TL;DR
- His Majesty's Passport Office (HMPO) operates seven regional offices in 2026: London (Globe House, Eccleston Square), Belfast, Durham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Newport and Peterborough.
- The Premium 1-day and Fast Track 1-week services are appointment-only, booked at gov.uk/get-a-passport-urgently through the consolidated appointment portal rolled out in early 2025.
- HMPO's processing arm sits inside each office and handles standard postal renewals; the customer-facing arm runs the appointment counters.
- HMPO issues roughly 7 to 8 million passports a year (HMPO annual report), with seasonal peaks between March and August.
- Contact channels in 2026 run through the GOV.UK online forms and the published HMPO callback request page. No phone number is reproduced here: numbers change and the GOV.UK page is the authoritative source.
The seven HMPO regional offices and their customer-facing role
His Majesty's Passport Office (HMPO), the executive agency inside the Home Office that issues British passports, operates seven UK regional offices in 2026. The full list is London (Globe House in Eccleston Square), Belfast, Durham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Newport and Peterborough. Each office hosts both a customer-facing appointment counter for Premium and Fast Track applications, and a back-office processing function that handles a share of the national postal application workload.
Customer-facing access is by appointment only. There is no walk-in service in 2026. The change away from walk-in capacity dates to the post-pandemic operating model adopted by HMPO in 2022 and consolidated under the 2025 appointment system. Appointments at all seven offices are booked through the single GOV.UK portal at gov.uk/get-a-passport-urgently.
Premium 1-day and Fast Track 1-week at the appointment counter
Two paid uplift services drive most of the in-person traffic at the HMPO offices. The Premium 1-day service costs GBP 207.50 in 2026 and delivers a new passport at the appointment itself, with the book issued before the applicant leaves the office. The Fast Track 1-week service costs GBP 178 and runs as a postal-style appointment where the applicant submits documents in person and receives the new passport by Royal Mail Tracked within seven days.
Both services are time-limited. Premium appointments are slot-bound (typically 30 minutes) and the applicant must arrive with every required document. Late arrivals lose the slot and the fee is not refunded. Fast Track is more forgiving on the appointment slot but still requires the documents to be complete on the day.
What to bring to an HMPO appointment
The HMPO appointment bundle in 2026 is: the partly-completed online application or signed paper form, the expiring or previous passport (for renewals), two printed photos meeting the HMPO photo guide (digital photos do not work for in-person appointments without an upload code), any supporting documents for name changes (deed poll, marriage certificate, court order), the email confirmation of the appointment and the payment confirmation.
For first adult passports the bundle expands to include a full birth certificate (long-form), a countersignatory's confirmation, evidence of parents' nationality at the applicant's birth, and any naturalisation or registration certificate where applicable. For lost or stolen replacements, a completed LS01 declaration is added.
What this means in practice: a London-based applicant whose passport expires in three weeks before a confirmed booking pays GBP 207.50, books a Premium slot at Globe House through gov.uk/get-a-passport-urgently, arrives 15 minutes early with the expiring passport, two photos, the application reference and a debit card receipt, and leaves the appointment with a new 10-year book in hand.
The processing function: postal applications and the back office
Each regional office runs a back-office processing function that handles a share of the national postal workload. Liverpool is the established hub for overseas applications; the other six offices process UK postal renewals on a workload-balancing basis under HMPO's national queue.
Postal applications do not require any in-person attendance. The back-office function is invisible to the applicant beyond the receipt and despatch emails. The applicant's posted documents return by Royal Mail Tracked 24 once the new passport is ready.
HMPO's annual reports published through 2024 and 2025 noted total passport issuance of roughly 7 to 8 million books a year, with the postal route accounting for the majority of volume and the urgent appointment routes for a small but high-revenue minority. The 2024 figure was 7.4 million books issued.
HMPO contact channels in 2026
HMPO contact in 2026 runs through three official channels and no others. The first is the GOV.UK online contact form, reached from the HM Passport Office page on GOV.UK, which logs the query against a reference number and replies by email. The second is the HMPO callback request service, where the applicant submits a contact number on GOV.UK and HMPO calls back during business hours. The third is the consolidated appointment portal at gov.uk/get-a-passport-urgently, which handles booking and rescheduling queries.
No phone number is reproduced on this page. Numbers occasionally change and the GOV.UK HM Passport Office page is the only authoritative source for the current contact line. Applicants are advised to ignore any premium-rate "passport help" numbers advertised on third-party websites: those are not HMPO and incur high call charges.
The 2026 update: consolidated appointment portal and seasonal capacity
From early 2025 HMPO replaced the previous per-office booking pages with a single consolidated portal at gov.uk/get-a-passport-urgently. The portal aggregates Premium and Fast Track slots across all seven offices and lets an applicant search by date and proximity. The change improved booking availability outside London by surfacing free slots in Newport, Peterborough and Durham that had been invisible to applicants searching only the London page.
Seasonal capacity in 2026 follows the established HMPO pattern. The March-August period carries roughly 60 percent of annual passport applications, driven by summer travel. Premium slots in London routinely book out 4 to 6 weeks in advance during this window, with greater availability at Belfast, Durham and Peterborough. Capacity tightens further around bank holidays.
Escalation routes and complaints when HMPO falls short
Where an application has missed the published 3-week standard, the first escalation channel is the GOV.UK contact form, citing the application reference number and date of submission. HMPO's published service standard commits to a response within ten working days. Where the application is needed for confirmed travel within seven days, the GOV.UK page for urgent-travel escalations sets out the request route to the HMPO escalations team, which can fast-track standard-fee applications without charging the Premium uplift in genuine emergency cases.
The HMPO complaints process runs in three stages. Stage one is the local complaint to the office handling the application, typically resolved within twenty working days. Stage two is escalation to a senior HMPO complaints manager. Stage three is referral to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman through the applicant's MP. The Ombudsman cannot order HMPO to issue a passport but can find maladministration and recommend compensation, with HMPO consistently complying with these recommendations in published annual reports.
What this means in practice: an applicant whose passport application has sat past the 3-week standard with confirmed travel five days ahead lodges an urgent-travel escalation through the GOV.UK form, citing the booking reference and the GBP 88.50 fee already paid. HMPO's escalations team typically responds within 48 hours and either issues the passport without uplift or offers a same-week Premium appointment at the standard Premium fee.
HMPO's place inside the Home Office and operational accountability
HMPO is an executive agency of the Home Office, accountable to the Minister of State for Immigration through its Chief Executive. It operates under a Framework Agreement with the Home Office that sets its strategic objectives, performance measures and reporting obligations. The agency publishes annual reports and accounts laid before Parliament, with its 2023/24 report showing total operating income of around GBP 600 million driven by passport fee revenue and operating costs broadly matched against that income under the cost-recovery model.
Operational accountability runs through the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration, who reviews HMPO performance periodically alongside the wider immigration system. The agency's IT systems sit on the Home Office Atlas platform, shared with the wider visa casework function, with passport-specific modules for the digital service and the consolidated appointment portal.
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How we verified this
The HMPO office list, customer-facing services and contact channels were checked in May 2026 against the GOV.UK HM Passport Office page at gov.uk/government/organisations/hm-passport-office and the urgent passport pages at gov.uk/get-a-passport-urgently. Annual issuance volumes were drawn from the HMPO annual report and accounts for 2023/24. The consolidated appointment portal rollout was verified through the GOV.UK announcement in early 2025. Premium and Fast Track fees and processing times were checked against the GOV.UK passport fees and urgent service pages. Only GOV.UK and HMPO sources were used.
Disclaimer: The content on this page is for informational and educational purposes only. Kaeltripton.com is an independent UK editorial publisher, not authorised or regulated by the FCA or OISC. Nothing on this page constitutes immigration, legal or visa advice. Always verify with GOV.UK or an OISC-registered adviser before acting. ICO registered ZC135439.
Frequently asked questions
How many passport offices does the UK have in 2026?
HMPO operates seven regional offices: London (Globe House), Belfast, Durham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Newport and Peterborough. Each office runs both a customer-facing appointment counter for Premium and Fast Track services and a back-office processing function handling a share of the national postal application workload.
Can a passport be collected without an appointment at the HMPO office?
No. There is no walk-in service in 2026. Premium and Fast Track collection are by booked appointment only, through the consolidated GOV.UK portal at gov.uk/get-a-passport-urgently. Standard postal renewals are returned by Royal Mail Tracked, not by collection.
Which HMPO office is the closest to me?
The GOV.UK appointment portal lists slot availability across all seven offices in a single search. London (Globe House) covers the south-east, Newport covers Wales and the south-west, Peterborough the east, Durham the north-east, Liverpool the north-west, Glasgow Scotland, and Belfast Northern Ireland. Slot availability often differs from proximity.
How is the HMPO contact phone number found?
The current HMPO contact number is published on the GOV.UK HM Passport Office page, which is the only authoritative source. Numbers occasionally change and third-party "passport help" lines charging premium rates are not HMPO. Online forms and the callback request are the lower-cost contact route in 2026.
How many British passports does HMPO issue each year?
HMPO annual reports published through 2024 and 2025 indicate roughly 7 to 8 million passports issued per year, with 7.4 million books issued in 2024. Roughly 60 percent of volume falls between March and August, driven by the summer travel peak. Postal renewals carry the majority of volume; urgent appointments are a smaller, higher-revenue stream.