The Department of Foreign Affairs had announced, starting June 1, those who will not show up on the date of their passport appoint will be barred from re-applying for 30 days."If you don't show up you're not going be able to reserve for 30 days. So please take your reservation seriously," the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) CHief told ANC Channel's Headstart program.
"Disregarding the schedule given to applicants by the DFA consular division has resulted in a two-month waiting period for hundreds of applicants," Almendra said.
People complain it takes two months to take a slot to be interviewed. Statistic showed that 47 percent of people who applied for appointment do not show up," Almendra added.
As there is no fee for passport application reservation, Almendras observed that many Filipinos take their slots for granted because they could easily apply for a new one.
Meanwhile, apart from problems on passport reservation, Almendras acknowledge that the DFA was experiencing challenges in cutting down the processing time, which normally takes two and a half hours to complete.
Almendras appealed to the Filipinos for patience as the DFA is transitioning to a new system to accommodate the huge volume of passport applications.
Another cause of delay is the stringent security check that applicants have to go though due to thousands of cases of identity fraud encountered by the DFA.
"We have a lot more screening happening. We have to double check. We receive 15,000 applications per day and about 4,000 applications are bumped off. We have to investigate, we have to protect the integrity of the passport," he said.
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