Check the passport before you book anything you can't refund

Quick answer: Open every passport in your party today and read the expiration date. Many countries want six months of validity left on the day you arrive. If a passport needs renewing, file it the day you decide to go, not the week you pack.

The date on the page

Picture the check-in counter. The flights are paid for, the rental car is booked, the kids are in matching shirts. The agent flips open the passport, pauses, and says your trip is over.

That's how it usually goes. The border officer in another country isn't the first obstacle. The airline is. Carriers can be fined for flying you somewhere that will refuse you, so they check at the counter and they don't bend.

Two rules cause most of the damage:

• The six-month rule. Plenty of countries require your passport to be valid for six months past your arrival date. A passport with four months left looks fine at home and is worthless at the gate.
• The Schengen rule. Most of Europe's Schengen zone wants at least three months of validity beyond the day you plan to leave, and the passport issued within the last ten years.

Some countries also ask for one or two blank pages. A passport stamped to the edges can get you turned away. Check the destination's entry requirements on the State Department's travel.state.gov country page, then check them again against your actual dates. The page changes, and a blog from 2022 won't tell you.

Put the expiration date for every passport in your family on your calendar, with a reminder nine months out. Takes two minutes. It's the cheapest insurance you'll buy this year.

Work backward from the trip

Nobody can promise you a processing time. The State Department posts current estimates for routine and expedited service, and those numbers have swung from a few weeks to a few months in recent years. Read the live figure when you apply. Then add time.

Add mailing, both directions. Add the days the application sits before anyone touches it. Add the chance you made a small mistake and it comes back. Treat the posted estimate as the minimum.

Expedited service costs extra and buys you weeks, not miracles. It's worth it for a trip that's close. It's not a plan for a trip that's close and also nonrefundable.

If departure is inside about two weeks, the State Department can book an in-person appointment at a regional passport agency, but you'll need proof of travel, and appointments are scarce. Don't count on one. Rules and eligibility change, so confirm on the State Department site before you rely on any of this.

And if you're eligible to renew by mail, do it. Generally that means your last passport was issued when you were 16 or older, within the past 15 years, and it's undamaged. It's the easiest paperwork in the whole process.

A rule worth keeping: file when you book the trip, or before. Never the other way around.

The kids' passports

A child's passport lasts five years. An adult's lasts ten. So the family's oldest passport is rarely the problem. The kid's is.

For children under 16, the application is in person, and both parents need to appear, or one parent brings written consent from the other. That's a rule that protects your kids, and it's a good one. It also means you can't do it on a Tuesday if your wife is traveling for work. Plan the appointment around both schedules.

If custody is complicated, or one parent isn't in the picture, read the State Department's guidance on that exact situation before you apply. Documentation requirements are specific. If it's tangled, a family law attorney is worth an hour.

Once you've got a toddler's passport, don't think you're done. Their face changes fast, but the passport doesn't have to. Just watch the expiration. If you're traveling with little ones, flying with small kids has the airport-day logistics once the paperwork is sorted.

The name has to match

The name on your ticket has to match the name on your passport. Not your driver's license. The passport.

This bites newlyweds most often. If your wife is booking a honeymoon and her passport still carries her maiden name, book under the passport name, or update the passport first with the marriage certificate. Don't do it three weeks out. Do it before the tickets exist.

Middle names, hyphens and misspellings count too. Small differences sometimes slide through, but you don't want to find out which ones at the counter. Read each name off each passport, letter by letter, as you type the booking. Slow, boring, correct.

Visas, authorizations and the lookalike sites

Destinations fall into three buckets.

1. Nothing extra. Passport and a ticket home.
2. An online authorization. Several countries, including the UK and Australia, now want one filed before you board. It's usually quick and cheap, and you want it done days ahead, not at the airport.
3. A real visa. An application, sometimes an appointment, sometimes an interview. This can take weeks or months, and it's the one that quietly kills trips.

Go to the destination government's official site, or the embassy's. Searching for a visa gets you a stack of lookalike sites that charge a fee for forms you can file directly for far less, or for free. If the web address isn't a government one, stop.

Check your layovers too. Some countries require transit authorization even if you never leave the airport, and a connection through the wrong place has caught plenty of people who'd planned for the destination only. For anything unusual, call the consulate, or pay an immigration attorney to settle it. Don't guess.

Cards, licenses and land borders

A passport card is cheaper and fits in a wallet. It works at land crossings and some sea ports. It doesn't work for international flights. If there's any chance you'll fly home, say after a family emergency, carry the book.

A Real ID driver's license is for domestic flights. It isn't a substitute for a passport anywhere outside the country.

Planning a first trip abroad? The paperwork is the first of the four things that go wrong, and the easiest one to prevent.

The Saturday-morning checklist

Do this once, with coffee, before you book anything.

• Read the expiration date on every passport. Count the months from your return date, not your departure date.
• Look up the destination's entry rules on travel.state.gov and the destination government's site.
• Confirm each traveler's name matches the booking.
• Check for blank pages.
• Look up current processing times. Add a month.
• Put every expiration date in your calendar, nine months ahead.
• Photograph the photo page of every passport and email it to yourself and your wife. Keep a paper copy in a separate bag.

If your wife is coming, give her the list too. Trips go better when both of you know the plan, and planning one she actually wants to be on starts with her knowing the paperwork is handled.

The man who checks the dates in February gets to enjoy July. The one who waits finds out the passport office doesn't care about your nonrefundable deposit.