So...

I decide to apply for a new passport in my new married name, so I get an application form and fill it in using BLOCK CAPITALS and black ink as instructed. I do this nice and neatly and take my time over it to avoid any mistakes. I also send my vicar and PD2 form which tells the passport office that I will be getting married to my H2B and that this will take place on 30th July. All is looking good so I trot along to the Post Office and que up for what felt like an age to use their Check and Send Service. I speak to the lady behind the glass and say "I have my passport application and cheque, can I use your Check and Send Service please?" she says "Absolutely!" and informs me that I don't need to send a cheque and that I can pay by card - brilliant, I thought, that means it can go on the credit card and I don't have to worry about it for a couple of months so I rip up the £77 cheque that I had neatly placed inside the envelope. She then looks at my forms. Low and behold she doesn't know what to do as she has never seen a PD2 form so she asks her manager, she has never seen it before so I will have to go to a larger Post Office store that is a mini mission for me to get to. I decline and she says "You can still send it but you'll need another cheque" to which I reply "I just ripped it up". I then had to fill out my card details and send it away not knowing if it would be correct or not!

Anyway...about two weeks later and on a day off my passport arrives, I think "brilliant". I open it up and check it to see what it is like to see my new name on official documentation and I see a spelling mistake, I am Gemma Louise Macken NOT Mackew! I can't believe it, so I phone them up straight away and the dappy woman on the other end of the phone is like, "have you got proof of who you are in your new name? Do you have a bank card with the details on?" - er NO, that would be fraudulant and illegal not to mention impossible to obtain! She then asks: "Do you have your application form or PD2 form?" and I am like NO I SENT IT TO YOU!!! She then says, and I laughed out loud when she asked this: "Do you have your marriage certificate?" OF COURSE NOT I'M NOT MARRIED YET HENCE THE PD2 FORM!!! She had no clue as to what I should do and neither do I! I have to call another office tomorrow and arrange for me and my H2B to go in and prove that we are getting married, and she says "you may not have to pay again but I am not sure" - how ridiculous!?!

I can't believe how easily I managed to obtain a passport in what is effectively someone elses name!

Sorry for long post! Rant over!

Isn't it! No wonder there is bank fraud if the systems aren't followed properly and the IPS don't check their work properly!!

and breathe... :o) Wow, that sounds incredibly frustrating! Hope you get it all sorted - its amazing how incompetent some people are! xx

I know, I am angry! I want to contact a newspaper and tell them but I think that is being a little dramatic!