Does my ex still have parental responsibility if we have a court order

[BitConfused28]

Im looking to change my youngest childs surname ( all 3 have the same dad but was forced to name my youngest after his dad, so 2 have my name and 1 have their dads name )

And the application says everyone with parental responsibilty must agree to the name change

I left my ex 2 years ago when my children were both under 2. My youngest was only 8 months, by the time it was his 1st birthday it had been to court and my ex had been found guitly and given a court order not to contact me or the children.

So does he still have parental responsibilty for the kids even though hes not allowed to see them or contact them?

It says you'll need a court order if you dont have permission. Do i have to apply for a family court order or can i just send them a copy of the court order we have?

Its bothered me for a long time but ive just applied for my youngests school nursery place and it was a bit shit seeing their names together and it not being the same

If im sending it to the uk gov deed poll thing why wouldnt it be valid once they accept it

Because any name change for a child is invalid unless either there is a court order specifically allowing the change or everyone with parental responsibility has consented to the change.

Bitconfused, would you mind coming back and telling me what the result is, when it comes (asking for a friend in similar circumstances)? Good luck.

Collaborate didn’t need to answer your questions because other people have already told you that yes, he has PR, and yes in the absence of consent you will need a court order.

Further, they advised that in many cases where the child does not have contact with their father, the court will not allow the name change as their name is a connection to the paternal family. This was in response to some bad advice by FatherB.

These are the legal boards. You’d be best advised by listening to those with professional experience rather than seizing on the advice you want to hear, which is bad advice.

Op you do realise that lawyers posting on legal are doing this for free don't you? And that whether you like the answer or not, this will not change the law, and that you really should apologise to @Collaborate for your rudeness. This is legal, if posters are guessing making things up and are misrepresenting the legal position the lawyers on here will often say so. This is because misrepresenting the legal position is wasting people 's time, including lawyers, judges and other readers of this thread who may also rely on the answer.

I don't mean judges and lawyers rely on this thread, I mean it is wasting their time and courts time if people take legal action due to relying on rubbish posted here.

I feel with all the evidence i have that the deed of name change will be accepted

The evidence you mention was relevant to whether your child should have contact with their father. It won’t be relevant to their change of name.

Why were you forced to give your youngest their fathers's surname and not your own ?

I feel with all the evidence i have that the deed of name change will be accepted

I'm afraid your feelings won't come in to it. And little as you like it, prh47bridge and collaborate are correct. This was s notneasy to achieve. I think your strongest arguments would centre on matching the full and cohabiting siblings. However you can expect that the reasons you chose to give a non-matching name in the first place will be scrutinised

Because any name change for a child is invalid unless either there is a court order specifically allowing the change or everyone with parental responsibility has consented to the change

Ahh, i didnt realise this. That makes sense

Thank you, yes i will definetly come back and update

I dont feel the need to apologise to Collaberate, they were unnecessarily rude to another poster because they said it should be straight forward.

The evidence you mention was relevant to whether your child should have contact with their father. It won’t be relevant to their change of name.

No harm in thinking positive, but i think it will, including everyhing i have if you type his surname name in on google several articles come up about him and his family, 2 months before he was in court about me his brother was in court for trying to suffocate his partner, his other brother in for animal abuse, several of them in for battery. Its a small town and a big family. Itd be more

Despite what most posters are saying i still think they will accept the deed of name change, i see no reason why they wouldnt, changing a childs name to match his siblings makes more sense than their name is a connection to the paternal family

Him being on the birth cerificate is a connection for them to the paternal family isnt it,

I had pre natal depression and post natal depression with my youngest. I gave birth with just the midwife there and spent the next 4 weeks on my own with the babies. Ex said he wasnt spending time with us because he wanted the baby to be named after him this time, said because he wasnt at the birth he didnt feel a connection to the baby

You can see from my 1st and 2nd that i was stronger at the beginning, i stuck to my guns. But 4 weeks of being up every 2 hours to feed a newborn, a nearly 2 year old who didnt sleep i was desperate for his help and sadly enough, deserate to be a family,

I have screenshots and facebook messages of him laughing about me seeing his name with our son every day if that would make a difference to the application do you think?

I made a mistake in saying that it would be straightforward, I actually meant the literal process would be straightforward not that it was a foregone conclusion. I appreciate that a lawyer has come in and discussed how difficult it is because of NC.

However, there are quite a few examples of separation/divorce followed by new marriage and new children where courts allow a change of surname so that the child does not feel separated from the rest of the family unit.

This is exactly the case here, there are 2 siblings and only parent with one surname and the other child with another.

www.co-oplegalservices.co.uk/media-centre/articles-may-aug-2017/changing-a-childs-surname/

Common reasons to change a child’s surname include:
Believing you were prevented from exercising Parental Responsibility by being deprived of the right to choose the child's name (i.e. the other parent forced you to choose a certain name)
Using that name for your child causes you distress, for instance if your child is named after the other parent who has been violent
Safety and protection concerns
Wanting all the children of the family to have the same surname

There are a few other resources that discuss similar combinations of reasoning.

The judge will listen to these reasons, stuff like appearing on a school register differently to siblings can cause distress and can be used to show how it is in DCs best interest to change surname.

Also you mentioned in OP that you felt forced to give that surname with DC "all 3 have the same dad but was forced to name my youngest after his dad" so remember to mention that too as it could be important.

That said I think I gave far too much hope, it seems like I had heard of a few fringe cases and a lot of google research shows that it does happen but it's not nearly as common as I thought. It's a lot more common to accept double-barrelled surnames but that wouldn't really help.

My personal opinion is that you have good reason to attempt this through court, you could even apply via deed poll on the provision that previous abuse makes contacting your ex dangerous or that you're in fear of doing so. www.deedpoll.org.uk/CanIChangeMyChildsName.html#Section7

I do apologise for giving bad advice, I was genuinely misinformed and thought I knew what I was talking about. It wasn't just a guess but i'll be more careful in future.

I actually meant the literal process would be straightforward not that it was a foregone conclusion Thats how i took it, i do think the process will be fairly "straightforward" just not as much as it would of if he didnt have PR

You didnt give me too much hope, as you can see i am already very positive that the deed of name change will accepted.

Thank you for the link ill have a look at that now

Just had a look at the link, the website looked familiar, checked my emails and the link took me to the same site

I have used that site before, i applied for a deed of name change in December 2017 online, i think i paid maybe £10, they sent me an email saying i needed to send them a letter of consent ( This letter is required if you are a mother or father and the other parent with PR is absent and the absent parent's whereabouts is unknown or if you are the mother and you have good reason for not wanting to contact an absent father )

I didnt send the letter of consent as it seemed so easy i got worried it wasnt a legit site and i was going to get a deed of name change i couldnt use

Believe me it is far from "straightforward"

I'm not a lawyer like collaborate but I'm a parent who has been through the process.

My ds father was born British. His mother was married and was Mrs A. Therefore he was Master A.

His mum and dad divorced and she married a Spanish man and due to how their surnames are done became Mrs B A. A being her married surname. My ds father had his name changed by deed poll to Master B A and his half siblings night have that surname. (So has hive bio dads surname as part of theirs).

Ds father and I met abroad in Spain. We weren't married when ds was born. We registered his name as master B-C (C being my surname).

We had to go to court and sign in front of a judge both accepting we were his biological parents before we could register the birth as unmarried.

When ds birth certificate arrived he was registered as Master B. B being his step dads family name and the name he had added on via deed poll.

His passport then obviously has that name.

We always used master B-C.

However ds and I returned to the uk and when I registered him for school he could only be registered with name on BC. Even though his name was what I we wanted at gp etc.

I had to change it via deed poll. Even though I sent the original court document and registration certificate showing both his father and I wanted master B-C and had all documents translated into English they wouldn't accept this. Because of his DoB and residing in Uk then the uk rules applied and his father had PR.
I had to get him to sign a form.

Then when I went to change passport even though we'd both had to sign to agree to change via deed poll they needed another letter from his father to state he agreed to the deed poll change and passport name change.

I know you want to believe it'll be easy because you've been to hell and back by the sounds of it but please don't be swayed by people with no knowledge of the system just because it's what you want to hear. It'll be more frustrating when you realise how many hoops you'll have to jump through in reality.

This is something iv looked into briefly due to being in similar circumstances. From what i have found out you need to have fathers consent to change surname if he is named on birth cert. I assume your ex is unlikely to do this so you will then need to have his parental rights removed, this is quite hard to do as most judges are reluctant to do this but can be granted in extreme circumstances. Have you considered adding the surname you would like to use as a middle name (dont need fathers permission to do add middle name) an informing the school of the name you would like your son to known by. Some schools will ask on enrolement prefered name, i assume this aimed more toward first name but the short and long is you can call yourself whatever you want its only on legal documents you have to use your registered name.

I know you want to believe it'll be easy because you've been to hell and back by the sounds of it thanks but please don't be swayed by people with no knowledge of the system just because it's what you want to hear. It'll be more frustrating when you realise how many hoops you'll have to jump through in reality

Thank you, i think your right, i think i do feel it will be easy because everything was so hard at one time. The thought of having to go to court and maybe get a soliciter ( i will obviously research before i go down the court path ) doesnt feel like it will be a "hard task"

Although many people think it wont be accepted i really do feel positive about it, I want this year to be the last year he is a reminder in our home and i really do think it will be

When it went to court i did not request the court order, i wasnt even expecting him to be found guilty with how brutal his soliciter was. When I rang up and asked the outcome ( i left as soon as i gave my evidence ) i was gobsmacked theyd said he wasnt allowed to contact the children. I didnt believe it until i got it in writing, i dont know anyone else whose been in my situation and the father was told no contact either which is why i also feel positive about it

I suppose i do need to start thinking maybe it wont go the way i would like but all i can do is be positive because if i start thinking negative i wont even try,

Thank you for the replies i have read everyones advise, i understand i will more than likely have to get a court order but as it costs £36 online at the gov.uk site or £215 court fee's i would rathar "chance" it and try writing to the deed poll first.

If they reject it without a court order i can go to court about it. If i need a soliciter ( i dont know a lot about family court so dont know if id need one ) i can save and get one,

if i cant get a court order then i will appeal it to be honest, but i just cant see them saying no. It doesnt benefit anyone keeping his surname different to ours,

From what I've read in here getting a deed poll isn't particularly difficult. But as I think prh said earlier, it'll be a useless bit of paper. The passport office won't accept it, and nowhere else should either. The court order has to come first.

that deed poll site is a private company charging for a standard form
it is not a government site

it has no special status

Repeatedly saying "I feel positive it will be accepted" is just like King Cannute and the Tide. How you feel has bugger all to do with the legal requirements of what you're asking. Feel as positive as you like; it doesnt change the legal requirements.

Deed poll office dont get to make policy. They csnt make decisions which go against the legal requirements. They cant apply their own judgements because of your very sad story. They would be on your side on a personal level, but that doesnt change the legal requirements. It's a box ticking exercise; if the boxes arent ticked then the answer is no. Doesnt matter how sad your story is.

Court is a different matter. They can make the decisions. Deed poll arent allowed to apply their own thought to it but a judge can. It is true that judges do not like to severe that familial tie. Thate a fact so there isn't any point in arguing against it. They really want to maintain that link, but your solicitor can argue all the reasons why they should. They are valid reasons, so it could very well go your way but you need to go see a solicitor and get the ball rolling.

gov.uk sets out the standard wording for a name change deed for over 16's

www.gov.uk/change-name-deed-poll/make-an-adult-deed-poll

and this is the government form for a child

www.gov.uk/government/publications/change-your-childs-name-forms-loc022-loc023-loc024-and-loc026

Repeatedly saying "I feel positive it will be accepted" is just like King Cannute and the Tide. How you feel has bugger all to do with the legal requirements of what you're asking. Feel as positive as you like; it doesnt change the legal requirements.

Ive acknoweledged ill probably need a court order to apply for the deed of name change upthread. I have repeatedly said it as others have been negative and i do feel positive the name change will be accepted especially if i have to get a court order

They really want to maintain that link I know they do. And in most cases it is mum wanting to change it to hers or new husbands. Its not boy has same mum and dad as his siblings but a different last name. The fact hes the odd one out will play a massive part. Ours isnt the norm and i think they will take that into consideration

www.gov.uk/government/publications/form-c100-application-under-the-children-act-1989-for-a-child-arrangements-prohibited-steps-specific-issue-section-8-order-or-to-vary-or-discharge

Looking online and i can apply onlone for the court order. I want to do it right now but i was offered a permenant home a few weeks ago, ive been to view it but havnt received a moving in date yet, but i know ill be moving soon, i dont want to get the ball rolling with this incase i end up moving and not receiving somthing important

Posted too soon. I can also apply online to see if i can get help for the financial side. I can only use this service if i havnt been to a soliciter about it yet.

Makes things a lot easier for me if i can just do it all from home,

You can apply to the court for help with the fee if you are on a low income or benefits.

There does seem to be some confusion between the "deed poll office" which is a private company not a government department

and "enrolling" a deed poll at the Royal Court of Justice.

Very few people need to enroll - most just apply for new driving licences or passports in new name and use these but it may be that enrolling is more useful for a child as it does give official recognition.

Anyway good luck op - hope the year ahead is better than last year!

Please don't "chance it". If your ex wants to challenge it he can go to court and get the name returned to original and you can get in a lot of trouble.

It won't be hard for him to have the name changed back and COULD lead to the judge ordering all children's names changed to his because you can be accused of parental alienation.

You also do NOT need to pay for a deed poll. They are free. Please see a proper solicitor.

The misinformation on this thread, though well meaning, can land you up on the wrong side of a family judge and lead to legal bills you do not want or need.

@BitConfused28 does your ex know where you live? If not due to his history and what you and your child have been through court months but grant it on a protection side of things , I'm gong through court at the min from name change , write a statement with your reasons and why it's in the best interest of the child. Good luck x