my passport is beat up from carrying it in my pocket every day for like 6-7 months. when i tried to get back into england, the customs officer made a withering comment but let me back in. Of course, England is my own country, I don't know what he'd have done otherwise.

NE: Further data points: the French border police didn't care, nor did the Croatian ones, but these were the kind of controls who just come onto the train and check your passport rather than the Dover office which has a bureaucrat saying STAY BEHIND THE YELLOW LINE and scanning your passport with a machine.