Passport gender change

[Hypatia]

A month ago I applied for a new U.S. passport, including:
* a letter from my doctor to the State Department that I am planning to get SRS by a year from now and I need a female passport,
* a certified copy of my court order.
* I marked "Female" on the application.
The ID I used was my old driver's license. I got my new passport yesterday with my girlname and my pretty face on it.

It had M instead of F.  WTF!

What went wrong? How do I get it corrected (and will it cost me another $60)?

[BeverlyAnn]

Hypatia,

This is from tsroadmap.com:
To get your name and sex changed on a valid US passport, you will need a court-ordered name change and a notarized letter from your surgeon showing you have had sex reassignment surgery.

For more, including important steps you must take, see the passport page.

(Bold text is mine)
Beverly

[Andrew]

I thought you could get a provisional one that was valid for a year if you were planning SRS. Do they not offer that anymore?

[Hypatia]

If that's what the Roadmap says, it needs updating. Current rules say you can get a 1-year temporary passport with a letter from the surgeon describing the nature of the operation. I was on the phone with a nice lady at the passport service just now (my phone voice is getting me called ma'am almost every time now). She read the rules to me and I think that may be what tripped me up. The doctor who wrote the letter is the guy at my transgender clinic who prescribes my hormones. He and I were both unaware of the crucial word surgeon. We thought "physician" was enough.

Anyway, I got a F2F appointment at the main passport office in DC tomorrow. Wish me luck.

[Sarah Louise]

This is from 2005, from Susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,1211.0/topicseen.html,
I have not looked to see if it is still there.

NPIC, Passport" ... 5.  Medical documentation that they have either undergone gender reassignment surgery OR that they are preoperative transsexual and will soon have the surgery.  The medical documentation for a post-operative transsexual should be from the surgeon or hospital that performed the surgery.  Preoperative transsexuals should provide a detailed statement from their medical (not pyschological) physician which outlines their treatment.

If you have further questions, please email us at NPIC@stte.gov.

Etc.


Sarah L.

[BeverlyAnn]

If that's what the Roadmap says, it needs updating. Current rules say you can get a 1-year temporary passport with a letter from the surgeon describing the nature of the operation.

Yep, the temp passport is on the passport page.  What I quoted here was the rules for the 10 year, or however long it is now, passport.  Anyway, good luck hon.  Hope it all works out well.

Beverly

[Sheila]

I think that I must have been meant to be female. I had no problems with my passport. I had my name change documents and two letters from my therapists and my birth certificate (says Male). I had gone down to our post office, which is where we apply for a passport, and put in an application. I didn't put down in the box my gender as I thought I would ask him what to do. He asked for my birth certificate and then my document for name change and my drivers license, which had F on it. He said that he would have to send my birth certificate in with my application. No problem. He also told me to mark one or the other on the gender box. So, I marked F. He told me that he had to send it off to San Francisco and I should get it back in about 5 weeks, now this was in 2004. I expected to have a one year passport with M in the gender box. Well, I got it back and it was a 10 year passport and it was marked female. I was so happy, I dragged my passport all over town and showed it off. I never did show my letters from my therapist. I don't know what I did, but I did it right whatever I did.
Sheila

[melissa90299]

I have had so many stories about federal bureaucrats screwing up and many times in our favor. I went to the SF passport office, they followed the letter of the law and issued a one year passport. The letter that I provided was from my FFS surgeon. It was just easier to slide by Dr O's office than write my Thai surgeon and wait for the mail.

[Ms Bev]

http://www.outinperth.com/index.php/news/national/trans-woman-wins-landmark-passport-case

[tinkerbell]

Hmmmm...that is strange.  If you provided them with the documentation from your doctor, they should have given you the one year temporary passport with an F on it.  Perhaps things are changing due to the upcoming Real ID Act?

tink

[Berliegh]

In England , U.K you have to have lived in a female role for over 2 years and already have had documentation like a passport for that time period before anyone will consider giving a referral for GRS. It looks like the rules are musch easier in the U.S than over here?

[Anonymouse]

Berliegh Wrote:

In England , U.K you have to have lived in a female role for over 2 years and already have had documentation like a passport for that time period before anyone will consider giving a referral for GRS. It looks like the rules are musch easier in the U.S than over here?

This is only true of the NHS route. If you are prepared to go private you can get a referal within 12 months of transition in UK.

Ann

[Enigma]

Berliegh Wrote:

In England , U.K you have to have lived in a female role for over 2 years and already have had documentation like a passport for that time period before anyone will consider giving a referral for GRS. It looks like the rules are musch easier in the U.S than over here?

This is only true of the NHS route. If you are prepared to go private you can get a referal within 12 months of transition in UK.

Ann

There are always internet legends of people that did it in less then 12 months.  Pay cash...

[Berliegh]

Berliegh Wrote:

In England , U.K you have to have lived in a female role for over 2 years and already have had documentation like a passport for that time period before anyone will consider giving a referral for GRS. It looks like the rules are musch easier in the U.S than over here?

This is only true of the NHS route. If you are prepared to go private you can get a referal within 12 months of transition in UK.

Ann

My goodness, I've been fighting for a referral with the NHS for 6 years! I didn't know the private route was so easy but I'm learning the hard way..

[Hypatia]

They've been giving me the runaround. On the phone the other day they said get an appointment to go downtown to the passport office. I went today, spent $12 on parking, and stayed in there for 2 hours--all for nothing. I could not get an answer to why my doctor's letter was not complied with. They said only the issuing office (in Philadelphia) knows that. No, you can't contact them yourself.

I was told to call on the phone again. First, they kept trying to pretend they didn't know about the 1-year preop passport. I kept reminding them and finally someone on the phone read me the rule about the doctor letter.

I said my doctor needs to talk with you directly to find out exactly what to write. No, your doctor can't talk to us. No, we can't tell you what went wrong or how to correct it. You're technically a man, so just board the plane using a male passport.

I seem to have run into a series of transphobes and I can go to hell for all they care.  Our tax dollars at work.

After that, I stopped at Social Security. A nice lady not only changed my name, she changed my gender in their records without even any documentation, just my say so. So I had a happy conclusion to a very frustrating day. 

[melissa90299]

Hypatia,

Better check back with SSA to see that the gender was, in fact, changed. A similar thing happened to me and I found out later, it wasn't changed. When you talked to the passport bureaucrats, they might have been seeing you as a male based on your voice. You might have explained to them that if they saw they would understand and also that "No, I am technically a woman, I was incorrectly gendered as male at birth."

Sorry you are going through this, luckily for me, I live near the SF passport office.

[Hypatia]

No, I'm perceived as a woman over the phone. I've been taking voice feminization training. Nowadays, every time I call on the phone, I'm called "Ma'am" even before I say my name. The only reason I got that insult "technically a man" is because I was talking about the subject of preop transsexuals. I'm also seen as a woman visually when I approach strangers, they call me "Ma'am" and the only way they know I'm trans is I bring up the subject myself.

When I was at the SSA office, I asked the nice woman to make sure if they have me down as female now. She said yes and showed me the F on the form she was uploading. What else is there? And how will I verify it later, short of calling and asking? If I do, I run the risk of getting a transphobe who would change it back to M just to be a jerk. Leave well enough alone.