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For all the excitement that a prospective holiday generates in

people, there is a moment that just about all travellers dread. Sure,

some are nervous about the flight, others about the array of flying,

biting, stinging creatures that might feast on them. But all will have

to share with a uniformed official the stomach churning moment of shame

that is the passport photo.

It gets worse. With the increase in photo IDs (train pass, driver's

licence, staff security card) those cringeworthy moments multiply, with

photographic evidence of your squinting, colourless visage increasingly

intruding on your everyday life.

However, Paspic.com hopes to offer a solution. If you can secure one

picture that you are happy with, in which you look young/slim/generously

coiffed enough to be flashed to all and sundry, then Paspic.com will

make you as many copies as you want. Forget those botox injections, this

method of remaining 21 forever is much cheaper.

Paspic.com enables users to register and send in their ID pictures or

upload them digitally for free, so that they can buy as many copies as

they need. It charges 75p for six passport-sized pictures, with a fixed

£1.20 delivery charge. The more ID piccies you order, the more it

saves you, and they are posted to you first class within two working

days.

Yehuda Hecht, who runs the company, is taking all this very seriously,

with trademarks and patent pending, and claims that his company's

process could make the high street photo booth obsolete. As a previous

backer of the business was Photo-Me, and considering that the photos

need to be taken in the first place, it seems a grand statement to make,

but Hecht is clearly ambitious.

"Every year around two-and-a-half million ID photos are taken in the

world, and most of those in front of the camera are unhappy with them,"

he jokes. "Our service is unique because we print the invoice, the

address and the photos all on the same sheet, which saves a lot of

money, and it all fits through the letterbox."

The company's marketing will be based online, and is being handled by

web site promotion firm Scotti.co.uk. However, professional

photographers need not lock up their dark rooms just yet. They can

upload photos to the site for customers and split the cash with

Paspic.com. Users will be charged £4, with £3.25 in

royalties going to the photographer.

"There is going to be a fair amount of hard copies sent because people

have photos they like and want to reproduce," says Hecht. "But in the

long term, more and more people will have digital cameras."

Paspic.com is now on the hunt for partners, and has initiated an

affiliate programme offering a 10 per cent commission, which currently

includes ClubSMS.co.uk. With such sites targeting a younger audience,

Hecht sees Paspic.com as a real benefit to students, who will need their

faces immortalised for NUS cards, young person railcards and library

IDs.

"If two students group together it would save them money," he

explains.

"But it's not only for students. At the end of the day, such a photo is

a commodity. Everyone needs a passport."