South African High Commission

Service sucks, the staff are rude and inconsiderate on how far people come from to sort out their issues. The website is not updated, emails are not replied. I try calling but the phone hangs up, like we disturbing them. Poor service!! Puts me to shame on calling myself a south african.

We arrived at what we thought to be 'early' to collect our daughter's passport (after a 7 hour drive from Scotland) only to read that as of 11th Dec 2023 collection times had changed from 2 to 3pm on a Friday to 11 to 12 noon. Thankfully we caught some employees on their way out at 1:45pm who asked what we were doing there and My daughter pleaded and said 'I received an email to collect between 2 and 3pm Monday to Friday (albeit a couple months earlier) to which she was told that the times change all the time (but even the web site times still read Mon to Fri 2 to 3pm). A very kindly English gentleman requested that one of the three ladies on their way out please assist us and after literally ten minutes we were all on our way. So grateful we were able to get her passport and ID, please be aware collection times changed as of 11th Dec and if you received your email for collection prior to this you will have no way of knowing unless you arrive at the door and read their notice. (SA High Commission please update your times on the website too)

Although limited opening hours, I can't complain, passport collection was fast. Staff are super helpful and pleasant. I have to admit the staff are great after noticing error on birth cert they responded within 3 days. And have notified Home Affairs to fix it for us. Much more personal touch feeling than when dealing with another western country embassy

Both the SA high commision and VFS Global provide way below a second class service. Very poor from both organistaions and the customer service is non-existent. Best of luck and eternal patience needed when dealing with these organistions. SHAMEFUL! Also made an over payment to them for a childs passport and have repetadly written to them asking for a refund, only te be ignored despite sending 6 or more emails over a number of weeks.

As the others said, the embassy service is a disgrace. Been waiting for 1 month for visa, supposed to go there to support my wife with the loss of her father, but I guess they dont care. What is worst now, is I can't get my passport back from them, i have no idead who to call in this kind of situation.
For anyone who wants to go there and apply for visa, book your slot 1 year advance, maybe you will be lucky and actually get the visa when your holiday is due.

I registered the birth of my son and applied for his South African passport.
I emailed in November for an appointment (my son was due in December) and received one within 3 days for 9th January. We arrived at 8:50 for the 9am appointment and had about 4 people in front of us in the queue. We were seen at about 9:45, and the lady helped me ensure I had all the correct documents and forms.
We paid, got our receipt, and were out of there by about 10:30, despite being 4th to be seen.

I received an email to say my son's passport had arrived on 13th March and we collected it about a month later. We arrived at about 2:15pm for the pick up between 2 and 3. There were a few people in front of us but it moved quickly and we left by 3pm.

His birth certificate arrived at my house at the beginning of May.

Overall, it was a good experience. If you look at it like South African home affairs, then you know what to expect. Don't compare it to the British system where you can do everything online and receive the passport a week later!

Extremely poor representation of South Africa. The staff working at this embassy have no customers care skills, they are rude, they don’t answer the phones or reply to emails. My application has been sitting for 9 months and hasn’t even been touched. Did I get a phone call (nope), did I have to keep trying for months to get through on the phone (yes) to find out it hasn’t even been looked at and the person was going to find out why and call me back. Did he call (nope). How do these people keep their jobs? Anywhere else and they would have been fired!! These are the kind of people that give SA a bad name. Lazy don’t care attitudes. Disgraceful.