Travel Tip Tuesday | Keep Your Passport Safe

How to keep your passport safe when traveling

Your passport is the key to proving your citizenship and it is the document that allows the US and other countries to recognize you. It is imperative that you safeguard this critical document at all times when traveling. In a nutshell, your passport is your key to traveling the world, and getting back home! 

This may seem like common sense (it is) but we do know of people that have put their passports in the pouch of on the back of their airplane seat and forgot them there when disembarking. They didn’t realize they had no passports until they reached customs. Luckily, the plane was searched and the cleaning crew found the passports and, they were returned, nightmare avoided. Another incident happened on a train in Switzerland. A friend’s passport somehow slipped out of her unzipped travel bag and onto the seat of the train, slipping between the seat and the wall. Thankfully, the passport was found and delivered to her two days later, just before she was about to make her way to the U.S. Embassy in Switzerland. 

We recommend a few tried and true travel tips to help you keep track of your passport. The next time you board a motor-coach, plane, or train, make sure that your passport is with you and fully secured in your pocketbook, pocket, or carry-on. Before leaving home make copies of all the pages of your passport – especially your personal details that can help speed up the replacement process should your original passport be lost or stolen. 

You can either scan all the pages of your passport and email them to yourself or take pictures of them with your phone. If you scan and email the pages of your passport to yourself, it is also a good idea to email your passport documents to a trusted friend or family member back home that can respond quickly to a request from you. 

As an extra back up, take a paper copy of your passport and put it in your suitcase, and if you are traveling with a partner or a friend, put your passport paper documents in your companion’s suitcase as well. 

Never forget to put emergency contact information on page four of your passport, this will help people locate you if you lose it, or if you are sick and unable to speak. 

Where Can You Use Your Passport?

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