Dog shreds owner's passport just days before friend's dream wedding

April 27, 2022

In the doghouse! Pet owner fears she will miss her best friend’s dream Cyprus wedding after her ‘serial chewer’ Pomeranian shredded her passport just DAYS before her flight

Sophia Kourtney, 24, left her dog Prince alone while getting her eyelashes done
She came back home to find her passport ‘in a million pieces’ on April 21
Ms Kourtney blames the dog’s ‘separation anxiety’ for his chewing habit

A dog owner fears she could miss her best friend’s wedding after her naughty ‘serial chewer’ Pomeranian shredded her passport just days before her flight.

Sophia Kourtney, 24, left her one-year-old pooch named Prince alone for just two hours while getting her eyelashes done – but came back to her home in Salford, Greater Manchester and found her passport ‘in a million pieces’ on April 21.

Ms Kourtney had left the passport tucked into her laptop sleeve on her desk after checking in online for the upcoming Cyprus holiday, but the mischievous hound pulled it onto the floor.

The aesthetics practitioner is now anxiously waiting to hear back from the passport office to see if her new documents will arrive in time to allow her to travel to her friend Sinead McCormack’s wedding in Larnaca on May 11.

Otherwise she faces not only paying more than £200 for the fast-tracked new passport but also losing out on the long awaited holiday and £600 cost.

She blames the dog’s ‘separation anxiety’ for his chewing habit which may cost her the special trip.

Sophia Kourtney, 24, left one-year-old pooch named Prince alone for just two hours while getting her eyelashes done – but she returned to her home in Salford, Greater Manchester to find her passport ‘in a million pieces’ on April 21

She blames the dog’s ‘separation anxiety’ for his chewing habit which may cost her the special trip. Pictured: The passport

Ms Kourtney said she thinks Prince (pictured) suffers with separation anxiety because he has a ‘tendency to chew all the time’

Ms Kourtney said: ‘I had my passport out to check in online and left it with my laptop on my desk to go out for my eyelash appointment. I leave him the run of the conservatory where my desk is and when I got home I saw a bit of paper by the door.

Backlog of ‘500,000 passports’ behind chaos keeping families from flying off on holiday

Britons with an out-of-date passport are facing potential holiday chaos with a backlog of more than 500,000 applications causing huge delays to applications, it has today been claimed.

Holidaymakers are being warned they face a wait of up to 10 weeks to get their new passports, sparking fears some may miss out on their trips and lose their money.

The issue is being blamed on a wave of people rushing to renew their passports following the lifting of the UK’s Covid travel rules.

Officials say five million Britons have delayed renewing their passports because of the restrictions.

Post-Brexit travel rules from the EU have complicated matters further as they require travelling Britons to have at least three months validity remaining when travelling to EU member nations.

The Passport Office is also reportedly suffering a staffing crisis, with unions claiming officials had wanted to sign up 1,700 new staff to help deal with the increase in demand – but have so far only recruited 300.

The ‘shambles’ has left holidaymakers who have recently applied to renew their passport fearing they will lose out on their upcoming holidays.

One family today told MailOnline how they had lost out on £10,000 ‘once-in-a-lifetime holiday’ to Florida because of delays to their passports – despite applying more than eight weeks before travelling.

Meanwhile, a wedding photographer yesterday told MailOnline how had to cancel a £3,000 job in France as she is yet to receive her new passport – despite ordering it September.

Yesterday, as pressure mounted on the Government to fix the issues, Boris Johnson yesterday threatened to ‘privatise the a*** off’ the Passport Office and DVLA unless they step up services.

Today Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab said that the Government was ‘driving as fast as they can to bear down’ on the delays.

But in a further blow, Britons applying for a new passport through the Government’s ‘one week’ fast-track system faced further issues this morning, with the website crashing for a second time in two days.

‘I saw the label sticking out from the rug and thought he’d probably just chewed that but as I walked in to investigate further I saw my passport and I was fuming.

‘He has jumped on the table and pulled my laptop bag off the table and my passport was just slid inside it. He’s got loads and loads of toys to play with but he’s chewed every single page out of it.

‘He’s a serial chewer, this is not his first rodeo – he’s chewed the heels off two pairs of my Louboutins.’

Ms Kourtney fears even if she beats the odds by getting her new passport in time, she will be left without a dog sitter as family members now refuse to look after the naughty pooch.

She said: ‘It’s my best friend’s wedding in Larnaca and obviously because of Covid it’s all been put off so it’s been two or three I’ve been waiting for this.

‘It’s going to be my first holiday in two years post-lockdown. I’ve been so looking forward to it, we’ve got a villa between eight of us and the flights were booked ages ago.

‘I’ve had my dress for the wedding over a year waiting to go. The wedding has been planned longer than I’ve had him [Prince] and he’s just come along and f***ed it all up.

‘Everyone was like ”you know he’s a little terror you shouldn’t have left it out on the table” but you don’t think he’s going to pick up your passport and chew through it.

‘My family were going to take it in turns to look after him but they’re all saying ”he’s not coming to my house, he can’t be trusted” so I don’t think anyone will look after this little terror for me now anyway.’

With very little time until her flight and the average wait time for a new passport being ten weeks, the dog owner desperately searched for an appointment to fast track her application.

But the closest slot was on the May 16 – the day everyone will be returning home from the holiday and wedding celebrations.

After calling the passport office and explaining her predicament, Ms Kourtney says she was advised to send her destroyed passport to them and then ring up once they have received it to upgrade her application.

She says this means she will have to fork out the usual £80 charge for a new passport as well as an additional £145 to speed up the process and receive her new passport within seven days.

Ms Kourtney said: ‘I rang the airline and they said if you could just have the actual page with your photo and code that would be alright but that was just in a million and one pieces.

‘I told my friend and everyone in the group chat straight away and they’ve all been ringing me telling me when they see an appointment come up but by the time I get on the website it’s gone already.

‘I tried the London, Belfast and Liverpool offices and there’s literally nothing.

‘I sent my passport off on Friday and I keep checking the online tracker but it hasn’t updated yet. It’s going to cost me over £200 to sort. I’m just so stressed.’

She says she believes Prince’s chewing habit is a result of separation anxiety from being a lockdown puppy – as she was constantly with him for the early months of his life.

His nervous chewing has destroyed not only his owner’s passport but also her designer shoes and various items and furniture in her family’s homes as well.

Ms Kourtney fears even if she beats the odds by getting her new passport in time, she will be left without a dog sitter as family members now refuse to look after the naughty pooch

Ms Kourtney said: ‘He’s a serial chewer, this is not his first rodeo – he’s chewed the heels off two pairs of my Louboutins’ (pictured)

After calling the passport office and explaining her predicament, Ms Kourtney says she was advised to send her destroyed passport to then and then ring up once they have received it to upgrade her application

Ms Kourtney said: ‘I think he suffers with separation anxiety because he has a tendency to chew all the time.

‘When I got him in lockdown I wasn’t working so I was constantly with him but now I’m starting to go out more and work and he just can’t deal with it, I have to take him everywhere.

‘When I’ve been at my mums a couple of times he’s chewed her railings and blinds. He needs his teeth taken out or something.

‘I bought him a cage so he can’t chew anything but he just howls and howls constantly so in my old apartment I got noise complaints about the dog.

‘When I moved out I lost all my deposit because he’d chewed through every single corner of the skirting boards. He’s just a nightmare.’

Ms Kourtney says the remains of her old passport are supposed to have already arrived at the passport office but her tracking is yet to update to confirm.

She fears she won’t get a new passport in time for her flight as the passport office workers have explained they can’t start processing it until they receive her old one.

With her holiday preparations already fully underway she risks losing the £600 cost of the trip as well as hundreds spent on new outfits and beauty treatments, including eyelashes and a hair appointment.

Ms Kourtney said: ‘I don’t really know if they’re going to be able to get it to me in time. I’ve been explaining to the passport people that it’s my friend’s wedding and I need to be there but they can’t do anything until they receive my old passport.

‘I keep getting waves of anxiety that it’s not going to come back in time and I won’t be able to go, everyone’s just praying for me.

‘I’m going to have severe fomo if I’m not there. I just hope today or tomorrow they update the tracker.’

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