signing documents as a guardian of a child.......help

[kentmumtj]

does anyone know whether it is fraud to sign documents relating to someone else's child by declaring you are their guardian even if there is no court ruling to say you are the guardian.

is this making sense???

it sounds confusing i know but what i want to know is if a child needs a form signed by their parent or guardian can another adult sign it and pretend to be their guardian, and if they do this is this commiting any kind of offence????

i do hope someone can answer this i have tried googling and had no luck

offence or not it, to me, is very wrong.

i agree that i think it is competly wrong, ive just discovered this is something my sister is doing and wnated to get the exact rights or wrongs before confronting her

Is your sister any kind of de facto guardian? (IE, is she regularly left caring for them?) What sort of documents are we talking about?

i thought it made no difference whether she was left caring for them or not she does not have parental responsibilty nor is she their legal guardian, and the parent has no objections to signing the forms anyway

documents are things like oyster card application, school letters think shes trying for the passport one too but am not sure on that at the moment

any one know??????

Under what capacity is she signing them? I mean you said the parents think this is ok is she their CM or something?
WHy can't they get the passport for the child? Is she signing her own name or forging theirs?

no i meant the parents would have no objections to signing the forms but for some reason the child has asked this other adult to sign them and the parents are very angry with my sister for signing them ...........quite right to i would be furious

How old is the child?

I think they have every reason to be angry and the parents should be getting to the bottom of why the child is asking her to do it.
SOmething strange is going on here and why on earth is she trying to get him a passport. I would imagine school letters and things are a bit shady but there will probably be a hard line on passport signing, because signing for that opens a whole can of worms really.

According to the IPS (identity and passport service, which issues passports) website, a parent or someone with parental responsibility should sign the passport application form www.direct.gov.uk/en/TravelAndTransport/Passports/Applyingforaneworrenewedchildpassport/DG_174107. It doesn't say whether it is an offence to sign it if you don't have PR but as a passport application contains statements of fact on the basis of which a legal document is issued my guess would be that it will be an offence to sign it when you don't have authority to do so (it could amount to obtaining a passport by deception, i.e. fraud). "Guardianship" is a legal concept which requires a court order and I think your sister should be very careful about passing herself off as a child's guardian if she is not - at the very least it looks dodgy.

The passport point is really important as it's perfectly possible that, in such a scenario, were the child issued a passport without the parents' knowledge, he could travel/be taken overseas without their consent. Pretty serious stuff.

i agree i think i just wanted clarification from others before i jumped in without thinking this through.

My sister is completly wrong with what she is doing and she really needs to stop otherwise she will find herself in some sort of trouble, i thought it could be fraud as well.

the child is 16 years old i think the other motive behind it is EMA as the child concerned would like to get it but wouldnt be entitled to it due to the parents income whereas if they say they are living at my sisters and she signs it they will get the full amount as she is on as many benefits as she can possibly manage to claim.

i agree that i think she will have massive problems with the passport but it is the other things i am not so sure about.

either way i think she needs to stop.