Has RM Tyneside lost my passport? Saying 'Delivery attempted - no answer' since 2 April, no updates to tracking

[Bagheera]

Hello!

I'm hoping that somebody can help me out with a really stressful situation here. I'm tearing my hair out!

I live in Ireland, but am a UK citizen. I applied for a passport renewal in March, and sent my old passport on 29 March to the designated Passport Office in Durham. I sent it as 'signed for' delivery, with tracking number of RL523174167IE.

The tracking information shows that it reached Tyneside MC on April 1st, and that they attempted to deliver it to the Passport Office at 7am on Saturday 2nd April. Unsurprisingly, nobody was there to sign for it as the office doesn't open until 9am, so the tracking information says
"Delivery Attempted - No Answer. Your Item was received by Tyneside MC on 01-04-2022 and is now due for delivery today." It has been saying this same message ever since 2nd April.

Contacting RM customer service was not much help, as they only had the same information as I do on the tracking number, and don't seem to have any idea where it is. [Surely the location of a 'signed for delivery' would always be recorded in the system somewhere?]

The Passport Office are saying that they haven't received the old passport.

I am in a panic here as HMPO won't process my passport renewal without the old passport, and despite calling up to 20 times a day for hte last two weeks it's impossible to get through to speak to anyone.

What could have happened to my passport? And what can I do to make sure I get my passport delivered? I'm due to travel in June, and am really worried that it's just lost and nobody can tell me anything!

All help or advice would be really welcome. Thanks a million!

[world class male]

signed for delivery isn't tracked all the way, only at certain points, it appears to be stuck/lost within the system after the 1st attempt,
it may have fallen off the shelf where returns are kept and also was it securely packaged? if it got torn open then it would be returned to belfast to try and return to sender, try RM help on twitter, they may be able to contact the office direct,
I'd also probably consider reporting it lost to the passport people,
I'm puzzled as to why it was even attempted at that time of day knowing they must get plenty of mail,
hope it gets sorted quickly

[TrueBlueTerrier]

I am of a slightly different opinion. Its possible that it has made it but the systems of both RM and the Passport office have not been updated yet/correctly.

The passport office has huge delays at the moment as evidenced by viewtopic.php?f=40&t=104655&p=975476&hi ... rt#p975476

[Essiedpud]

Hey I just wanted to find out if your issue ever got resolved and what came of it. My husband sent his off also living in Ireland but still a British citizen and had the same issue as yourself and any help would be appreciated.

[sb833]

Same problem here but sent from Spain, not sure if this is a default status given I wouldn't expect:

1) The passport office to not have some sort of mailbox for these
2) The passport office to receive a red card and pick individual applications up

Though, maybe the passport office do have someone collect all the applications from the delivery centre?

If anybody who had the problem has an update on what happened that would be great

[sb833]

UPDATE

Despite this status remaining the same "Delivery attempted - no answer", the passport office have now received the docs.

So for those that land on this post in future don't worry!

[Snaggletooth]

I don’t think the Passport Office will receive a “while you were out” card. They will receive a truck load of mail every single day, so RM will take it to them.

It is the sheer volume of mail that is the problem here. Because there is so much, RM often don’t acquire signatures for many of the items, or track them out of the system.

The next issue is at the Passport Office. Items only show up on their systems once the the packet is opened and the contents booked in. When things are quiet, there is usually a couple of days lag between the Passport Office receiving the packet from Royal Mail and the Passport Office logging receipt into their system. But things aren’t going well at the moment, see the recent Select Committee appearance by the Passport Agency’s boss. So in all probability, your item has been physically delivered to the Passport Office but not yet opened and logged in to their system.

You might well ask how I know the above. Because the special envelopes that the Post Office use for their check and send service are consistently scanned on delivery by Royal Mail. And occasionally I have had to trace those items on the rare occasion when something went wrong. Which has given me an insight into how the system works or, at least, how it worked a few years ago.

[Snaggletooth]

UPDATE

Despite this status remaining the same "Delivery attempted - no answer", the passport office have now received the docs.

So for those that land on this post in future don't worry!

Looks like our posts crossed. But I think I have explained the above!