ELECTRONIC PASSPORT FOR ROMANIAN CITIZENS

          Pursuant to the Council Regulation (EC) NO 2252/2004 of 13 December 2004 on standards for security features and biometrics in passports and travel documents issued by Member States, Romania is issuing electronic passports.
The new element brought by these documents is the electronic storage medium (chip). The chip contains personal that are data included in the data page: name, first name, date of birth, personal code, document’s validity date, issuing authority, nationality. It also contains the facial image and two fingerprints, one finger of each hand, save for the cases of children under the age of 6 and of persons for whom the enrolment of fingerprints is physically impossible.
Compared to the former passports that remain valid until their expiry date and which contain 32 safety elements, the electronic passports include 50 safety elements. It is worth mentioning the biometrics inserted in the chip and the insertion of this chip into a polycarbonate page which ensures its protection and security also guaranteeing the data’s authenticity, integrity and confidentiality. Other elements: Romania’s coat of arms in intaglio technology, the polycarbonate page – containing the holder’s identification data and the chip – placed between the first cover (inside cover) and page 1, page 1 with the holder’s inkjet printed ghost image, the holder’s photo being laser engraved and the ghost image being obtained by image perf, the passport serial number perforated through pages 1-32, including the second cover, in the polycarbonate page the laser engraved machine readable zone (MRZ), the intaglio printing strip, the used paper containing watermarks in 3 shades, the protected stitching thread, the sign “European Union” and the electronic passport sign that are inserted in the cover.

The electronic passport is valid for 5 years and in case of children under the age of 6 it is valid for 3 years.
The delay for issuing is at most 30 working days.
The equivalent value of the electronic passport was set by the Company the National Printing House S.A. at the price of 276 lei (244 lei plus VAT) payable to the CEC Bank branches and the consular fee is set at 32 lei payable to the CEC Bank branches or to treasury offices.
In emergency cases Romanian citizens can apply for the temporary passport that is issued in a delay of at most 3 working days. The total cost for the temporary passport is 216 lei (84 lei the passport’s price payable to the CEC Bank branches, 32 lei the consular fee payable to the CEC Bank branches or to treasury offices, as the case may be, and 100 lei the additional emergency fee that is payable to treasury offices) and it is valid for 1 year.