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| Personal appearance is required for all Philippine passport applicants |
The Philippine Consulate has issued a warning on Facebook about “fixers” who offer to help Filipinos obtain travel documents in exchange for a fee of at least $1,000.
The Consulate
did not cite any specifics in its post yesterday, Aug. 30, but said it only
charges $240 for a travel document (passport or one-way travel document) and
$200 for affidavits of loss or undertaking.
“The Consulate
wishes to stress that these illegal fixers are not in any way connected to the Consulate
or any of its personnel,” the advisory said.
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| PINDUTIN DITO |
Vice Consul
George Soriano who heads the assistance to nationals section of the Consulate,
said the cases reported to them involved Philippine residents who paid to get
their passport applications processed by the fixers.
“They might have
the wrong idea that they can apply without personal appearance,” he said.
In both
instances, or when applying for a passport or executing an affidavit, the
applicant is required to appear in person at the Consulate.
Passport
applicants must personally appear to get their photos and biometrics taken, while
they should appear before an officer authorized to administer oaths when
executing an affidavit.
Soriano
clarified the victims in these cases did not include Filipino domestic workers
who pawned their passports to obtain loans, an illegal practice that appears to
have become prevalent again lately.
All those who
apply for new passports either because they lost them or had pawned them still
appear before him to apply for a replacement, said Soriano.
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| Basahin ang detalye! |
These cases are dealt with on a case-to-case basis, and if the applicant urgently needs to fly home, a travel document is issued, he added.
This would mean applying for a new
passport back in the Philippines, if the person involved needs to travel back
to Hong Kong or other places abroad.
To obtain a
replacement passport, one is required to execute an affidavit of loss, which
could make the applicant pay even more money to a fixer, again, without
realizing that a personal appearance is also required for this purpose.
“The Consulate
reminds the public to be vigilant and to only transact directly with the
Consulate’s personnel for consular services such as issuances of travel
documents, passports, notarial services and civil registry services at the 14th
floor, United Centre, 95 Queensway, Admiralty,” said the advisory.
Anyone who is
victimized by these so-called fixers is urged to report immediately to the ATN
section through telephone numbers 2823-8514, 2823-8513, 2823-8516 or 2823-8505
or email to atn.hkpg@gmail.com
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