Life would have been much more simple if I’d been born with the same surname as my wife. The hassle she is going through since our recent wedding changing her surname on such things as pensions, credit cards and bank accounts is a pain.
To alter the details in your passport though – as we’ve found out – is an extra layer of annoyance. The UK Passport Office charges £72.50 to change surname letters (in our case, six) on the particulars, even if the expiry date of your previous one is still many years off, as my wife’s was. It seems grossly unfair to the hundreds of thousands of (mainly) women who might want to do this each year. Changing your name on a document you have already paid for should be a free service, no? The DVLA doesn’t charge for driving licences. So why for passports? It got me thinking about other things in life it seems out of order to have to stump up cash for.
When I buy something from a shop, I can almost always return it no quibbles for a full refund, or at the very least a voucher for the same amount.
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