stan18

Re-Post #1602/sometimewoodworker -

Passport extensions will be added to passports that have expired in the last 6 months or are due to expire within 3 months, unless the country requires a minimum of 6 months validity where offices can extend passports with up to 7 months remaining.

So you will be ok

I had summarised for those needing to travel.

Thanks for the amplification / Stan

I have 5 years left on my passport thank god. But could i go now and gat the 12 month extension to make it 6??

No you will not get the extension

If anyone is due to renew a passport it is going to take a minimum of 8 weeks. New passports much longer.

However if you haven't sent your passport in yet,

and your passport is expiring soon (not more than 7 months),

and you need to travel soon,

and you are a British Citizen or variant passport holder e.g. BPP, BNO, BNSS.

The FCO staff can issue a one time 12 month extension (foc) which will run from the date you get the stamp in your passport not adding 12 months to the expiry.

Information from Policy Principles issued to consular staff.

I hope the above underlined sentence is not mandatory in any way.?

I renewed one family UK passport via Hong Kong a year ago, took 3 weeks without undue hassle other than DHL.

Now have to renew another one and had assumed same situation existed until just encountered this thread.

My commiserations to people already trapped in this organizational disaster.

I am not immediately planning a trip (ie no flight evidence) but passport is expiring in 1 month so obviously no chance by official renew route.

I had understood from earlier posts / website statement that no travel caveats attached to getting a 12 month extension, ie the primary objective was to “solve” expiry date failure.?

Or is this information to allow redirection to ETDs / prioritisation of appointment scheduling for Embassy purposes.

Anybody actually rang the Embassy yet ?

Thanks for any info / Stan

Yes, the link as per your post. Indeed, last time blue was definitely "in". My white ones were flatly rejected ("not machine acceptable").! Fashions change, or maybe it's technology enforced. Net result back to square one. Another reason for my present caution. Although, to be fair, at least acceptable colour examples are now offered within the guidance notes.

I noticed that UK photo booths are mentioned in the link. I daresay this may define to those familar with UK current activities that digital is the (only?) way to go. Looks like something out of Dr Who. For example -

http://www.picture-booth.co.uk/

You will have hard time getting photos taken that are not digital now. There is no way to tell the difference unless they are poorly printed and/or printed on non photo quality paper. So yes digital photos are accepted.

Thks comment and I’m not too surprised at yr availability prediction. Must admit have not entered a camera shop recently. If you are right, my nearly finished 35mm roll may be destined for a time-capsule only. i wondered if the ability to scan non-digital / digital photos was different (not a techie).

Assuming digital versions are OK, and in fact inevitable, I rather dread presenting the website’s required headshot example to the nearest photography unit. My last experience was that only inch/half-inch formulae were recognized. I noticed the US website offer a neat, do-it-yourself sizing tool which seemed very effective on a simul-head. Unfortunately I understand that the settings are, predictably, not compatible with UK. I guess time will tell.

Apologies to terak for slight OT but can anyone confirm that digital photos are fully acceptable when renewing UK red passport via Hongkong ? How about non-digital ? 7000bht is inducing caution. I noticed some 2013 threads here mentioning intended use of digital versions but not as to whether there were any subsequent problems from the other end.?

I cannot see any specific statement on official BKK website regarding options / acceptability digital photos although I can see that the dimensional requirements might well challenge a non-digital product, or more accurately the photographer.

From memory, I think that last time, 10yrs back, a digital photo was definitely unacceptable even though the issued-within-5day passport had some kind of “digitized” photo page look. Maybe it was “Bangkok digital”.

Thks for any comments / Stan

Dear All,

Apologies if this is slightly off-topic. I hv learnt a lot from this forum related to True’s current decoder “upgrading” project. I am using both gold cable/silver satellite packages with 21in, non-HD TV. I recently gleaned this, maybe interesting, little snippet which I don’t recall seeing on the forum so far. (I am definitely a user only and not a techy). Further apologies if already discussed here.

From my latest conversation with True, I understood that HD must be (for them?) transmitted in mpeg4. Was informed that old sat. digital boxes were/are mpeg2 compatible only.

As a result true are intending to transmit both SD / HD in mpeg4 so old dig. sat. boxes will refuse all signals.

Only exception is some packages below Silver, eg Knowledge, where apparently mpeg2 signal is to be maintained (seems illogical ?) so no need to change sat.box (assuming Knowledge package is available on satellite system, no idea).

I do not hv technical ability to evaluate above comments but if correct, seems like most people will shortly be forced to relinquish old True, dig.boxes, like it or not. Or maybe it is just (more) BS ?.

Having recently ugraded my cable set-top box to HDplus, I totally agree previous post that, compared to old dig.sat. boxes, the non-ability to re- number channels is a massive negative “bonus”, not to mention the necessity to use 4 steps to solely view the list of selected favorite channels or 2 steps to start rotating thru the list (even the old analog cable box allowed rotation directly).

In addition, it requires a gorilla-sized hand to cover the remote.

The only positive cable benefit that I noticed was a major increase in quality of picture compared to old analog display, now on a par with my dig.sat.picture, maybe even slightly better.

Maybe the theoretically forthcoming PVR , VOD etc functions will carry weight for some users but personally, at the moment, if I could think of a way of retaining my current dig. sat. box, i wouldn't hesitate.

Rgds / Stan

No Dr. Seri today? Is he off the air on weekends?

Assuming you mean the Thai language version of 12/11/2011, go to main page link below and look at upper, right hand mini-pics. Image of latest Dr.Seri presentation is frequently (all the time?) clearly visible and linked to the actual clip.

http://www3.thaipbs.or.th/flood54/

Previous presentations accesible by visual selection from (among) various thumbnails accessed via the "more" link below mini-pics on main page or from (among) thumbnails shown below any of the linked video clips.

Rgds / Stan

The Thai PBS - Thailand's Worst Flood English-language segments archived back to 24 October. I have not been able to locate the Thai-language videos on the Thai PBS website, but believe they would be worth watching even if one does not know Thai.

(not sure if it's OK to post direct links, pls edit if otherwise)

Didn't see any previous replies to this comment, sorry if redundant.

I think you can see the previous Thai presentations included amongst the various pics/thumbnails at bottom of window of this recent Thai entry. The latest ones are (maybe sporadically) displayed on the upper right-hand segment of site's main page (and maybe on left index "somewhere" also ).

http://www3.thaipbs....newsid=C0001939

Rgds / Stan

PS, for my XP, antique PC, the main website consumes very substantial CPU capacity but the video clips are relatively ok