Registering a birth

If your child is born outside the UK you can register the birth with the nearest consulate or with our consular department in London if you’ve returned to the UK. You don’t have to do this, but if you do your child will be given a British style birth certificate and the birth will be registered at the General Register Office in the UK.

We recommend consular birth registration because it means you’ll be able to get extra copies of the consular certificate from the General Register Office in the future.

Before applying for consular birth registration

You won’t be able to register the birth with your local registry office in the UK so you’ll need to register the birth with the local civil authorities and obtain a local birth certificate from them.

Exceptions

Please note that we can’t register births which occurred in the following countries:

• Australia
• Canada
• New Zealand
• Republic of Ireland
• South Africa
• Overseas Territories

The standard of registration in these countries is similar to that of the UK. We also can’t register a birth if the parents were born overseas and are only British by descent. Nor can we register the birth of a non-British child who has been adopted by British parents.

What documents do we need to provide?

To consular register a birth you will need to provide:

• child’s civil overseas birth certificate (If the child was conceived as a result of a surrogacy arrangement on or after 6 April 2009 we are able to accept a hospital notification where the surrogate mother's civil partner is not named on the child's overseas birth certificate.)
• mother’s full length British birth certificate (or Home office naturalisation or registration certificate if born outside of the UK).* 
• father/second female parent’s full British birth certificate (or Home office naturalisation or registration certificate if born outside of the UK)*
• parents marriage certificate or civil partnership registration
  
• One current British passport

* this is at least A4 sized and shows details of your parents. Copies can be obtained from the General Register Office

If one parent was born overseas, we will still need to see their overseas birth certificate or passport photocopy

A full British birth certificate is one which shows details of the parents on, and is usually at least A4 sized.

We’ll need the original documents and two legible photocopies of each, and the application form plus one copy.

We can accept a certified copy of your passport but the bio-data page will need to be certified by a UK solicitor or a notary public registered with the Law Society

If you and your partner are not married

If you are a British man and your child’s mother is foreign you can only apply for a Consular birth registration of a child who was born on or after 1 July 2006. If you are an unmarried women who’s had a child abroad and you would like the father’s details recorded on the certificate, both you and the father will need to swear Statutory Paternity Declarations in front of a UK solicitor/Commissioner for Oaths. This is sworn in front of a consular officer if you are resident overseas.

Paternity Declaration

How much does it cost?

The cost of registration, whether in London or at the Consulate abroad is £98.00 and each certificate requested is £63.00 e.g. one certificate costs £98.00 + £63.00 = £161.00; two certificates would cost £224.00 etc. You can pay by postal order or bank draft made payable to "The FCO". We do not accept personal cheques. If you would like more than one copy of the certificate each additional certificate will cost £63.00. The fees are closely regulated by parliament and cover the cost of administration.

Payment by Card

You can make payment for our services by credit or debit card. When submitting your application, make sure you include a print out of the Barclaycard payment confirmation page which gives details of your payment reference and date and time of payment. Without this information we will be unable to process your application.

Registering at a British Consulate overseas

You should consult the website of the relevant consulate for information on processing times and other information. You can find an Embassy or Consulate using the search facility to the right.

Registering at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London

We can’t accept personal callers at our London office so you will need to post your documents to us by recorded or special delivery.

First you'll need to download and complete the registration form.

Please include two stamped addressed special or recorded delivery envelopes so we can return your documents and your consular birth certificate to you. We’ll return your documents to you within 20 working days. If you do not include two special delivery envelopes you will need to include the special delivery charge on the shopping basket. You should receive the Consular certificate about 6 weeks from us receiving a complete application. 

Obtaining copies of the certificate in the future

You’ll be able to obtain certified copies of the certificate from the General Register Office from the March of the year after registration. If you need a copy before then you should submit a request to us plus payment of £63.00 for each certificate requested which we’ll forward to the relevant British embassy.

e.g. If a child is registered in June 2000, their certificate will be obtainable from the General Register Office from March of 2001; if they were registered in November 2000 the certificate would still be available from the GRO from March 2001.

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