Canadians who sent their passport application by mail more than 20 days ago will now be able to apply for a transfer at one of the 300 Service Canada Centers if they have a trip planned within the next 20 days.

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Before, transfer requests were only made in person at a passport office or by contacting the call center.

With this new service offering, Canadians who present proof of travel will have their application expedited in order to receive the valuable document on time, by mail or at a passport office.

“This change is intended to reduce the number of file transfers processed by passport offices and to minimize the local printing burden,” said Minister Gould. It will expedite the processing of requests for which the service standard has not been met and a file transfer has been requested. Offices should also see a further reduction in queues associated with urgent applications at passport offices.”

Fees may apply if the request was submitted less than 20 days ago and a transfer is required due to imminent travel.

Since April 1, Service Canada has issued no less than 665,532 passports, including 51,418 in the week of July 18 to 24. Also, for that same week, the average call center wait time was around 50 minutes.