IT services provider Logica has been selected by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to electronically process Emergency Travel Documents to UK citizens under the Bridge (BRitish Identity Document Generating Equipment) programme.
Logica will partner with WorldReach Software and De La Rue to implement the project. WorldReach Software supplies consular software for traveller safety and security. Its software is said to be used by the Ministries of Foreign Affairs in Canada, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain and the UK.
De La Rue is a commercial security printer and papermaker, involved in the production of over 150 national currencies and security documents such as passports, fiscal stamps, traveller’s cheques and authentication labels.
Logica will develop a workflow system based on WorldReach’s software PassportReach, to replace the manual ETD issuing process. De La Rue will design and print the new ETDs in accordance with International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) standards.
Julian Braithwaite, director of consular services at the FCO, said: “This new system will modernise the British government’s international passport operation, providing both a more robust, efficient and secure issuing process and a better service to British nationals overseas.”
The first electronically processed ETDs are expected to be issued in July 2009. Subsequently, the technologies are likely to be used to issue Full Validity Passports.
