Passport renewal question

[mek]

I'm sailing on Joy 9/25/24 and I have to renew my passport.  Do I understand correctly that I have up until 3 days prior to sailing to complete and submit my passport information?

 

My current passport expires in August and I'm on the fence about paying extra to expedite the new one.  The end of September seems like a long way off and I would think I would have to new one back by the end of July, but this is summer and I'm not sure $60 is worth stressing out about getting the new one in time.

[9tee2Sea]

9 minutes ago, mek said:

I'm sailing on Joy 9/25/24 and I have to renew my passport.  Do I understand correctly that I have up until 3 days prior to sailing to complete and submit my passport information?

 

My current passport expires in August and I'm on the fence about paying extra to expedite the new one.  The end of September seems like a long way off and I would think I would have to new one back by the end of July, but this is summer and I'm not sure $60 is worth stressing out about getting the new one in time.

go onto the Government website for passports.  That should give you the turn around/processing time.  I think $60.00 is a pretty good price to pay for peace of mind.  What if you dot get your passport in time before you cruise? Are you willing to forgo the monies paid?  I dot think travel insurance will cover slow passport renewal .  Just my opinion.

[versuco]

We just renewed a passport.  They received it 4/15/2024 and we got the new one on 5/17/2024.  I think you will be fine renewing it now without paying to expedite.

[mjkacmom]

35 minutes ago, 9tee2Sea said:

go onto the Government website for passports.  That should give you the turn around/processing time.  I think $60.00 is a pretty good price to pay for peace of mind.  What if you dot get your passport in time before you cruise? Are you willing to forgo the monies paid?  I dot think travel insurance will cover slow passport renewal .  Just my opinion.

Does the OP even need a passport? Turn around time lately has been very quick.

[complawyer]

if you're willing to pay for it, expedited service will get you your passport within 2 weeks or less

[SeaShark]

2 hours ago, mek said:

I'm sailing on Joy 9/25/24 and I have to renew my passport.  Do I understand correctly that I have up until 3 days prior to sailing to complete and submit my passport information?

 

My current passport expires in August and I'm on the fence about paying extra to expedite the new one.  The end of September seems like a long way off and I would think I would have to new one back by the end of July, but this is summer and I'm not sure $60 is worth stressing out about getting the new one in time.

 

If the expiration date on your passport is in August, then your passport is already "expired" as you'll need 6 months remaining on your passport to sail. IOW, you lost the ability to use this passport for cruising back in February. You might as well renew it now...you gain nothing by waiting.

[zqvol]

14 minutes ago, SeaShark said:

 

If the expiration date on your passport is in August, then your passport is already "expired" as you'll need 6 months remaining on your passport to sail. IOW, you lost the ability to use this passport for cruising back in February. You might as well renew it now...you gain nothing by waiting.

Inaccurate. For closed loop cruises out of the US as long as it is valid on the day your cruise ends there is no 6 month requirement. Cruising in other parts of the world may require six months before expiration in order to enter a specific country, but even that is not everywhere. 
 

To the OP I would go ahead and renew it now, since it expires before your cruise. No need to expedite the service as it is currently being reported that renewals take 3 - 6 weeks. 

[mjkacmom]

39 minutes ago, SeaShark said:

 

If the expiration date on your passport is in August, then your passport is already "expired" as you'll need 6 months remaining on your passport to sail. IOW, you lost the ability to use this passport for cruising back in February. You might as well renew it now...you gain nothing by waiting.

Where is the op cruising to that has that requirement?

[SeaShark]

17 minutes ago, zqvol said:

Inaccurate. For closed loop cruises out of the US as long as it is valid on the day your cruise ends there is no 6 month requirement. Cruising in other parts of the world may require six months before expiration in order to enter a specific country, but even that is not everywhere. 

 

Reference?

 

Even the CBP says "Apply early for your passport, or make sure your current one will be valid at least six months beyond your travel dates and has two or more blank pages. Your cruise company may also require you to have a passport even if U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) or foreign port of entry does not. " Nothing on their page for cruise ship passengers mentioning any sort of closed loop exception.

[Distinctive-Destinations]

45 minutes ago, SeaShark said:

 

If the expiration date on your passport is in August, then your passport is already "expired" as you'll need 6 months remaining on your passport to sail. IOW, you lost the ability to use this passport for cruising back in February. You might as well renew it now...you gain nothing by waiting.

Please do some research before posting inaccurate information. The 9/25/24 Joy cruise leaves Quebec (Canada) and goes to NYC (US).  The 6 month expiration does not apply. You can enter up to the expiration date. However since the OP’s passport does expire in August, it obviously needs to be renewed.

 

But your “it’s already expired” bit is completely wrong.

[PelicanBill]

The 6 month statement is a generic guideline because there are some places in the world that require it.  A cruise rarely requires it unless visiting unusual places, and even most of those waive it for in-transit airline transfers and cruise stops.  Here's the detail.

 

https://cibtvisas.com/blog/us-passport-validity-guide

[mjkacmom]

Just now, Distinctive-Destinations said:

Please do some research before posting inaccurate information. The 9/25/24 Joy cruise leaves Quebec (Canada) and goes to NYC (US).  The 6 month expiration does not apply. You can enter up to the expiration date. However since the OP’s passport does expire in August, it obviously needs to be renewed.

 

But your “it’s already expired” bit is completely wrong.

Thanks for this information, I posted that a passport might not be needed depending on location, a passport will obviously be needed so ignore what I posted.

[mek]

1 hour ago, zqvol said:

Inaccurate. For closed loop cruises out of the US as long as it is valid on the day your cruise ends there is no 6 month requirement. Cruising in other parts of the world may require six months before expiration in order to enter a specific country, but even that is not everywhere. 
 

To the OP I would go ahead and renew it now, since it expires before your cruise. No need to expedite the service as it is currently being reported that renewals take 3 - 6 weeks. 

#1 - You are correct about closed loop cruises.  One year I cruised when my passport was expiring the week following arrival back in the US.

#2 - It appears my post was misunderstood.  I wasn't asking if I should renew now, I know that, it was simply a question if I should expedite processing even though my next cruise isn't until September.  It has become a non issue sine I just returned from the post office and only requested regular processing.

[mek]

3 hours ago, mjkacmom said:

Does the OP even need a passport? Turn around time lately has been very quick.

Yes - the cruise begins in Quebec, so if for no other reason, a passport is required to fly into Canada.

Edited May 25 by mek

[mek]

3 hours ago, versuco said:

We just renewed a passport.  They received it 4/15/2024 and we got the new one on 5/17/2024.  I think you will be fine renewing it now without paying to expedite.

Thanks - this is reassuring.

[mek]

And my original question was do I have up to 3 days prior to sailing to enter all of my information into the system?  Perhaps not NCL specific, as I think that is probably SOP for all cruises, at least in N America.  

[zqvol]

1 minute ago, mek said:

And my original question was do I have up to 3 days prior to sailing to enter all of my information into the system?  Perhaps not NCL specific, as I think that is probably SOP for all cruises, at least in N America.  

You can do it at the pier on the day of sailing if you want, it just speeds things up to do it ahead of time. 

[Laszlo]

4 hours ago, mek said:

I'm sailing on Joy 9/25/24 and I have to renew my passport.  Do I understand correctly that I have up until 3 days prior to sailing to complete and submit my passport information?

 

My current passport expires in August and I'm on the fence about paying extra to expedite the new one.  The end of September seems like a long way off and I would think I would have to new one back by the end of July, but this is summer and I'm not sure $60 is worth stressing out about getting the new one in time.

There is no question I would pay for expedited turn around. At the moment I have three friends, for three different parts of the US who are all waiting for their passport renewals. Two are going on almost 5 months and one is just over 6 months 

[IAcruising]

All this discussion about the 6-month rule.

 

My understanding is that it is NCL policy regardless of where you are going. If a passport is necessary, and it expires in less than 6 months, you will not be allowed to board.

 

I am more than willing to be corrected on this.

 

[mek]

41 minutes ago, IAcruising said:

All this discussion about the 6-month rule.

 

My understanding is that it is NCL policy regardless of where you are going. If a passport is necessary, and it expires in less than 6 months, you will not be allowed to board.

 

I am more than willing to be corrected on this.

 

The experience I had with my passport expiring one week after returning on a closed loop cruise was not on NCL, so not speaking from experience on that particular cruise line.

[mek]

1 hour ago, Laszlo said:

There is no question I would pay for expedited turn around. At the moment I have three friends, for three different parts of the US who are all waiting for their passport renewals. Two are going on almost 5 months and one is just over 6 months 

Well, the packet it in the mail w/o paying for expedited processing , so looks I'll just keep my fingers grossed.

Thankfully fingerprints are not required - it took me forever to get TSA approval and the only reason I can think of is that my fingerprints are not very defined.  I've had problems with them for other background checks that require fingerprints, (volunteer work), and the machine can't "read" my prints.

[mek]

1 hour ago, Laszlo said:

There is no question I would pay for expedited turn around. At the moment I have three friends, for three different parts of the US who are all waiting for their passport renewals. Two are going on almost 5 months and one is just over 6 months 

Wow - that seems crazy.  I will start tracking mine in a few weeks and hopefully I won't be in panic mode sometime in August.

[IAcruising]

6 minutes ago, mek said:

The experience I had with my passport expiring one week after returning on a closed loop cruise was not on NCL, so not speaking from experience on that particular cruise line.

 

Thanks for clarifying. That strengthens my understanding that it is NCL policy, regardless of differing laws.

 

[mek]

Just now, IAcruising said:

 

Thanks for clarifying. That strengthens my understanding that it is NCL policy, regardless of differing laws.

 

Well fortunately it was a Caribbean cruise, so just in case, I took my birth certificate with me, which would have worked it the passport had been a problem.

[WexIrl]

39 minutes ago, IAcruising said:

 

Thanks for clarifying. That strengthens my understanding that it is NCL policy, regardless of differing laws.

 

 

We are booked on a NCL Cruise out of the UK (traveling from Ireland) in 2 weeks time, both my teenagers passports expire in September this year. 

I have no fear of there being an issue with this.
(But I would be interested to see (and open to correction) where it explicitly states we will have an issue with the kids passports being out of date in less than 6 months)

We have travelled on passports around Europe/UK on passports that expire within 6 months with no issues previously.

 

Edited May 25 by WexIrl
added the word 'with'