DON’T listen to what people say of their frustrations over services provided at Immigration offices.
Of late, after reading reports in local English dailies of the long queues for those wanting to apply for new passports, I told myself to let the “mad rush” cool down before I go there.
I waited until Sept 6 because I believed that by then, most applicants would have got their passports.
As schoolchildren were sitting for the Ujian Pencapaian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR), which began on Sept 5, I thought it was the right time for me to apply for a passport, and I planned to do so before the end of the examinations.
On Sept 6, I woke up at 5.30am and drove to the Kelana Jaya Immigration office. I made tracks at 5.45am from Subang Jaya and reached my destination at 6.10am.
From a distance, I saw a small group of people already gathered in front of the office. I was relieved to see only a handful of people, and not a large crowd.
After parking my car, I joined the line and was standing at No. 8 in the queue.
The queue got longer by the minute and when the Immigration office opened its doors at 7.30am, the tail end of the queue had reached the opposite end of a 91m-long verandah.
Everybody stayed in the queue quietly and orderly. Furthermore, nobody jumped the queue.
When a staff member came to hand a piece of paper to those in the queue to furnish, he told those who were 60 years and above to step forward and form another queue for senior citizens. They could enter the office first and be given a queue number as well.
I was given a second call number to wait inside the waiting area. Around 8am, my number was called and I was attended to by an officer who checked my documents and took my photo and fingerprints.
The documentation was done at 8.10am. I was told to pay a RM100 fee, and wait an hour for the new passport to be ready for collection at the next counter.
To my surprise I was handed my new passport at 8.50am, not 9.10am. This meant that everything was done 20 minutes faster than what I was told.
Kudos to the staff of the Kelana Jaya Immigration Office for a job well done.
Service was efficient and I could find nothing to complain about.
Keep up the good work — the staff all deserve a big round of applause for their hard work.
LAU BING, Subang Jaya
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