Passport problems over, says State Department

Members of the State Department stated on Friday that Americans would now be able to apply for and receive a passport in a reasonable amount of time, declaring that the passport crunch had ended.

After months of delays, many disrupted summer travel plans and problems affecting thousands of Americans, things may now be on track. In order to cope with the change of regulations requiring Americans to carry passports whenever they leave the country, even to Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean, the State Department hired hundreds of new employees and transferred hundreds of others to help cope.

They even opened a new facility to deal with the thousands and thousands of passport applications that came in after the regulations were instated.

As a result, the average waiting time to process a standard application for a passport is six to eight weeks. Expedited service can now be obtained within three weeks.

“We’re very pleased that we’ve been able to get back to the customer service standard that has long been our desire, and pleased that we’ve been able to do so in accordance with the commitments that we made to the American people and Congress,” deputy spokesman Tom Casey said.

He told reporters: “So, good news, and we hope that this will ensure that Americans will be able to receive their passports, now and in the future, in a timely and secure fashion.”

During the worst of the passport crunch this summer, processing time for a standard application ran more than three months.