- EU ETD: what it is?
The EU ETD (European Union Emergency Travel Document) is an emergency document that can be issued, in the event of theft, loss, or accidental lack of documents, to Italian citizens or citizens of unrepresented EU countries, limited to a single trip to the Member State of which the applicant is a citizen, to their country of permanent residence, or, exceptionally, to another destination.The document is issued free of charge.
- HOW TO OBTAIN THE SERVICE
To obtain an EU ETD, you must go to the Embassy from Monday to Friday between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. On weekends and public holidays, EU ETDs will only be issued in cases of proven emergency (accidents, arrests, serious medical problems, natural disasters, serious family situations). We therefore invite all Italian citizens traveling to Bulgaria to carry two different documents, to be kept separately (for example: identity card to be kept with you, and passport to be kept in another safe place).
- REQUIRED DOCUMENTATION
The application for an EU ETD is submitted using the appropriate form and must be accompanied by:
a) declaration of theft or loss of passport or other travel document, made to the Consular Office pursuant to Articles 46 and 47 of Presidential Decree No. 445 of December 28, 2000, and with the precautions referred to in Article 76 of the same decree;
b) report of theft, loss, or destruction of the passport or other travel document to the local police authorities;
c) in cases where it is not possible to capture an image of the applicant’s face at the time of application, a digital or scanned photograph of the applicant, in accordance with the standards set out in document 9303 of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) on machine-readable travel documents;
d) the travel document (airline ticket, bus ticket, etc.), where possible.
If the request comes from an unrepresented EU citizen, the ETD will be issued after appropriate checks with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the country of citizenship or other office indicated by the Member State.
For minors, the request must be signed by both parents or the legal guardian.
- OBLIGATION TO RETURN THE DOCUMENT
Once at their destination, the beneficiary of the EU ETD is required to hand over the document to the border police or other police station, regardless of its remaining validity. If the beneficiary of an EU ETD issued by a consular office is traveling to a country other than Italy, they are required to return the document to the consular office with territorial jurisdiction for their destination.