Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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444. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade in view of the greater diversity in backgrounds of Irish citizens, the steps the Passport Office has taken to better serve those applying for, and renewing, their passports. [27096/15]

Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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445. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade his plans to minimise the impact of the increased demand for passports in the Passport Office each summer. [27097/15]

Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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446. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the number of additional staff in the Passport Office for the summer; if he anticipates a high demand for the passport card in the autumn; the staffing plans for this service. [27098/15]

Charles Flanagan (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 444 to 446, inclusive, together.

Almost 50% of passport applications are received in the months April to July. So far this year through the extreme spike in passport applications average turnaround times for passport express have remained at 10 or 11 days. Additionally approximately 250 customers are seen daily by appointment at our public counters in Dublin and Cork and receive a turnaround service of between 1 and 10 days as appropriate.

This high level of service delivery has been achieved with the support of our staff in our passport offices in Dublin, Balbriggan and Cork. To cope with the seasonal demand, the passport service recruited 160 additional temporary staff, most taken from the live register. Additionally in line with the wider public service reform programme, the passport service pursues opportunities to improve customer service through an effective combination of internal and external service delivery initiatives. One such example is our online tracker service, which is updated a number of times a day and gives the most up to date progress report on an application.

Resource requirements are being kept under review in order to ensure that we can meet the growing demand for passport services, while at the same time modernising our processes and introducing new services such as the passport card for travel within EU and EEA countries. It is envisaged that demand for the passport card will be high among young adults for age verification and consequently assist in reducing the number of lost passports. The additional staffing resources required will be kept under regular review to ensure resources dedicated reflect actual demand.