The cost of loosing your passport....

Many trips ago, I managed to misplace my passport on a trip to the USA.

But what is the actual cost of loosing a passport? The numbers are actually shocking

Lets assume for some odd reason you loose your passport, and never want to travel again...

Emergency Passport Cost	£100.00	Embassy Charge (currently $147)
Photo	£7.00	About $10.

Costs - FCO/British Consulate, Chicago.

So... £107 to get home and never travel again. Think that's bad? What about the rest of the costs... and if you want to travel again?

Emergency Passport Cost	£100.00	Embassy Charge (currently $147, based on todays exchange rates of 1.46)
Photo	£7.00	About $10.
Replacement UK Passport 48 Page	£90.50	Can go down to £74.90 for a 36 Page Passport
Post office Passport Check Fee	£8.00	Optional - but for the hassle saved..
Telephone	£105	Approx £1.10 a minute thanks to Orange
Data	£40	A grand total of 5MB of data

For those keeping track, that's now a grand total of £350.50!

I don't care how you dress it up - it's a LOT of cash.

So what can you do to prevent turning into me and how my bank accounted after October a few years ago?

1. Don't loose the smegging thing in the first place. Sounds simple, but things happen - we all know this.
2. Don't Panic - to quote Douglas Adams.
3. Take copies of your passport before you go - either electronicly or in a paper copy. And keep them seperate.
4. Consider getting a local SIM Card to the country you're in and not use the phone you normally roam on (it's actually a very good method of saving a few pennies). Least of all if you have to ring the British Consulate, or IPS back home, you'll be on the phone a lot to work out where you need to go.
5. Look after and keep that passport safe!
6. Know where your local British-Foreign and Commonwealth Office/British Consulate or British Embassy is and work out provisions to get there.
7. Take Appropriate travel insurance to reclaim the costs when you get home
8. Take an additional form of identification - separate to the passport (UK Driving Licence Card or other Photo ID)

If you do loose your passport....

1. Don't Panic
2. Contact local police and get an incident number
3. Contact the FCO/BC/BE, explain the situation. If possible get your backside down there.
4. Fill in Form LS01
5. Pay money, get emergency passport activated

And finally - Losses happen. All you can do is mitigate... and don't panic.

Safe Travels!