Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, for what reason his Department charges more for applications for passports accepted through post offices compared with online applications.

The current fees charged by Her Majesty’s Passport Office for administering a passport application, as approved by Parliament in March 2018, introduced a differential depending upon whether an application is made online or by post to reflect that digital applications are cheaper to process.

Check & Send is an additional service provided by Post Office Ltd. Fees charged for passport applications submitted at a Post Office include a Check & Send element. This fee is levied by Post Office Ltd for the service that they provide. The fee will differ depending upon whether the customer chooses to apply via a paper form or digitally.