Renewed your Australian passport? Updating your OCI after three months now costs A$43

Three months. That is how long an OCI passport update stays free after a new passport is issued. Lodged later, it now costs A$43, according to notices from India’s High Commission in Canberra and its Consulate General in Melbourne: A$38 for what Canberra calls miscellaneous OCI services, and A$5 for the Indian Community Welfare Fund.

The charge took effect immediately in Canberra on 10 April 2026, and in Melbourne a week later. Inside the window nothing has changed; the Melbourne notice says those updates “will continue to be provided free of charge”. India’s Ministry of Home Affairs draws a similar line in its OCI portal FAQ: a passport update made more than three months after the new passport is received costs US$25.

The three months are not counted from the same day. Both fee notices start the clock when the new passport is issued; the ministry’s FAQ and the Sydney consulate’s guidance page start it at receipt.

The OCI passport update rule now comes in two versions

In April 2021 the ministry stopped requiring a fresh card with every new passport up to 20 and once more after 50. Uploads of the new passport and a recent photo took its place: each time a passport is issued up to 20, and once after 50. The rule sets no upload for passports issued between those ages, with one exception. People registered as the foreign spouse of an Indian citizen or OCI cardholder upload every new passport, with a declaration that the marriage still subsists. Those registered before 20 must also have the card re-issued once, when a new passport is issued after their 20th birthday, for a fee the ministry’s FAQ sets at US$25 or the local equivalent. The FAQ and Sydney’s guidance page still set it out this way.

Two notices on the Perth consulate’s website read differently. One, in graphics bearing the seal of India’s Bureau of Immigration, says a new passport obtained after 20 or 50 no longer calls for a fresh card: details are updated online, though anyone who updates after getting a new passport at 20 or older must also update their biometrics at an Indian mission, an FRRO office or an international airport on their next trip abroad. Passport particulars, it says, must be updated within 90 days of issue, or a US$25 late penalty applies. An advisory Perth posted on 15 October is explicit: every cardholder must update whenever a new passport arrives, within three months of issue, or risk an A$43 penalty.

So a woman born in Chennai who took an OCI card at 35 and renews at 40 has no upload due under the 2021 rule, and one due under Perth’s advisory. On travel, the 2021 decision set no restriction until the uploads were acknowledged; Perth’s advisory gives that assurance once an application is in, and advises carrying both passports.

A portal inside the window, Canberra’s envelope after it

Within three months, the update is made through the OCI portal’s miscellaneous services option for passport particulars; the Sydney consulate says no documents go through VFS or the mission. Canberra’s 31 August notice is shorter still: “The service is gratis.” Applicants, it adds, need not submit any documents.

The High Commission’s procedure for a late update begins online and ends in the post. The applicant lodges the update on the portal, which issues an application reference number, then mails a completed form quoting it, with copies of the new passport and OCI card, to the VFS centre at the card’s original place of issue: VFS Canberra for a Canberra-issued card. The A$43 goes in the same envelope, by bank money order or Australia Post postal order made out to VFS Services Australia Pty Ltd, or by Australian-issued Visa or Mastercard with a signed authority form. Melbourne’s notice describes an online update, and neither it nor Perth’s advisory mentions a postal step.

New cards now start with an appointment

From 1 April 2026, the High Commission said, applications for a new OCI card “will no longer be accepted by post”. Applicants book an appointment and attend a VFS centre in person, where their documents are checked against the originals. Since 23 July VFS Global has run new, upgraded Indian Consular Application Centres in Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney. The High Commission says a VFS service charge of A$115 per application now applies on top of the Government of India fee. Its 31 August notice on late updates, issued after that change, lists A$43 and mentions no service charge.

Person of Indian Origin (PIO) cards, whose holders had been told for years to convert them to OCI, were to be accepted with a valid foreign passport as travel documents until 31 December 2025, under an extension the Sydney consulate said in May 2025 would be the last. India’s embassy in Washington now says the cards are not valid after that date and conversion has been discontinued, though holders may apply for a new OCI card.

The e-OCI shows the passport on file

The Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2026, published in the Gazette of India on Thursday 30 April 2026 as G.S.R. 323(E) and in force from publication, provide that a registered cardholder is issued either a physical card or an “electronic Overseas Citizen of India (e-OCI) registration”. They also require OCI applications and renunciations to be made electronically on the portal.

The portal’s e-OCI FAQ says existing cardholders can download the electronic version free of charge and show it in digital form to airlines and at immigration check posts. It does not replace the physical card. On renewed passports the FAQ is conditional: where the guidelines require an update, the e-OCI “will reflect the updated particulars after the request has been approved”.

The three-month window dates from 2021. What changed in April is the price on the far side of it; which renewals it covers is where the official pages now part ways. The e-OCI, meanwhile, shows whichever passport the record holds.