To book my wedding without a decree absolute

[rosieposies]

Getting married in September this year. My first marriage, OH's second marriage.

In going through the process of everything we need to get together to give notice at our local registry office, OH has realised he never applied for a decree absolute after getting his nissi and is therefor still kind of married to exw.

I'm desperate to not miss out on our venue and just want to get it booked. We've got a solicitor working on it but have absolutely no idea how long this process takes. I know we should ask him but he's never in the office and takes ages to reply to emails and OH didn't think to ask when he instructed him.
There will be no problems with exw at all, it's more that I'm worried how long the paperwork will take to get turned around.

Would you book your venue and then give notice later on when you've got the absolute?

Sorry if this is in the wrong topic.

Why would anyone have a wedding, thats jot actually a wedding, when you have no idea when the legal part can take place. I get it if it's a few days apart, but not legal for possibly months?

Who wants to wake up next, the day after their wedding....look at their husband and realise 'oh actually, not my husband....he is married to someone else'

I'd never have even dated a person who was still married. Had so many 'I'm separated' bollocks to find out they were still legally married I started asking to see the decrees after so many who CBAd, were married but still wanted to behave as if they weren't.

Don't book a fake wedding. It's a lie. I'd be furious to find out I was seeing a fake wedding. And they can't use certain language when it's not a legal wedding, it's easy to tell.

You're chasing after this guy and he couldn't even be arsed to get a divorce.

Fuck that.

@HugoSpritz this is what is giving me a heart attack as well - we own a house together and he has quite a bit of inheritance after his dad passed away last year.

Yes he's an idiot, we've all given him a flaming for it including his family etc etc, he is mortified and feels awful. Luckily I'm not marrying him for his organisational skills and he's overall an amazing dad and partner. There was no drama in his actual divorce and they both agreed to it etc. However, she is not the nicest person to OH (they have one DS together and OH is resident parent which she finds understandably hard) and I do worry she'll enjoy making his life a bit difficult. On the other hand I can imagine she'd hate the thought of still being married to him and so will facilitate it as quickly as possible.

We are having a registry office wedding and then going on to a venue after. My sister and best friend are both travelling long distance from other countries to be here for it. I will have to cancel everything won't I.

I don't really want to get married and have a separate party 😓

Book it & you can have a sort of blessing ceremony if you can’t have an official marriage then. Then once it comes through, nip to the registry office and have it made official.

OH has just spoken to the solicitor - he says the earliest it will come through is May. That seems ok??

Book your wedding when he is divorced.

Would be silly to cut it so fine over a bloody venue, tbh. Or a fake wedding. Just cancel it all. Really wonder about people who marry this men who already have kids when they have none and yet the person can't even organise a piss up in a brewery.

Shouldn't take long if it's 2 years separation and both consent - he can file online

It's a venue. There will be others. 'The earliest' is no guarantee. He's still married to her. What a whazzock.

I did. In fact I hadn't even started divorce proceedings, only have a six month run up before the wedding, hadn't married in the UK the first time and ex lived in another country (that I had to go to sort it all out). It was fine, divorce came through with days to spare.

He needs some top quality legal advice ASAP.

Have you actually booked the wedding ceremony, as in the legal bit? I didn't think they would let you do this unless you confirmed that you weren't married, or produced the decree absolute.

It is a risk

My exh booked his wedding to OW before we were divorced. However my solicitor died unexpectedly (heart attack aged 41). It delayed the submission of my paperwork to court and then something was missing so the judge refused to sign it off and it had to wait for another hearing date. In the end the decree absolute came through 5 days before exh's booked wedding!

My Dh’s ex-w got ‘married’ in Spain. Loads of family there, friends etc.

She was still married to DH, decree absolute came through about two weeks after her ‘wedding’

She got married officially about six months later. Dh was a bit bemused by it all.

Depends what court you get. I did an online submission started last Jan and was allocated Liverpool. I called after weeks and weeks of hearing nothing to be told each response can take up to 16 weeks to process. To make matters worse, my stbeh missed one of the parts of the form so I had to resubmit everything back in July/Aug. I got my Nisi effective 3rd Jan and have just applied for the Absolut (had to wait 6 weeks and 1 day) so should be done and dusted by the end of next week.

I really wouldn't chance it.

Happened to us OP, but DH had been married for a extra 14 years! In his defense he'd married at 18 and been married for 6 weeks so he was young, irresponsible and a bit of a twat.
We'd booked everything and as we didn't want to wait the wedding was set for 10 weeks from when we decided, all paid etc. You should have seen his face when we went to register as he really didn't know. The absolute came through about 3 weeks before the wedding.

OH has just spoken to the solicitor - he says the earliest it will come through is May. That seems ok??
EARLIEST. Meaning no earlier than May but absolutely nothing to say it could be delayed several months after than. Then what?

@EuroMillionsWinner who said I had no children? Your post is a bit confusing.

@Leeds2 they don't need a decree absolute to book the registry office, but We do need one to give notice

OH has come home and told me the solicitor said May for decree absolute if exw (maybe I should refer to her as DW???) signs some paperwork. If she doesn't sign it he has to start the whole divorce process again and it will be June worst case scenario.

Right so now he has to speak to her and ask her to sign this bloody paperwork. But if she doesn't it's not the end of the world.

@Lunde that's awful.

This seems to be a 'it should be ok but anything can happen' situation.

My Dh’s ex-w got ‘married’ in Spain. Loads of family there, friends etc.

That's true of a great many destination weddings, they're not legal in the UK.

Are you marrying Boris? Newspapers say today the decree absolute ought to be through any time soon.

You can't get married in a register office if you are still married.I
Instantly not know that you are still married, it quite clearly states the procedure in the decree nisi, unless it's different online.

Not read the whole thing but of any consolation I got pregnant in January, engaged Feb, decree nisi April (they'd been separated nearly a year), decree absolute six weeks later. Married November. You've got plenty of time.

Don’t book anything until the absolute is through.

FWIW the responses you've got are a bit OTT in the unsolicited judgement. It's really not that bad not having got the absolute, as in I can see how it could happen, but as the financial settlement or whatever that waiver thingie is usually happens before the DA, I sure hope they've done that bit - from memory it's the granting of the DA that makes it effective though. Anyway I really don't think it should change the way you view your DF, don't take the comments to heart. He's human and I'm sure he's lovely.

So there wasn’t a consent order providing a clean break on the finances?

You do realise she’s his next of kin in the event of his death?