Five years ago I stood in line at the San Fer­nan­do Im­mi­gra­tion of­fice from 4 am and did not leave un­til af­ter lunch. Then I had to wait three months to get the ma­chine read­able pass­port. What a 180 de­gree turn! Af­ter mak­ing an ap­point­ment for Sep­tem­ber 10, (that was the date I want­ed-I was of­fered a much ear­li­er ap­point­ment) I was re­mind­ed by text of the said ap­point­ment. I went to the of­fice at 7.45 am and was home in my house in San Fer­nan­do by 8.35 am. Yes, all busi­ness com­plet­ed in less than 15 min­utes by some very cour­te­ous, ef­fi­cient and friend­ly of­fi­cers. On Sep­tem­ber 17, I re­ceived an e-mail mes­sage stat­ing that my new pass­port was ready. I col­lect­ed the pass­port on Sep­tem­ber 21, again in 15 min­utes. Con­grat­u­la­tions to the Min­istry for such an amaz­ing turn-around. Your ef­f­i­cen­cy is great­ly ap­pre­ci­at­ed. Thank you. An ex­tra thank you to the very kind and help­ful fe­male po­lice of­fi­cer who went out of her way to help us se­nior cit­i­zens.

San­dra Robert­son

San Fer­nan­do