Passport price hike: why Australian passport fees keep going up
Heading to the post office to get my passport renewed, I got a nasty shock. I could not believe how much it cost to get an Australian travel document.
My passport expires soon and I recently received a helpful text from the federal government reminding me to get a new one.
It has been on my to-do list for a while but in the lead-up to Christmas, the end of year craziness and then the never-ending school holidays, it got pushed to the bottom.
When I finally got to the post office to sort it out, I got two very rude shocks.
The first was my passport photos. They were taken quickly and when I saw them I almost dropped my coffee.
I know these portraits aren’t supposed to be flattering but wow, they were bad. It seems there is a big difference between the age of 35 and 45 when you are snapped for the equivalent of a police mugshot against the wall of your local post office with harsh fluorescent lighting.
I blame my kids, not sleeping for the past decade, the pandemic, too many gin and tonics, my mortgage, life … well pretty much everything for why I now look 10 years older than I actually am.
The second shock, delivered while I was still recovering from the first, was the cost of a 10-year passport. As of January 1 the price is $412. I’m sorry, how much?
And if I want it back in fewer than four to six weeks (which I do), it will cost a further $104 – a grand total of $516.
I am pretty sure that would buy a cheap overseas airfare to a place where I could have a nice gin and tonic by the pool. It could even be a deposit on some type of anti-ageing procedure.
As my colleague Penny Hunter wrote in this column last year, the price of our travel document went up 15 per cent in July, making it the second-most costly passport in the world. Now that 2025 has ticked over and inflation has kicked in, it has become the most expensive in the world.
The nearest rivals are Mexico ($353.90), the US ($252.72) and New Zealand ($193.72), according to recent reports.
It is one thing to read about cost increases, but it is another thing entirely to fork out that much money, especially during a cost-of-living crisis where every trip to the supermarket seems to set you back at least $180.
Back in 2015, when I was younger and much more carefree, my passport cost me only $250. It was a bargain in comparison. No wonder I looked better in the picture.
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