Horror and happiness of Home Affairs

I SHARE with your correspondent Ilan Lipschitz, The Mercury, March 13, his frustration with Home Affairs. I recently waited seven and a half months for my unabridged birth certificate from the Chatsworth office.

However, although we get frustrated, we should recognise service excellence when it happens.

I decided to visit Home Affairs in Umgeni Road to enquire how long it would take to renew a passport as my daughter, who works in the UK, was coming over to visit and needed to renew her South African passport.

I went there before her arrival to find out if this was possible within a two-week time frame. A very positive supervisor gave me her name and said to bring my daughter in to see her upon her arrival.

On Wednesday, March 8, at 7.30am we were in the queue, which was more than 100m long. When the doors opened, I saw the lady I had spoken to previously and she immediately took my daughter and I inside.

We paid the R400 fee for the passport and did the biometrics. Once my daughter’s number was called, the supervisor assisted by marking the passport application a priority and we left just after 10am.

The following Monday morning, two working days later, she called me to say the passport had arrived at Umgeni Road and we could pick it up. On Wednesday, I went to fetch it. There was no queue at all and we exited Home Affairs 20 minutes later, passport in hand.

There are people in Home Affairs who are very passionate about customer service.

Thank you Estella, you are a credit to Home Affairs.

HUGH ACTON Queensburgh