Passport delivery times: ‘Expected’

Questionable administrative management leads to longer than usual issuance and renewal periods for passports. Some suggest that the situation could have been foreseen.

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Authorities defend themselves by citing the jump in passport applications over the past year, from 363,000 between April 2020 and March 2021, to 1,273,000 between April 2021 and March 2022, according to data from Employment and Social Development Canada.

But the argument for the explosion of more than a million requests in one year does not pass for everyone.

“We know how many passports have been issued, and I hope the government knows that,” said Claudio Benedetti, assistant professor at Qatar Insurance University. “He knows which ones will fall, and with a percentage of the error, it is calculated!”

He argues that such administrative chaos was more than expected at the end of the pandemic, especially “as they themselves admit.” Passport season, they say, so they are aware of it, he says, is terrified.

Employment and Social Development Canada boasted through its spokesperson, Maja Stenanovska, that it “continues to hire and train more staff,” and notes that its workers “work overtime every day and on weekends to increase processing capacity.”

That doesn’t prevent the delay from continuing to anger the public, who are getting impatient every day in front of Service Canada’s offices.

“I was told I have to go to the Jay Favreau complex. I was told I can’t go 24 hours before my flight, that’s a bit silly. Flight is on the 8th, I have to go there on the 7th… It’s a bit stressful,” A passerby says.

Several weeks are needed before you can hope to get your hands on his precious sesame.

“We submitted the file on May 2, then we had no news, so we will leave on Monday,” admitted another, who will attempt a desperate departure.