During Nepal's transition to machine-readable passports, applicants converged on the Passport Department in Kathmandu. Some people arriving from outside the valley waited more than twelve hours and slept overnight outside the office simply to submit their forms. In January 2014, the government opened six application-collection counters at the department in Narayanhiti Palace to reduce waits of as much as fifteen hours.
What distinguishes this queue is that the delay was shaped not only by passport production but by the number of places able to accept an application. Adding counters was also an official acknowledgement of the time that the document transition had imposed on citizens.