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  1. #1
    たのむよ。
    The Gentleman Scamp's Avatar
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    Not my passport application

    Got this in my junk mail, I suppose some civil servant leaked it - but I found it relevant and relatable. My sympathy to whoever wrote it.


    Dear Minister,
    I'm in the process of renewing my passport but I am a
    total loss to understand or believe the hoops I am being
    asked to jump through.

    How is it that Bert Smith of T.V. Rentals Basingstoke has
    my address and telephone number and knows that I bought a
    satellite dish from them back in 1994, and yet, the
    Government is still asking me where I was born and on what
    date?
    How come that nice West African immigrant chappy who comes
    round every Thursday night with his DVD rentals van can
    tell me every film or video I have had out since he
    started his business up eleven years ago, yet you still
    want me to remind you of my last three jobs, two of which
    were with contractors working for the government?

    How come the T.V. detector van can tell if my T.V. is on,
    what channel I am watching and whether I have paid my
    licence or not, and yet if I win the government run
    lottery they have no idea I have won or where I am and
    will keep the bloody money to themselves if I fail to
    claim in good time.
    Do you people do this by hand?

    You have my birth date on numerous files you hold on me,
    including the one with all the income tax forms I've filed
    for the past 30-odd years. It's on my health insurance
    card, my driver's licence, on the last four passports I've
    had, on all those stupid customs declaration forms I've
    had to fill out before being allowed off ! the planes and
    boats over the last 30 years, and all those insufferable
    census forms that are done every ten years and the
    electoral registration forms I have to complete, by law,
    every time our lords and masters are up for re-election.

    Would somebody please take note, once and for all, I was
    born in Maidenhead on the 4th of March 1957, my mother's
    name is Mary, her maiden name was Reynolds, my father's
    name is Robert, and I'd be absolutely astounded if that
    ever changed between now and the day I die!

    I apologise Minister. I'm obviously not myself this
    morning. But between you and me, I have simply had enough!
    You mail the application to my house and then you ask me
    for my address. What is going on? Do you have a gang of
    Neanderthals working there? Look at my damn picture. Do I
    look like Bin Laden? I don't want to activate the Fifth
    Reich for God's sake! I just want to go and park my weary
    backside on a sunny, sandy beach for a couple of week's
    well-earned rest away from all this crap.

    Well, I have to go now, because I have to go back to
    Salisbury and get another copy of my birth certificate
    because you lost the last one. AND! to the tune of 60
    quid! What a racket THAT is!! Would it be so complicated
    to have all the services in the same spot to assist in the
    issuance of a new passport the same day? But no, that'd be
    too damn easy and maybe make sense. You'd rather have us
    running all over the place like chickens with our heads
    cut off, then find some tosser to confirm that it's really
    me on the goddamn picture - you know... the one where
    we're not allowed to smile in case we look as if we are
    enjoying the process!
    Hey, you know why we can't smile? 'Cause we're totally
    jacked off!

    I served in the armed forces for more than 25 years
    including over ten years at the Ministry of Defence in
    London. I have had security clearances which allowed me to
    sit in the Cabinet Office, five seats away from the Prime
    Minister while he was being briefed on the first Gulf War
    and I have been doing volunteer work for the British Red
    Cross ever since I left the Services. However, I have to
    get someone 'important' to verif! y who I am -- you know,
    someone like my doctor... who, before he got his medical
    degree 6 months ago WAS LIVING IN PAKISTAN...

    Yours sincerely,
    An irate British Citizen.
    "I'm an outsider by choice, but not truly. It's the unpleasantness of the system that keeps me out. I'd rather be in, in a good system. That's where my discontent comes from: being forced to choose to stay outside.
    My advice: Just keep movin' straight ahead. Every now and then you find yourself in a different place."

    George Carlin

  2. #2
    Thailand Expat
    astasinim's Avatar
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  3. #3
    Cacoethes scribendi
    Loombucket's Avatar
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    ^^Yeah, that, kind of, sums up my feelings too. Everything in that letter is what it is really like, trying do do anything through the government, in the UK.

    Nice Post.

  4. #4
    Member
    meow's Avatar
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    Oooooooooooohhhhh ! (sound of red hot metal hissing in a bucket of cold water)

    Very well written and straight to the point. There really is no retort to that one !

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