When applying for a US passport renewal, the first thing you need to
do is to determine whether you are eligible to apply by mail or whether
you need to go to the post office and apply for a new passport there.
In general, you qualify to renew your passport by mail as long as all of the statements below apply to you:
-
Your passport was issued on or after your 16th birthday.
-
Your passport has not been lost or stolen.
-
Your passport was issued less that 15 years ago.
-
You have the legal documents to substantiate any name change requests
that have become necessary since your last passport was issued.
-
Your passport is undamaged.
Most of those statements are pretty clear-cut, but what about the
requirement that the passport be "undamaged?" After all, if you use your
passport frequently to travel, some wear and tear is unavoidable no
matter how careful you are.
According to the State Department,
the following is considered "normal wear and tear" and does not
disqualify you from getting a US passport renewal:
-
"Bending" from carrying your passport around in your pocket.
-
"Fanning" of visa pages; in other words, your passport has been gone
through so many times that it doesn't want to close properly anymore.
The following is considered "significant damage," and you must apply for a new passport in person at a post office :
-
Water damage
-
Torn pages
-
Torn out visa pages
-
Writing on the data page that wasn't put there by someone official
-
Holes punched through
-
Other injuries
If the wear and tear on your passport is somewhere between "normal" and "significant," applying for a US passport renewal by
mail is a crap shoot. If the Department of State determines that your
passport is "significantly damaged," you'll have to apply again in
person with proof of identity and proof of citizenship. You'll also be
out a second set of application fees, so it's best just to apply for a
new passport if there's any question about the condition of your old
one.
