Wekiva

As a planner type, and someone who only travels periodically, making my trips a big deal...I now have a new fear.

Today a friend dropped off her 20 something daughter and her cousin to go on a trip of a lifetime to Australia. They had been excitedly planning this trip for many months, and had taken off 2 weeks from work.

My friend got a frantic call as she was arriving home from dropping them off and her sobbing daughter told her that she wasn't allowed to travel because her passport had been reported stolen. Mind you, this passport had been sitting safely in the family safe since their trip to the Philippines 4 years ago. She hurried back to the airport to try and help plead for a resolution, to no avail. In the end they're going to Hawaii for about a week, paying a TON for the last minute flight, and losing about half of the reservations costs they had for their Australia trip.

They have no idea how this could have occurred. After researching online several have theorized this could happen when a passport worker accidentally enters the wrong number when processing lost/stolen passport forms.

From what I can tell there is no way to check if this has happened before you travel. Maybe you could try and talk on the phone with someone at a passport office, but not sure they'd even be able to tell you. So I guess this is just one more thing to worry about when checking in for an international flight.

Makes me wish there was a website you could check for document status, like global entry.

Jean

I feel terrible for the young people whose trip was pulled out from under them. I don't even know how you go about straightening this out. I hesitate to ask if they bought trip insurance, and I don't know whether the policy would cover this sort of problem.

But don't get me started on Global Entry... I filed renewal applications for two elderly friends. The wife's application was processed and approved in a reasonable amount of time. The husband's was filed in early October 2022 with the payment going through his AMEX account shortly after filing. On the CBP website, the status of his application has been "in process" (or something similar) every since. There is no way to check on an individual application, and CBP says approval could take as long as a year. This is for a renewal, not a first application, and the applicant is 88 years old and U.S. born. What level of risk do they think he might present that would require 8-12 months of evaluation/investigation? But I don't think that's what is happening. I think it's just SNAFU bureaucracy... like typing in the wrong number on a lost passport report.

seamuspie

I just saw a recent news article about a woman who had to spend 4 days in confinement in an airport because she lost her passport between diembarking the plane and immigration. Passport anxiety to the max

MmePerdu

All day yesterday I got texts from American Airlines advising me of delays & gate changes for my flights to Florida from Tucson via DFW, as I sit here in California with no travel plans. Obviously someone has signed up for text alerts with a mis-entered digit for their phone number so they aren't getting the texts & I am. Though small potatoes compared to losing a passport, or not losing one, in essence the same thing, someone's carelessness. Flawed humans and their flawed systems.

seamuspie

Now you have me reminiscing about when I used to live in Laguna Beach, the concrete jungle of London doesn't live up to the memory let alone passport anxiety.

burta

A friend had a horror story of his own making, but it is a cautionary tale. He reported his passport lost, but then found it and traveled with it overseas. Because he had used it without incident, he thought it was still valid. Three years later he took a charter flight to a worldwide conference in Asia that had been postponed because of COVID. The charter people checked to see that all travelers had passports, but unlike commercial carriers, did not scan the passports. This was done at their Asian destination, where my friend's passport was flagged as invalid. Apparently, the bureaucratic paperwork to mark the passport lost and no longer valid did not happen fast enough for his first trip, but caught up by the time he traveled three years later. He was confined to a windowless room overnight at the foreign airport until a return flight could be booked for him, then he was escorted from that airport to a connecting airport and put on a plane home. It was an expensive lesson, as he had paid and was not reimbursed for airfare and accommodations.

hetismij2

Not quite sure what any of this has to do with Europe. I expect the mods will move it.
I'm glad I have two passports is all I can say.

Wekiva

That's fair. But all my passport usage is for travel to Europe, so I spend my Fodors time in this forum. I just thought it was useful to know, but it could certainly apply to international travels anywhere.

nylilly

Quick question for you as a possessor of 2 passports - I also have two after confirming my German citizenship by birth last year. Germany, however, issues my passport in my maiden name. rather than my married name. I had planned to depart the States using my U.S. passport which is in the same name as my ticket and then using my German passport for arrivals in Naples. I will also bring copies of both my marriage license and my divorce papers which explicitly state my ability to continue using my married name or to return to using my maiden name. Does this sound acceptable or problematic?

bvlenci

I think you should use your American passport throughout. You will have to use it for the return trip; anyone who has an American passport is required to use it for entry to the US. Using a German passport just for your arrival in Italy will only confuse the database, especially if it has a different name. There's really no advantage to entering Italy with a German passport. If you were going to Germany, you might be required to use the German passport, but you'd have to use the US passport when returning home. If I were you, I'd try to get the surname changed on the German passport.

I have three passports. I am a dual citizen by birth of the US and Ireland, and I acquired Italian citizenship after moving here. When I visit the US, I have to use the US passport on the way out, and I'm supposed to use the Italian passport on the way back. Immigration in both directions gets confused, so I always show them both passports. I don't need the Irish passport at all, since both Italy and Ireland are in the EU. I do carry it along when I visit Ireland.

In Italy, a woman by law retains her birth surname when she marries, and I had resumed my birth surname at some point in the US, so all my passports have the same name.

hetismij2

If you are only visiting thense the German passport to enter Schengen, then use the US passport as ID for other stuff you may need a passport for - renting a car for instance so the names match on driver's licence and passport. Leaving again the airline will want to see your US passport to match the name, but use your German one to actually leave the country again.
The Dutch do the same as the Germans normally - women keep their own name on marriage and double barrel it if they want to. In my case I said I had used my husband's name for so long and everything else was in that name I preferred to use my married name. Not a problem.
My other passport is British and I never carry any other ID documentation with me.

My German ex DIL changed her German passport to her married name as she hated her father. Now long divorced (and much missed by me) she has reluctantly reverted to her maiden name as life is just easier that way in Germany. You may be able to get your changed if you want to.

We are unusual in being allowed to keep our British passports after becoming Dutch. Dual nationality is not normally allowed here, but we met a couple of loopholes in the system. A young friend had to give up her UK citizenship on becoming Dutch. It cost her a fortune to get her Dutch passport and even more to give up the British one. My kids have remained British.

aquamarine_seas

In my very recent experience (was there a few weeks ago), Italian immigration will have the passport number you provided to the airline. If you scan a different passport, you will be pulled aside and taken to the immigration office. I would therefore strongly recommend scanning (they use automated scanners in Rome at least) the passport you provide to the airline. The little gate screen will flash red and not let you through if you scan a different one.

In my case, I had apparently updated my passport number "too late" so the plane manifest had my old expired passport number, even though I checked in back in the US with my new passport. It all got sorted out and I was allowed into Italy, but it was a stressful detour.

balthy

The passport number you enter into an airline booking is not sent to immigration. That passport number is used a) for identity purposes b) to make sure you're allowed into the destination country or that you have correct papers for it. I enter one passport into an airline booking but use the other passport for passing thru immigration. The above issue was for a different reason, nothing to do with APIS info.

I would ensure both passports have the same names in each, according to this link, it seems possible to have a married name on a German passport:-

https://www.germany.info/us-en/servi...arriage/911866

Certainly for UK dual nationals, the non UK passport has to match the UK passport name and the UK passport office does check that it does, when the time comes to renew the UK one.

ms_go

A couple of decades ago, mr_go's passport number apparently matched the number of a passport (from another country, but we never found out which) that had been reported lost or stolen. It didn't became an issue to the degree of the OP's story, but a couple of times he was sent for some rather lengthy secondary screening related to that - in the UK and Canada, if I recall correctly.

Christina

Are you sure this is legit? Sounds like a bogus scam to me. Did you actually check with the govt authorities?

I get bogus emails and robocalls a couple times a year claiming my social security card has been reported stolen or was involved in some theft or something stupid. I always ignore them.

Wekiva

They found out when they went to check in for their flight. They're researching now with authorities...but she wasn't allowed to get on the plane. I also get all those bogus emails, this seems a lot different, and real. Not sure what the scam would be for a ticket agent at the airport to deny someone getting on a plane.

kybourbon

**I just saw a recent news article about a woman who had to spend 4 days in confinement in an airport because she lost her passport between diembarking the plane and immigration**

I found a passport on the sink in the restroom upon arrival in Rome airport a few years ago. I tried to find out if it belonged to anyone in there (no one claimed it). Between there and luggage claim I asked several employees what to do with it and they really weren't interested. I eventually forced the guy checking my passport to take it (he didn't want to).