definitely be simplest, cheapest, and most obviously acceptable to the participating governments.
You'd think my expired passport would be just as valid as my birth certificate. It's an official US document that clearly lists my place of birth as "Ohio, USA," and it has to be harder to forge than a flimsy little pictureless slip of paper stamped with the Cuyahoga County seal. If it weren't for that airline website, I'd feel perfectly confident.
Argh.
Update: Yay, mom. She has my birth certificate, and she's sending it today.
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Date: 2002-08-09 10:57 pm (UTC)True story: reservations in Toronto for a July 4 weekend getaway. We're *on the bridge* between the US and Canada when I ask the boi (who is not yet a conditional permanent resident thanks to the slowness of the Buffalo INS office) to pull out his "parole" paperwork. Without this paperwork, the US considers him to have abandoned his application for residency if he steps foot across the border and can deny him re-entry for months or years, never mind that we're married and the paperwork is pending on their end and we're just waiting.
And he pulls out the paperwork, and sees that his parole expired the week before.
Much hasty begging of a nice Canadian border guard to please NOT process us through and let us go back NOW ensues. We got many pissy lectures from the US folks (like we didn't get the seriousness already!) and turn around and drive the three hours back to Syracuse, terrified and chastened.
Another true story - train back from Canada got stopped for over two hours because a woman of Indian descent, who was a Canadian citizen, had bought a one-way ticket to stay with her sister in New York until she had her baby, and she didn't have anything more than a driver's license to prove her Canadian citizenship, and she was a student and thus not currently employed. Because, you know, every brown-skinned person crossing into the US is probably just trying to stay here illegally.
And both of these were years before Sept. 11.
I'm sorry, telling you scary stories may not help. They're things that have stayed with me and scared me. :-/
Get help from the US passport service for the 14-days-or-less thing if you can. Or call the records office at the city/county where you were born and see if they can fax or express mail you something. (Indiana is a fucker about it - they take forever and have no expidited process IIRC). Barring that, take the expired passport plus driver's license plus a letter from your employer on letterhead, dated plus some bank statements plus your last tax return plus your social security card plus your voters registration card. The sheer volume of the above may make the difference, plus prove that you reside in the US, have accounts in the US, pay taxes in the US, vote in the US, and work in the US.
Best of luck. Running into these kinds of snafus sucks, I know.ยต