UK passport applicants to get £50 refund

The Nigerian High Commission in the United Kingdom has announced plans to refund £50 to applicants who paid a £70 administrative fee during the ongoing passport intervention exercise.

Under the new arrangement, applicants will retain only the approved £20 administrative charge, while the remaining £50 will be returned to them.

The commission announced the refund in a notice published on its official website on Friday.

“This is to inform all passport intervention applicants that have paid £70 admin fee that £50 will be refunded to you, £20 being the standard admin fee,” the notice stated.

The development followed complaints from Nigerians in the UK over charges and other difficulties encountered during the special passport intervention exercise.

The Federal Government had, on September 8, denied introducing additional charges for the exercise, maintaining that applicants were only required to pay the approved passport fees, apart from applicable bank charges.

The Ministry of Interior said neither it nor the Nigeria Immigration Service had authorised any charges outside the official passport fees.

The NIS reiterated the position on September 11, stating that applicants were not required to pay additional charges to participate in the intervention exercise.

Meanwhile, the passport intervention exercise has been extended in London and Manchester following a high turnout.

The exercise, which was initially scheduled to end on September 19, will now run until October 3 in the two cities.

The NIS said 1,477 Nigerians had been successfully processed and enrolled within the first four days of the exercise, adding that more than half of the passports had already been produced and dispatched.

The refund is expected to address concerns surrounding the disputed administrative charge as the intervention exercise continues.