04/23/08 11:39 AM
Marriage License and Name Change Security
As some of you may have picked up from my previous post, I was recently married, and am taking my husband’s name. Let me tell you both how easy and how much of a hassle changing your legal name is.
I was married in Frederick County, Maryland which has an interesting Marriage License system. When you apply for your license, you’re given three pieces of paper: a fancy piece of paper, a green sheet, and a white one with a raised seal. All three have the same information: full names, ages, and addresses of the bride and groom. It also has blank spaces for the date and location of the marriage. The final piece of information it has is a signature block for the officiant. It does not have anywhere for the bride or groom or witnesses to sign. When I went to apply for the license (only one of us has to go), I showed my ID and gave them the information printed on the license as well as both of our social security numbers. I had to state under oath that all of the information was correct to my knowledge and that we both intended for the marriage to take place.
Once the officiant signed the three copies, we kept the “fancy” one, the officiant kept the white one with the seal, and we mailed the green copy back to the courthouse. I will never get an “official” copy of the marriage license from the county, the “fancy” copy I have (with no raised seal) is considered my official copy to use when changing my name.
I see several issues here:
1: neither of us signed it, how does the county know that the officiant isn’t just completing it for one party?
2: there is no raised seal or any other indicator that the marriage certificate is an official government issued document. In fact, it is copyable (yes I tried…).
3:We have no confirmation that the county received the completed copy of the license (I called later to confirm that they did receive it.)
Some of these factors made it quite interesting to start the process of getting my name changed (and it’s not even close to finished yet).
I had a lot of bank accounts, investment accounts, and credit cards that would need changed, so before the wedding, I had called all of these companies and asked what I needed to do to change my name. I was honest with them and said the wedding would be in a week, and I was just calling to get information. The banks and investment accounts gave me the address to send a copy of the marriage license once we had the official copy. The credit card companies said “we can do that over the phone for you right here, what’s your new name?”. So, before the wedding, I had in my possession credit cards in my new name. I didn’t activate them yet since all of my ID was in my maiden name, but wow, that was easy.
After the wedding, I started changing the more official IDs.
I had read that the first stop should be either your passport or your driver’s license, well, I was about to head overseas, and I was traveling under my maiden name, so the passport was out. I started with my driver’s license and SSN. Monday morning after the wedding found me waiting in line at the MVA with my driver’s license and my marriage license. It was quite painless. They took a new picture, charged me $30 and I was on my way with my new ID. The SSA office was a little more interesting. There was a man at the front desk checking to make sure everyone had the proper paperwork for whatever they were there for, and he had told me that I needed an official copy of my marriage license, with a raised seal. I repeated to him what the county had told me, and he let me wait in line anyway. When I got called, no problems, I got a nice letter that I would get my new card in 2 weeks (I haven’t gotten it yet, nor have I called about it, so there may be problems elsewhere).
My bank was pretty easy, I just walked in with a copy of the license, and they copied it and changed the name on my account. I haven’t dealt with the places I have to mail a copy to yet, but they’re on the list for writing this weekend.
However, I have not changed my passport yet. Supposedly, I only need to send my original passport and the original copy of my marriage license to the dept of state, and they’ll send me a new one. I haven’t done this for a few reasons. For one, there are a lot of places where I’m still Laura Bowser and I need ID to authenticate myself. Also, I’m registered to take a few certification exams, and the people running the exams weren’t sure if the system would have my name updated in time to take the exam. So I need a piece of ID in each name for a while.
It’s been an interesting journey. Even my husband occasionally forgets that I’ve taken his name and refers to me by my maiden name, but I’m sure that will eventually change. I have had to be extremely careful when signing my name since in cursive a capital B and capital R start very similarly.