Get your kid's passport NOW!
Posted by Richard Kuhlenschmidt Sun, 30 Jul 2006 22:48:45 GMT
Take it from me, if you’re planning to travel overseas with your kids this summer, don’t wait unil the last minute to get their passports!
A friend of my son was planning to travel to China with his parents this summer. He recounted the nightmare experience he had in getting his passport and it reminded me of a similar nightmare experience we had when we were preparing to take our kid’s to Paris last spring.
Most important thing! Do not take an abstract of your kid’s birth certificate, take an actual certified copy.
In both cases, with my son and his friend, we arrived at the local post office with abstract in hand. Of course, the post office only offers passports during the time when the kids are in school, so you have to take them out of school.
Anyway, we were turned away and had to request a certified copy of our son’s birth certificate.
When we finally got it, time was running short. We had to go to the Federal Building here in Los Angeles, to get the passport in time for our trip. After parking a mile away from the Federal Building, we got there with minutes left before they closed the doors. We walked in and the told us we couldn’t take our cell phones into the building.
So I ran back a mile to the car and left the cell phone there and a mile back to joins my family in line. When we finally got to the front of the line and they asked if we had an appointment. We said no. They said we needed an appointment and they gave us a number to call.
Great, except our phone were a mile away back in the car.
So I ran back to the car, called them, got an appointment, and – end of story -, we got our son’s passport.
Trust me, you don’t want to go through this stress. Plan early.
