My daughter, amongst thousands of others, was waiting for her nine-month-old son’s first passport to return from Peterborough Passport Office.

She sent the application off in May by recorded post and then monitored progress online. She then made 15 phone calls with the promise of a call back within 48 hours each time. No calls were returned.

She was starting to get worried because everybody she spoke to, when she did eventually manage to get through, had no record of any previous calls.

Whilst this was going on I was on holiday in Crete receiving distressed and despairing phone calls from my daughter.

I then decided to call and e-mail her local MP Ed Vaizey’s office and within 30 minutes received a call back from Mr Vaizey’s excellent assistant, Jonathan Badyal.

He was then instrumental in contacting the Passport Office on several occasions resulting in calls being made to my daughter and ultimately the delivery today of her son’s new passport.

Firstly many thanks to Jonathan and Mr Vaizey for helping push through this application, a fine example of your elected MP’s office helping out.

Secondly, and more importantly, Theresa May and Paul Pugh are heading up a shambles of a department with demoralised and unhelpful staff who demonstrate little or no customer service skills.

This department must undergo a radical improvement to ensure that other people do not go through what my daughter experienced.

Ray Huzzey
Valance Crescent
Witney



 

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Today’s letters