My very old PASZPORT KONSULARNY has a pesel number.

Hi i have a very old PASZPORT KONSULARNY issued in 1990,in red it says SERIA K IV NR 0-----0, would that be a pesel number as well as the passport number or were the passports issued then without a pesel number. regards John

A regular passport should contain a PESEL number, but I'm not sure about the consular passport. You may make a screenshot and it may be possible to figure it out if it's there.

Thank you for your reply i'm sure now that the number is just a passport number and not a pesel number,however it states that i am a Polish citizen so hopefully i can renew it without to much difficulty.

A pesel number begins with your birthday.... last two numbers of the year you were born, the month then the day and then 5 more numbers.

So a person born on July 17 1964 would have a pesel that begins 640717.....

Having a Polish passport should equal to having Polish citizenship, unless there are very weird circumstances but it's very doubtful. If you don't have a PESEL number assigned yet, they will assign one to you when you apply for it. I found this law from the Polish law (1984):

A booklet consular passport is issued to a Polish citizen permanently residing abroad. A consular passport entitles you to enter the country for permanent residence.

It suggests that the consular passport was supposed to be issued to a Polish citizen = you should have Polish citizenship still unless you gave it up in the meantime.

Thank you so much for the information,when i hand my old passport into the Embassy do you know if it will be returned back to me ? i think they send it to Poland where they issue the new one.

My old passport was issued in 1993 and expired 20 years ago do you think i need to provide more documents for them in order to apply for a new one,also i think the old passport is sent to Poland where thy issue the new one,would the old one be returned to ? sorry for so many questions.

you have to have a polish birth certificate as well to get a new passport. not sure if you can keep the old passport.

They return the old passport usually, but not sure about the consular one. The only sure way and possibly stress-free is to go to Poland and city/province you were born at and from there you can collect your birth certificate and other documents if needed. Doing it remotely is going to be frustrating and time consuming. The only question is - were you actually BORN IN Poland? If so, you are a Polish citizen and getting the paperwork is just a formality.