Home delivery service for passports inaugurated

Official says move is to save public from exploitation by passport office staff

KARACHI: Residents of Karachi will now have the option to have their passports delivered at home, for a small fee, instead of personally going to collect them from the passport office.

A home delivery service for passports was launched on Monday by the private courier service, TCS, in collaboration with the government and the National Bank of Pakistan.



The same service was inaugurated in Islamabad by interior minister Chaudary Nisar Ali Khan on November 26 this year.

Immigration and Passports director Mazhar Yasin Watto was the chief guest at the launch, held at the Regional Passport Office, Saddar, where TCS marketing director Naiyar Saifi was also present.

Under the project, Karachi residents will now have the option of having their machine-readable passports delivered to them at their doorsteps through TCS Passport Express Service for Rs250.

"The corruption element [in the department] will minimise with the start of the TCS Passport Express Service," said Watto. He clarified that the courier will verify the recipient through a biometric device at the door so the right person gets the passport.



He said by this service, they want people to avoid the hassle of constant visits to the passport office, adding that by launching this initiative the precious time of their clients will be saved and people will not be vulnerable to exploitation by passport office staff.

If a person is not available at the designated address, after two to three weeks the passport will be delivered to the regional office from where it can be collected, he explained.

The token slip provided to the applicant would be retrieved from TCS staff while handing over the passport to the right person.

Saifi said the service, which was launched in Islamabad and Rawalpindi last month, has now been extended to Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar and can be termed a landmark event. He added that the service will be extended to Quetta and Muzaffarabad and be made available countrywide by the first week of March next year.



"TCS will ensure that the passports dispatched by the authorities reach the correct person or an authorised representative on the given address within the prescribed time in a safe and secure manner," said Saifi. He added that a client can complain to TCS or the Islamabad passport office in case of late delivery.

According to Watto, the interior minister is trying to meet global standards and for this purpose an online application process for passport renewal will be started soon. He further said that executive passports offices will be established in 16 different cities of the country with state-of-the-art facilities in 2016.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 29^th, 2015.