Does the pilgrim's office give a sello?

[Hilly]

I just want to know so I can leave a space for it!

 

[Peterexpatkiwi]

They do but it's right at the very front on the first page. It's how they close out the Credencial.

 

[Hilly]

They do but it's right at the very front on the first page. It's how they close out the Credencial.

Thanks for clarifying!

 

[Flog]

They give two. One on the inside front cover, and one at the end of the other stamps.

 

[Tincatinker]

I closed out my recent Camino Inglés with the double stamp from the PO.

I did seem to be the cause of some confusion requesting “solo un sello”, but we got there. The lovely volunteer on the jump asked twice why I didn’t want a Compostela. “I’ve already got one” seemed to add to the confusion.

Perhaps it’s time the PO set up a separate desk for recidivists, grumpy old pagans and anyone else who doesn’t want a souvenir

 

[Peterexpatkiwi]

Perhaps it’s time the PO set up a separate desk for recidivists, grumpy old pagans and anyone else who doesn’t want a souvenir

Or aforesaid grumpy old pagans & recidivists could simply not bother the poor old PO.
But let's face it - if you didn't want the souvenir, you wouldn't have bothered with the stamp!

 

[Peterexpatkiwi]

They give two. One on the inside front cover, and one at the end of the other stamps.

I've been cheated! I've only got one.
Guess I'm going to have to go for another walk.....

 

[Flog]

Perhaps it’s time the PO set up a separate desk for recidivists, grumpy old pagans and anyone else who doesn’t want a souvenir

Hmm

In the past two weeks, out of a thousand or so pilgrims, only one asked me for 'solo sello'. I wasn't going to question him why not a compostela, until he said he didn't think he deserved one, so then of course I asked him why he thought that.. after all, he was all stamped up and everything, (from I don't remember where, but a couple of hundred kilometres back). He just shrugged and said it was okay, he'd come back again and walk a longer way. It was his first time.

I'm not sure such a desk would get a lot of use...

 

[naplesdon]

If there is line out in front of the office, why bother. A cold beer beckons on Rua Franco.

 

[C clearly]

If there is line out in front of the office, why bother. A cold beer beckons on Rua Franco.

It is rather like the question, "If there is a thread on a subject that is irrelevant to me, why bother reading?"

 

[Kiwi-family]

haha I read PO to mean Post Office and could understand their confusion! I also totally understand wanting a sello in your credencial, but not needing a compostela. I went in to the PO (not post office) earlier this year in search of a sello to finish off my homemade journal-cum-credencial - and also came out with a compostela as well, because it was easier to accept it than to turn it down! And the little rebel in me loved getting it when I really shouldn't have with an unofficial credencial ;-) On the last day of my ten week walk the spine fell off the journal and so the compostela has made a great cover!

 

[t2andreo]

They do but it's right at the very front on the first page. It's how they close out the Credencial.

Actually, staff at the Pilgrim Office counter affix TWO, different sellos to your credential. The first, is on the last page of stamps. This signifies that you made it to the Pilgrim Office.

The second stamp is affixed to the inside, front cover page of your credential as Peter correctly states. However, the significance of this second stamp is to CLOSE OUT that credencial. This renders it finished, and no longer valid for documenting progress on a Camino.

Hope this helps.

Tom

 

[t2andreo]

haha I read PO to mean Post Office and could understand their confusion! I also totally understand wanting a sello in your credencial, but not needing a compostela. I went in to the PO (not post office) earlier this year in search of a sello to finish off my homemade journal-cum-credencial - and also came out with a compostela as well, because it was easier to accept it than to turn it down! And the little rebel in me loved getting it when I really shouldn't have with an unofficial credencial ;-) On the last day of my ten week walk the spine fell off the journal and so the compostela has made a great cover!

If you actually do not want a Compostela - they produce them very fast these days - all you need to do is ask a security guard or any staff person "solo sello?" This means I only want a stamp.

The person you asked should take you aside and arrange for the near-immediate affixation of a sello, signifying that you arrived at the Pilgrim Office.

But, these days, getting a Compostela, as well as the accompanying two sellos, only takes few minutes more.

Asking for only the stamps made sense in past years, when the lines were really long and repeat pilgrims did not want to hang around. But now, it is almost easier to submit your data online before arrival and just get the Compostela - which comes with two sellos.

Hope this helps.

Tom

 

[paolademberger]

If you actually do not want a Compostela - they produce them very fast these days - all you need to do is ask a security guard or any staff person "solo sello?" This means I only want a stamp.

The person you asked should take you aside and arrange for the near-immediate affixation of a sello, signifying that you arrived at the Pilgrim Office.

But, these days, getting a Compostela, as well as the accompanying two sellos, only takes few minutes more.

Asking for only the stamps made sense in past years, when the lines were really long and repeat pilgrims did not want to hang around. But now, it is almost easier to submit your data online before arrival and just get the Compostela - which comes with two sellos.

Hope this helps.

Tom

How do you submit your data online?

 

[t2andreo]

Using your cellular phone web browser, go here:

Sigle Register | Pilgrim's welcome office

oficinadelperegrino.com

Supply the information, then SUBMIT it. You will receive a return message containing a scannable QR code. Shown to a security guard, that code will grant you access to the Pilgrim Office on arrival.

When that QR code is scanned by the security guard out front, your pre-submitted data goes into the automated production queue, and you will receive a "call number" or queue waiting number.

When that number is called, you approach the counter and receive your laser-printed Compostela. It happens FAST.

Arriving pilgrims are advised to use the toilet FIRST, before you arrive at the Pilgrim Office, as the wait from the front door to the counter to get your Compostela is VERY SHORT. You will have time afterwards.

FYI there are public bathrooms on the lower, rear level of the Raxoi building, up Rua de Carretas, next to the local police station. At the bottom of the ramp from Plaza Obradoiro, turn LEFT to the bathrooms and police station. The Pilgrim Office is RIGHT at the bottom of the ramp.

Hope this helps.

Tom

 

[Pilgrim Patricia]

@t2andreo, what if you're a techno-peasant like me and don't have a smart phone?

 

[SabsP]

Hmm

In the past two weeks, out of a thousand or so pilgrims, only one asked me for 'solo sello'. I wasn't going to question him why not a compostela, until he said he didn't think he deserved one, so then of course I asked him why he thought that.. after all, he was all stamped up and everything, (from I don't remember where, but a couple of hundred kilometres back). He just shrugged and said it was okay, he'd come back again and walk a longer way. It was his first time.

I'm not sure such a desk would get a lot of use...

Hope you had a great time again with the volunteering and all went smoothly?

 

[Jeff Crawley]

If you actually do not want a Compostela - they produce them very fast these days - all you need to do is ask a security guard or any staff person "solo sello?" This means I only want a stamp.

The person you asked should take you aside and arrange for the near-immediate affixation of a sello, signifying that you arrived at the Pilgrim Office.

But, these days, getting a Compostela, as well as the accompanying two sellos, only takes few minutes more.

Asking for only the stamps made sense in past years, when the lines were really long and repeat pilgrims did not want to hang around. But now, it is almost easier to submit your data online before arrival and just get the Compostela - which comes with two sellos.

Hope this helps.

Tom

Didn't there use to be a sello stamp and ink pad on the right as you entered just for this purpose? It's been a while, memory fades.

 

[henrythedog]

@t2andreo, what if you're a techno-peasant like me and don't have a smart phone?

Just turn up at the reception; the analogue process still works as it did.

 

[t2andreo]

Didn't there use to be a sello stamp and ink pad on the right as you entered just for this purpose? It's been a while, memory fades.

It has not been a "self-service" Pilgrim Office sello for years, at last within my memory. Even back then, as I recall, it was episodic not constant.

 

[Kiwi-family]

If you actually do not want a Compostela - they produce them very fast these days - all you need to do is ask a security guard or any staff person "solo sello?" This means I only want a stamp.

The person you asked should take you aside and arrange for the near-immediate affixation of a sello, signifying that you arrived at the Pilgrim Office.

Hope this helps.

Tom

That’s exactly what I did! I even explained to the security guard that I was ineligible for a Compostela because my credencial was not official and he asked “Did you walk or not?” and proceeded to tell me “You are a pilgrim so you can get a Compostela” at which point he filled in my details on the computer in the foyer - and as I was Person Number Two in the queue gave me a lunch ticket! When I got to the reception desk I explained again, this time in English because I was greeted in English, and the volunteer leafed through every page of my journal - no sense of hurry at all - and declared I had obviously walked and seen and sketched and he would give me a Compostela if I wanted one. It would have felt churlish to refuse!
He kindly gave me a stamp on the journal page for that day and also on my “front page”

 

[t2andreo]

@t2andreo, what if you're a techno-peasant like me and don't have a smart phone?

Click on this link.

Sigle Register | Pilgrim's welcome office

oficinadelperegrino.com

Follow the instructions.

If you do not have a smart phone:

1. Borrow one from someone else, then send the resulting e-mail with the QR code to your phone as an attachment using a messaging app.

OR,

2. simply show up, and tell the guard that you do not have a smartphone. They will sort it out.

Worst case, they will admit you to the small office immediately inside the entry to the right. There, they have several terminals set up for you to enter your information directly, and receive the queue number QR code there.

Discussion:

This automated process, rolled out during the COVID-19 pandemic, eliminated several disease vectors, including: the paper form shared by up to 20 people per page, the attached clipboards, and reusable ballpoint pens. That was one of the reasons this was automated.

The other primary reason is that, given the ever-increasing popularity of the Camino de Santiago, Pilgrim Office management and Cathedral authorities learned that you could not hire or build your way out of the long queues. Simply put, there was a logical limit to the physical resources you could throw at this burgeoning problem. A business-process solution had to be found.

This is what dramatically saves time and eliminated the long queues, if YOU enter the data, the staffer/volunteer at the counter does not have to. That saved several (5 - 7) minutes per pilgrim for EVERY pilgrim. I have timed this personally. The per-pilgrim "dwell time" at the counter dropped from 8 -10 minutes to less than two minutes. When everything is humming along, the per-pilgrim time can be under a minute.

The savings is additive and linear. Process 100 pilgrims, save 500 minutes, etc. That is eliminating over eight pilgrim-hours waiting in a queue - for one counter position. Spread across perhaps a dozen processing positions, you can imagine the cumulative / additive effect on the queues of days gone by.

Back in the day, we would freak out if the daily totals exceeded 2,000 Compostelas issued in one day, and the lines would be 2 -3 hours long, in all weather. Now, they don't even concern themselves under about 4,000 Compostelas per day. The lines, even on weekends and busy arrival days, rarely exceed 30-minutes.

The current, automated data submission process, combined with laser printing Compostelas and Distance Certificates, dramatically improved the Pilgrim Office's ability to do a LOT more work, without having to constantly add staff and volunteers indefinitely.

I worked as a volunteer, every year, from 2014 through 2022 (excepting 2020 - the COVID year). A family medical emergency has kept me home, as a caregiver, for the past two years. Otherwise I would have been there to see the results, first-hand. I am cautiously hopeful that i will be able to return to help out once again in 2025.

But, I was part of the informal pre-COVID discussions about what to do to address increasing future volumes, in a general sense. There was actually a process improvement plan under discussion when COVID hit big in 2020.

We all - staff and volunteer alike - KNEW that something had to change to be able to successfully manage the foreseeable increases in pilgrimage. We knew about impending Holy Years and watched the annual volumes increase.

The pandemic provided the needed imperative to implement the previous "pie in the sky" improvements.

The rest, as everyone can see, at present, is the result.

Hope this helps the discussion.

Tom

 

[Flog]

Hope you had a great time again with the volunteering and all went smoothly?

It did, mostly.. thank you for asking!
Old friends and new friends..
I always leave Santiago with a heavy heart, but I'm always thankful for the wonderful memories, and I was blessed with so many lovely people..

But I'm leaving it behind me in the morning, a few days in Andalucia and a change of pace...