Scan your Passport!!!!

Yesterday while I was wasting the hours away on the sofa, I watched Top 20 Travel Tips. I thought it would be a real big bore of a show, that I could keep on as background noise while I surfed the web. I was surprised that the show was not only entertaining but very informative. Most of the Travel Tips I had already known, but the show helped to expand as well as broaden my knowledge of the tip(s).

One of the tips that I thought was just ingenious was to have your passport scanned and then sent via an email to yourself. In the past I just made two photocopies of my passport. One I placed at home and let a friend know where it is and the second copy I would leave in my luggage in another place other then where my real passport is kept. With scanning you have a real copy of your passport rather then a poor photocopied version available to you anywhere you have access to an internet cafe.

You may ask yourself why should I go through all the trouble of coping my passport anyway? Well imagine this scenario.

While shopping through the lovely town of Bath, England, you decide to take a break and have a spot of tea, how very British of you. While you sip your steaming Earl Grey, you don't seem to notice when a thief steals your bag. It's not until you have to pay for your tea, that you realize what has happened.

What to do now?

Not only were your credit cards and money in the bag, but your passport was also in there and now with your Chase and Citibank, your passport is gone also. Luckily you call your credit card companies and have them all canceled, plus Citibank has a branch in London so you can get another card the next day when your visiting. Your travel companions agree to cover your expenses while your in this bind. But how do you plan to get back into the good ole' USA? And won't the Citibank branch in London need some proof of identification?

So, instead of spending the next couple of days touring the Tower of London and appreciating the art work of the Tate Modern, you have to spend it at the US Embassy dealing with a whole roll of bureaucratic red tape.

The event described above actually did happen to a friend of mine. They did not make a copy of their passport, nor did they have any other type of identification. The replacement of the passport took so long they had to extend the trip an extra 2 days; the robbery took place 2 days before the end of the trip.

How could this event been avoided? If you had just listened to the wise words in this blog and had your passport scanned into an email, you could have just stopped into an internet cafe, had it printed, and then stopped by the nearest US Embassy. Travel guru Rick Steve's gives this advice. "Losing your passport while traveling is a major headache. If you do, contact the police and the nearest US consulate or embassy right away. You can get a short term replacement, but you'll earn it. A photocopy or computer scan can speed the replacement process."
To view Top 20 Travel Tips show click here for future listings or click here to see the entire list via Fine Living Network's website.