Mismanagement to blame for passport delays last year: report

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The extraordinary delays at passport offices across the country over the last year are being blamed on mismanagement.

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Accordingly Blacklock’s ReporterAn internal federal memo said half of employees were sent to work from home and 20% quit at the height of the backlog.

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“Processing times remain long due to the sheer volume of applications,” then-Social Development Minister Karina Gould testified before the House of Commons Personnel Committee on May 30, 2022.

When travel restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic were lifted last year, the federal government said it was faced with an unusually high number of passport applications.

However, an information note dated June 23, 2022 said that they had known for a year that they had to prepare for increased interest in traveling.

“In anticipation of increasing volumes, Service Canada began implementing a staffing plan,” the release said. Pass productivity and staffing measures.

But the latest memo blamed management for not being prepared.

“High application volumes, coupled with staffing limitations due to health and safety measures in place in spring 2022, resulted in an inventory build that exceeded our capacity to process applications,” staff wrote Processing passports and providing services.

“Applications were submitted by mail at an unprecedented rate, nearly double pre-pandemic levels,” the memo continued. “Postal applications are approximately 40% less efficient to process compared to applications submitted in person.”