Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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The Passport Service is successfully meeting high demand for passports. So far in 2024, the Passport Service has issued over 883,000 passports. Forecasts indicate that the Passport Service will issue over 1 million passports this year.

Thanks to significant investment by the Government and the work of the Passport Service staff, virtually all complete passport applications are processed within or before advertised turnaround times with the majority of adult online renewal applications issuing within two working days.

The turnaround times for passport applications are:

• 10 working days for simple online adult renewals
• 15 working days for complex or child online renewals
• 20 working days for first time online applications
• 8 weeks for post passport or paper applications

The Customer Service Hub of the Passport Service is available between 9am and 4:30pm Monday to Friday. The Hub has handled over 345,000 calls and 95,000 webchats from our citizens to date this year.

The Passport Service offers Urgent Appointments for applicants who need to renew their passport urgently in time for travel. The Passport Offices in Dublin and Cork operate a four-day Urgent Appointment Service for renewal applicants.

The Passport Online service offers Irish citizens the ability to apply online for their passport 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It is a user-friendly, efficient service that consistently offers processing times up to four times faster than paper-based passport renewal applications.

Over 90% of passport applications are made through Passport Online, which is now available to 99.9% of all applicants globally.

The Passport Service continues to be in an excellent position to meet the demand forecast for the remainder of this year.

I encourage citizens to apply for their passports online, well in advance of any planned travel, for the quickest, cheapest and most efficient service.