A 10-year-old boy was left "screaming and sobbing" after he couldn't join his friends on a skiing trip because of passport delays.
Mum Kirsty Morgan applied to have her son Reuben Murphy's child passport renewed a full month ahead of the planned trip to the Italian ski resort of Bormio. But after what she claimed were repeated delays with the passport arriving, his mum had to tell him he couldn't join his school friends for the much-anticipated trip, before they all move on to secondary school later in the year.
Kirsty, 39, from Anfield, said: "I had to tell an excited 10 year old boy who's in his last year of school he's not going skiing with his friends. It was one of the most heartbreaking experiences of my life. He was devastated, screaming and sobbing."
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The mum-of-one said the Passport Office and courier firm TNT were "blaming each other" for the non-arrival of the child passport.
She added: "I was told I could have it cancelled and an emergency one reissued if I went to the passport office, so I did three times only to be told by a manager there was nothing they could do. No one could tell me exactly where my son's passport was."
At one point Kirsty claimed she was told she could go to Liverpool John Lennon Airport if she wanted to pick up the passport in person, only to receive a text the next day to say it had already been "loaded on the van."
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But despite this, the vital document still did not arrive in time for the necessary tests to be carried out before Reuben could travel with his friends from All Saints Catholic Primary School in Anfield.
She said: "People had applied in the same time frame as me and had their passport within two weeks and it was first time too. Reuben's was a renewal, it was his third passport.
"I'm absolutely disgusted. I've never heard him so upset as that in all my life when I told him he couldn't go. It was so sad, it was like somebody had died."
A Passport Office spokesperson said: "As is clearly indicated in our online guidance people should allow up to 10 weeks to get their passport when applying from the UK, or they can apply via a one-week fast track service for child passport renewals."
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