Fort Liard (Feb 28/03) - Rob and Caroline Harkin found their passports in the mail last week, several days after returning from vacation in Mexico.

The Fort Liard couple began arranging for passports for themselves and their two young children in October. In December, Caroline and Rob received notice from the Department of Immigration and Citizenship that their passport photos, taken in Fort Nelson, B.C., were rejected.

The letter informed them that the appearance of shadow was the problem, although Caroline noted that she couldn't detect any shadow in the pictures.

The family subsequently had to set aside another day to travel to Fort Nelson to have their photos redone. As required, they also submitted original identification with their passport applications.

With just over a week to go before they departed for Mexico, not only were they without passports, their IDs hadn't yet been returned. Without them, they wouldn't even be permitted to board the plane.

Fortunately, their IDs arrived in time but their passports did not. As it turned out, they were able to enter Mexico with their birth certificates, Rob said.

"It worked out okay in the end," he said. "But the big irony is that the week after we get back we get our passports in the mail."

Rob studied the original and replacement passport photos and he said he's still perplexed by the situation.

"To the naked eye, to me, my old picture looks better than the one they put in there," he said. "We talked to other people ... and we're not the only ones this is happening to."

In response to a similar problem that a Fort Simpson family experienced, Reynald Doiron, spokesperson for the Department of Foreign Affairs, said the issue revolves around new security measures. Computer scans are now used to analyze passport photos for contrast and shadow. Any defect renders the subject unidentifiable, Doiron said.