All 19 regional consular offices (RCOs) of the Department of Foreign Affairs have been issuing electronic passports (ePassports) since April 28, Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo said.
“This way, our kababayans (countrymen) living in the provinces and overseas need not come to Manila to get a passport. They just have to go to an RCO nearest them and avail of the same fast and efficient services,†he added.
The same day that the RCOs shifted from the machine-readable passport (MRP) to the
ePassport, the Philippine consulate general in Hong Kong also rolled out the
ePassports, the DFA-Office of Consular Affairs (OCA) said.
Other embassies and consulates general will soon follow suit, it said.
In the coming months, the DFA-OCA plans to accommodate more people as it will ramp up the system to accept more appointments—from 2,800 a day to around 3,300 a day, and even more in the near future. It is also aiming for a shorter queuing and turnaround time from receipt of application to the issuance of the passports. Earlier, Romulo said
ePassport applications could last no more than 30 minutes from start to end. - Philippine Daily Inquirer
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