A travel content creator has issued a stark warning about a passport mistake that could cost him thousands of dollars.
In a recent TikTok video for her 180,000 followers, Sabrina Escapes, who calls herself the “Vacation Queen,” warned against placing “novelty souvenir stamps” in passports, explaining that they can render the passport “invalid.”
Sabrina warned: “You’ll have to think twice before doing this. In fact, don’t even do it! It’s becoming more and more common to get these novelty stamps when you travel to amazing places around the world. I admit they look pretty cool, but if you get them in your passport (which is a government document), they will invalidate it.”
She added: “It’s like putting a fake stamp on any other ID document you have, for example a birth certificate – you wouldn’t do anything to that, would you?” She then cited the case of Briton Tina Sibley, who lost £1,000 in 2020 after receiving a souvenir stamp in Machu Picchu, Peru.
Tina was denied boarding on her next flight to Thailand, so the British embassy had to issue her with a new document. She also had to rebook her flights, which cost her £1,000 in total.
Sabrina ended her video with a tip: “If you want to get one of these cool stamps, maybe you can put it in something like a travel journal. Hopefully, you’ll have seen this in time and won’t already have one of these stamps in your passport.”
One viewer asked in the comments section: “Why would anyone do this?” Another chimed in: “Honestly this should be common sense, you shouldn’t be tampering with your passport, it’s not a colouring book.” And another said: “That’s good advice.”
