I saw this in an email message this morning.

Problem:
The writer used a past participle where a preposition was required.

Explanation:
The word “passed” — spelled P-A-S-S-E-D — in the expression “it was passed 3:00 pm” is the past participle of the verb “pass”.

The message writer was trying to say in the complete sentence that the time was after 3:00 p.m. when someone saw something.

The word “after” in this context is a preposition.

In other words, the message writer should have used a preposition instead of a past participle, and this preposition should sound like “passed” — spelled P-A-S-S-E-D — and act as a synonym for the preposition “after”.

This gives us the solution. The writer should have used the preposition “past” — spelled P-A-S-T — which means beyond in time.

Solution:
“… it was past 3:00 pm …”