No stress if passport is lost when travelling outside the EU

New rules adopted today by the European Parliament will make it easier and safer for those who lose their passports, have them stolen or damaged when travelling outside the EU to get temporary documents from any EU Member State’s consulate in a shorter period. These documents will be much safer and will offer protection against fraud and counterfeit.

Kinga Gál MEP, Spokeswoman for the EU Emergency Travel Document, said: “Through swift cooperation between Member States’ diplomatic services, the new Directive will guarantee that no EU citizen is refused when in need of a temporary travel document to get to their final destination. Such cooperation is crucial in cases when a traveller does not have the possibility to seek help at their own national embassy.”

The new legislation also increases security components of these temporary travel documents. “After recent improvements in the security of EU IDs, residency permits and Schengen visas, the European emergency travel documents are the last unsecured identity documents issued by the EU states. They have therefore been abused by human traffickers and smugglers and some states refuse to issue and accept them. With new features against counterfeit, such as live facial images of the applicants that are to be taken at the embassies to confirm their identity and machine-readable security features, we are addressing these security concerns”, added Gál.

The new temporary travelling document would be valid for a maximum of 15 days and can be used for those who lose their passports in order to travel back home. The procedure of verifying applicants’ identity and issuing an emergency travel document for them should take a maximum of 4 days.