You can request a new passport or a renewal, add additional pages to your passport, get a second passport (often desired by frequent travelers), or apply for a visa. (Details are available on the  A. Briggs website.) If you currently have a passport, keep in mind your passport needs to be valid for at least six months beyond your return date to the U.S.

U.S. citizens are required to have a passport for visiting any destination outside of the United States. This now will include Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean, whether visited by sea or by air. If you are planning to travel outside of the Western Hemisphere by air, you are required to have a passport. Additionally, by June 1, 2009, a passport (or other accepted document) will be required for U.S. citizens who travel by air, sea and land to and from the Caribbean, Bermuda, Central and South America, Canada and Mexico. (At present, a passport is not required for Canada or the Caribbean, for example, if getting there by car or cruise ship.)

Passports are issued for adults for a period of ten years (and for five years for children). We recommend not waiting till the last minute to order your passport(s), as processing times have increased to keep up with new application requests.

For more information on the passport initiative and how it may affect you, please visit the State Department's consular website travel.state.gov or the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's web site www.dhs.gov. For more information about applying for a passport, U.S. citizens may visit travel.state.gov or call the National Passport Information Center toll free at 1-877-4USA-PPT or TDD/TYY: 1-888-874-7793. You can also use our preferred agency, A Briggs, (all details are available on the website.)

Foreign nationals (non U.S. citizens) should contact their respective governments to obtain passports and for advice on what documents are required for traveling from and returning to the United States. Beginning Jan. 12, 2009, all nationals and citizens of Visa Waiver Program (VWP) countries will be required by law to obtain a travel authorization prior to initiating travel to the United States under the VWP. This authorization may be obtained online through the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA), a free Internet application administered by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) through a U.S. government Web site www.dhs.gov.

ESTA countries include: Andorra, Austria, Australia, Belgium, Brunei, Denmark, Finland, France,Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom.