US Passport Renewals In New Zealand

Today we made our trek to the US consulate in Auckland for passport renewals. We had to physically go to the consulate because my daughter’s passport is expiring soon, and all passports for kids under 16 require a personal appearance. (Side note - there are roaming consular outreach events in different cities if you don’t want to come to Auckland. There’s one in Wellington in a few days and one in Christchurch in April. Also, if only one parent can make the appointment, there is another form, the DS-3053, that can be signed and notarised to allow one parent to attend the interview.) Since my passport is expiring later in the year, I decided to go ahead and renew mine while we were there, too, even though adult renewals can be mailed in. If I didn’t have to go to the consulate anyway, I definitely would’ve opted for the mail-in option, btw. So here’s how it all went down:

First, I spent some time reviewing all of the information on the US Embassy site. It is important to reviews both the instructions on the consulate site and the instructions for the form itself. For kids, that form is the DS-11 even if the kid has had a passport before. I filled out the form - without signing it - and began gathering all of the documentation we needed: original birth certificate, her passport, my husband’s passport, and my passport, and I made copies of all of them. For my renewal - a normal adult renewal - I filled out a Form DS-82 and made a copy of my existing passport.

Second, I made an appointment for us. I made one appointment for her and one appointment for me per the instructions. In reality, I’m not sure I needed to make an appointment for me because I just handed them all of my documents with hers and they took it all. The final step of making the appointment was to print out my appointment confirmation notices. I did that and put that piece of paper with our other documents. This step turned out to be important because security checked our confirmation information before letting us in.

Third, I finagled and wrangled halfway decent passport photos. US passport photo requirements are different than New Zealand passport photos, so I found the only way to get the right dimensions was to DIY it. This nearly led to a monumental blowup between my husband and myself because the heads in the photos didn’t perfectly fit the specifications. I was not going to get our applications kicked back because someone’s head was an eighth of an inch off. All of the specifications can be found here.

Finally the day of our appointments arrived. We drove to the CBD and parked in a Wilson lot at 27 Fort Street. It’s the closest, reliably available parking I’ve found, but it costs NZ$8 per half hour. As we were almost late, I didn’t have the luxury of searching for less expensive parking. The consulate is located on the third floor of a the Citigroup Centre building. The entrance to the lobby is easy to miss as it is wedged between a Flight Centre and St. Pierre’s Sushi. Once we took the elevator to the third floor, we were immediately greeted by consulate security. They checked our appointment confirmation pages, then took all of our belongings and ran them through an x-ray machine. Everything except glasses and a wallet (cause they want your money!) has to stay outside in one of the locked cabinets. This part is especially painful because a long wait without mindless internet fluff sucks.

I’m going to digress for a moment and talk about how absolutely dystopian the consulate feels. It looks like it could be a set out of very disturbing psychological thriller movie. Or possibly the Handmaid’s Tale. There’s dated wood paneling. Slightly creepy framed portraits of old white men. There are no clocks visible, and they no longer turn the TVs on. The lighting is legitimately creepy, and people sit silently, back to back, in two rows of chairs waiting to be called up to one of the many windows. There are no magazines to sift through, nothing to look at except domestic abuse hotline posters and emergency escape plans. The whole place has a weird, off-kilter energy. So it’s a super fun place to take kids! (Sarcasm intended)

Back to the process… We waited to be called to a Non-Immigrant Visa window where I presented all of our documents. I knew that I would probably mess something up, and in true Bumblemom fashion, I did - I didn’t bring a self-addressed courier envelope. Fortunately, I can go back to the consulate and pick up our new passports when they’re ready. However, if you don’t live anywhere near the consulate, don’t forget this step as it is not on the form instructions, it is only on the consulate instructions. Once the woman behind the counter looked through and approved our documents, she gave us a ticket to take to the cashier. I was planning on US$110 for my passport renewal and US$80 for the child application. As it turns out, there is an additional US$35 for an Examination of Oath charge. You know, because the parents have to swear an oath that the application is true and that necessitates an additional fee. (Can you see my eyes roll at this one?) If paying by credit card, the charges are made in US dollars, so use a US credit card to avoid additional bank fees.

Then we waited again. Fortunately, the consulate isn’t completely barbaric, and if you have little kids, there is a small cubby of a room labeled “Not an Exit” across from Window 1 that has a small collection of toys and books for young kids to play with. My daughter and husband hung out there, and in true American fashion were VERY loud and entertained the whole place with their make-believe game about baby squids.

Finally we were called up to another window where they asked my daughter her name and who she was here with. After that, we made our oath that her application was true to the best of our knowledge. They stamped a bunch of paperwork and let us know that our passports would be ready in a couple of weeks. They kept both of our old passports but returned all of the original documents. We’ll get the old one’s back with our new ones.

We were in the consulate at 8:40 am and out by 9:30. It was pretty quick, all things considered, and the processing time isn’t that bad. Once we get our new passports, we’ll need to transfer our New Zealand visas to those passports. Fortunately, that is a simple process requiring a short form to fill out to send in with our old and new passports. All of the details can be found here.

I hope this takes a little of the mystery out of passport renewals while living abroad. It’s a bit of effort and paperwork, but nothing too difficult.

Update ** I got an email that my passports were ready to pick up one week after going in. Fortunately, I was able to swing by the consulate before they shut down due to the coronavirus. **