THE Passport Immigration and Citizenship Agency (PICA) says it is “disappointed” at being named by Acting Public Defender Herbert McKenzie as one of the three state agencies Jamaicans complain to that office about the most.

McKenzie, in participating in a panel discussion put on by the Office of the Political Ombudsman in recognition of its 20th anniversary earlier this month, said “there is no shortage of complaints at the public defender’s office with respect to” PICA, the Registrar General’s Department (RGD) and the Criminal Records Office”.

“The commonest one we get, and it applies to all three, you pay for a service advertised at, for argument’s sake, $8,000 and you get the service or the item in three days, $10,000 or $15,000 you get it in 24-48 hours. Far too often citizens pay the prescribed sum for these guaranteed services and at the end of the period they are nowhere closer to getting in than before they approached the entity,” McKenzie told the conference then. According to the acting public defender, “It’s the quality of the service and the standard that is important.”

But PICA, in a letter to the editor of the Jamaica Observer signed by its Chief Executive Officer Andrew Wynter, said it “noted with interest” the August 16 article carried by the newspaper in which “the public defender singled out PICA as one of three state entities offering substandard service to the public”.

“Over the past five years, PICA has made significant investments to improve the overall experience for its customers,” the agency said.

Those improvements, PICA said, include: The relocation of the Montego Bay and Mandeville offices to make them more centrally located with improved facilities that are safe and comfortable for both customers and staff; an online appointment system, which enables customers to use any Internet-enabled computer or mobile device to make an appointment to conduct business at their convenience, and the launch of the Online Adult Passport Renewal System, which enables customers to use any Internet computer or mobile device to renew any adult passport issued after September 2001.

PICA said it has also implemented a dropbox service for customers who want to deposit their applications in the office for processing with the option of returning to collect the document or having it mailed or couriered, as well as the implementation of a robust community intervention programme to improve the access of Jamaicans in rural communities and the diaspora to their services.

In the meantime, addressing McKenzie’s criticism of its express service offerings, PICA said, while it “offers several options for expedited services, this must be balanced against ensuring the authenticity of the documents received to support application for the product or service”.

It added: “The veracity of every document issued by the agency must be maintained and must meet international standards in order to ensure acceptance worldwide. Balance must always be maintained between securing our nation and the identity of Jamaicans.”

And the acting public defender, in a letter to the newspaper following the publication of his comments, chastised the entity for its headline — ‘Disgrace’ — noting that “at no time at all did I ever say that PICA, RGD, and the Criminal Records Office were causing Jamaicans most pain, or any such words which could be interpreted as such”.