How To Get Passport For Newborn

Passport Application And Documentation

While you wait for your scheduled appointment, complete your Passport Application and procure your Passport Documentation. Visit travel.state.gov to see what documentation you will need for your specific scenario.

You will need to fill out Form DS-11 for your child. There is a fillable form on the State Department website that will create a printable PDF for you. You will need some personal information like your childs social security number and height. Make sure you have the pertinent information available when you fill out the form. And make sure you fill out the form from your childs perspective. Visit the State Department website for more details on passports for children under 16.

We were both renewing a child passport and getting a brand new passport for an infant. For the renewal we had to provide the childs expired passport, an original birth certificate, a copy of the birth certificate, proof of guardianship, original government-issued IDs for both parents and copies of these IDs to submit with the application. Thats a lot of documents! Gather and collect these items early to make sure you havent misplaced anything that is required for your application.

A child passport requires consent from both parents. If both parents are not able to attend the appointment, there is additional notarized documentation required.

What If I Dont Have Sole Legal Custody But The Other Parent Can’t Or Won’t Sign

If you dont have sole legal custody, and the other parent cant sign for some reason or wont cooperate in signing Form DS-3053, you can give the passport office a notarized statement or Form DS-5525. The statement or form explains why the other parent is not available.

Examples of reasons why the other parent cant sign might be things like: there is an order for protection or no contact order, or you dont know where the other parent is. Or maybe they are just refusing to sign.

Find Form DS-5525 online at

• Scroll to “I want a form”
• Scroll down to Forms for Special Situations

BUT, the application agent who takes your form decides if it is approved. There is no guarantee that your explanation will be accepted. Different application centers may make different decisions on the same application. The surest way to avoid needing the other parents signature is to try to get sole legal custody through a family court order.

Do I Need A Passport For My Newborn

Question: We’re traveling in early July and our son will be under 2 months old. We have not received the birth certificate yet to apply for a passport. What would you recommend we do? Can we travel with him by adding his name to our passports? Thanks for the advice in advance. Please advise asap.Answer: Yes, your newborn must have a passport in order to exit and re-enter the United States. You cannot add the name of a baby to a passport. Each U.S. citizen must have his or her own passport.What you can do is contact the vital records office of the state in which your child was born. This is the state agency that issued birth certificates.You can request to know the status of your baby’s birth certificate and ask whether the process can be expedited or not. Many states expedite birth certificates for an extra fee. For more information, click the link below.

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How Do You Get A Childs Passport When One Parent Dies

In the case of a deceased parent, you need to bring the death certificate. If you are a single parent, you need to bring a birth certificate of adoption decree listing you as the only parent. Or provide a court order either granting you sole custody or giving permission for you to apply for the passport.

Expedited Service For Non

If you do not have urgent travel, you can request expedited service.

• Request expedited service by mail for passport renewals or

• Request expedited service in person at a passport acceptance facility near you. This is for new passports.

Expedited service costs an extra $60, plus any delivery costs.

• Normal and expedited processing times fluctuate throughout the year.

• Check the current processing times before you submit your application.

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Go To Your Passport Appointment

Go to your passport appointment with the required documentation. We scheduled our appointment with our local Post Office. We showed up a few minutes before our appointment. They called on us promptly at our appointment time and we were able to skip the general post office line. If your appointment time has come and gone, notify an agent that you are there for a passport appointment.

Having the applications pre-filled saves a lot of time. Make sure that you do not attach your photos to the application. The Post Office does not accept credit cards for payment for passports. Be prepared to pay by cash or checkor use a debit card to buy a money order.

We presented all of our documentation, paid the fees, and took an oath that the information we presented was true.

The entire process to complete two passport applications took us 15 minutes total! Much better than waiting hours at a walk-in facility or a Passport fair.

Register Account In Passport Seva Website Complete Application

First thing you need to do is register and create an account at Passport Seva Website. When you are registering a new account, you may not find the exact Passport Seva Kendra center in the drop down as it may not be the major one and just a collection or appointment center. In that case, you select the head of the state. For instance, you may not see Tirupati in the list of Passport Office, when you register, you will have to Select Hyderabad. It can be very misleading, but trust me, I did exactly the same thing by selecting the head office.

The process is pretty standard and ensure that all the spellings are correct. Make sure you give a valid email ID, as the link to activate your account and other status emails will be sent to the email address. Once you register you will get an email to activate your account, then you are set with registration. You can check the guide to Applying Indian Passport Online, the basic steps on the website are same irrespective of the kind of passport.

You need to complete the application online, it is very much straight forward, you can download the PDF form and save and submit it or fill it online. Just make sure you complete the application online.

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Three But How The %# Do You Take A Passport Photo Of A Newborn

Ha. Well, as you may have figured, theres no surefire way for getting a perfect passport photo of a baby, particularly a newborn. But here are a few helpful tips.

Perhaps the most helpful tip I can offer is, that unless babys old enough to hold his head up all by himself, youll want to be taking the shot with baby laying on his back on a clean, pattern-free white surface .

But even that will only get you so far.

One of you will still have to do everything in your power to get baby to look in the general direction of the camera. If youve ever spent time with a newborn, you know that this is next to impossible.

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Out of a half dozen shots, we got lucky. Instead of using babys favorite toy to get his attention, try some new, shiny object hes never seen before.

A quacker or kazoo also works great, though you want to be careful that baby doesnt loose his sh*t, or it might be very hard to get a clear shot.

And as tempting as it may be, remember no sunglasses, hats, or fake mustaches .

Keep in mind, passports for children under 16 are good for five years.

Up until age 16, immigration officials rely on an array of factors to positively identify a minor child, not solely relying on the passport photo .

Get Babys Passport Photo Taken

Just as you had to when getting your own passport, your baby will need to have a photo taken that satisfies the requirements necessary for use on U.S. passports. Many drug stores or pharmacies , offer this service as well as the printing of the photo at a low cost. As an alternative, however, you can take the photo at home using a camera, or even download an app that helps you with the process.

When taking a photo of your baby, no other person should be in the photo. Your child should be looking at the camera with her eyes open, although it is acceptable if an infants eyes are not open or not open entirely.

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What Documents Do I Need

You must submit the following with your completed application form when youare applying for a childs passport for the first time:

• Four passport photographs of the child, 2 of which have been signed by a witness as per instructions provided with the application form
• Child’s birth certificate
• Appropriate fee
• PPS number
• Additional documentation to confirm the childs Irish citizenship. The documents you need to provide depend on how the child became an Irish citizen see below.

Newborn Baby Passport Checklist

• Certified Birth Certificate
• Original parent/legal guardian government-issued identification. Each parent needs ID. Bring a photocopy of the front and back of each ID.
• 2 Passport Photos
• Form DS-11 Filled out in Black Ink. Do NOT sign the first page of the application until they ask you to.
• Extra blank DS-11 Form. Trust me, youll want to have this if there is an issue with the first one.
• Completed Form DS-3053 if both parents cannot attend the appointment. This form will need to be signed by the non-applying parent in front of a notary. Make sure its done in black ink! Also, bring a photocopy of the front and back of the ID the parents used in front the notary.
• Payment to cover the passport application fee and any additional fees for expediting and/or processing.
• Proof of travel plans if applying for an expedited passport.

TravelingMom Tip: The passport application form asks for your full name. Middle initials are acceptable in passports. Note that the name on your childs passport is the same name he or she will use for booking any future flights.

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Travel With Your Newborn

Your new passport should arrive in the mail within 6-8 weeks, or 2-3 weeks if youve paid to have it expedited. Your birth certificate will also be returned and should arrive in a separate envelope around the same time. Now that you have your newborns passport youre all set to travel internationally for 5 years before it expires.

Print The Form And Get Signatures

If you apply online, our website will generate a completed application form for you.

You need to the form.

Everyone whos giving consent for the child to have a passport needs to sign section 15 of the form in front of a witness. If they cant easily do that because theyre in different parts of the world, follow our .

Children have to sign section 16 of the form .

To see which original documents to bring when you lodge the form, check the instructions in Step 1 above.

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Can Babies Travel Without A Passport

NO!!!

Well, at least not internationally.

In some cases, you may be able to get away with a passport card , but for the vast majority of overseas trips, baby, just like the rest of us, will need to have a passport.

So, yeah, if a baby wants to travel abroad, they need a passport from the second they draw their first breath.

Fortunately, the process is fairly easy the most painful part of it all for most people being the cost.

And if you need the passport quicker than 4-6 weeks as we did, its even costlier. Yay

Without further ado

Three Get Babys Passport Photo Taken

Here it is, getting that elusive passport photo for baby. Do this step ASAP, and dont take any chances with the quality, particularly if your travel plans are imminent.

We took our own photo , but I do not recommend the average parent trying this unless a) you are very confident with a camera, desktop imaging and high-quality printing AND, b) you know EXACTLY what you are doing and what the requirements are.

The most common reason for an application to get rejected is because of the passport photo. I saw this happen more times than I can count.

Keep in mind that just because the acceptance agent at the post office gives the thumbs up doesnt 100% mean the photo wont be rejected, and getting a photo rejected later in the process can hold up the application for weeks.

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Thats why its so important to get your photos done at a trusty outfit. FedEx Office generally does a pretty good job . Drug stores, not so much.

With that said, if you are absolutely confident in what you are doing , you can stand to save a good chunk of change by doing the photo yourself, particularly if multiple people in your family are getting passports or you need several photo duplicates for visas, etc.

For more details, check out the USDOS official guide and requirements for passport photos.

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Be Prepared For Your Visit

Required Documents:

We recommend arriving as early as possible during our business hours as we may close early or for periods of time throughout the day.

We are located in the Texas Global building at 2400 Nueces St, Suite B.

When staff are available, they will enter guests’ names and phone numbers on a waitlist so they can be texted when ready to be seen. Guests will not have to wait on site once they are on the waitlist.

Procedure For Obtaining A Passport For A Newborn Child

• Do Infants Need Passports to Travel?

Your baby book probably doesn’t have a page for Baby’s First Paperwork. It’s too bad, really, because between the hospital, your insurance carrier and your county’s department of vital records, newborns rack up a bit of paper pretty quickly. If you want to travel internationally with your newborn, she’s going to need one more thing: a passport. All Americans, even newborns, must have passports to fly to another country. Getting one isn’t too complicated, but it does take weeks. Start the process immediately.

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