Genealogy Chat

What details will I find if I go to the registrars to check out a birth certificate from 1990?? Sorry to sound silly, but all mine are Scottish!! Thanks!

You can't get any details by going to the registrar and looking anything up. The only way to get info about what is on the cert, more than you find in the GRO index, is by buying the cert. It will have child's name, date and place of birth, parents' names(including mother's maiden name), places of birth and occupations, name and address of informant. nell

Hi Lindsay, For a start, I don't think you can go to the registrars and 'check out' a birth certificate. They will only give you access to the information if you buy the certificate (£7 each, so much more expensive than Scotlands) You will then get date and place of birth, sex, father's name (unless illegitimate), father's occupation, mothers name and maiden name and the informants name and address (usually the father or mother) Kath. x.

Excuse me if I am wrong (not feeling on 'top form' today), but wouldn't there be a problem getting a cert so recent (1990) ?, unless you are VERY closely related? Someone on here will, I am sure, clarify this for you. Regards, Dea x

I think you can get a recent birth certificate if you show you are a relative and if you have the exact date of birth and not just the qtr. and year. I could be wrong though, so if anyone is certain, feel free to correct me. Kath. x

This is what the GRO site says: We now offer the facility to order certificates online, this can be used to place orders using the GRO index reference and for certificates dating from 1900 up to 18 months before the present date where the exact details are known. See Ways to apply for a range of other options. www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificate/index.asp#0 nell

Thanks Nell - sorry if I confused anyone. Well, you learn something new every day - Don't you think it's a bit scary though ?? - That means that within less than a year, ANYONE could get hold of a copy of my little grand-daughters birth certificate, AND, I would't even know. Seems a bit wierd to me... Dea x

Thank you everyone!!

Dea The rules USED to be that you had to give an exact date and place of birth etc for any event in the last 50 years, and also the relationship to that person, in an attempt to prevent identity theft. I am surprised that this is no longer the case - however, I know it is not. My daughter was stalked a few years ago by a man who obtained copies of my living family's BMDs. He used these to a) torment my daughter on the phone (I know where your little sister was born and where they live, think I'll give her a call as you don't love me...etc....etc) and to try to set up a bank account in her name (!). This man was mentally unstable and the police dealt with him more or less as soon as we reported it, but it was a very frightening episode, especially when the Police found all these copy certs. Yet another reason why I have absolutely no identifying info about living people on this Site. Olde Crone

Scottish certificates are the same price as from GRO for England & Wales, the difference is that in Scotland, if you aren't needing the information as a legal requirement - and so don't need it certified - you can get an uncertified copy of the register page for the price of a Scotland's People credit or so. Scottish law is different from the law in England and Wales and therein lies the difference. Christine

Have things changed then? I was a Registrar until about 3 years ago. The SR where I worked would allow, by appointment, people tracing family history to come and look at relevant registers to search for relatives. This would allow them to take the information without buying a certificate. I think other register offices in the area did this too... but maybe it has all changed or maybe it was because we were a very small part time office.

Josephine's right. You used to be able to pay a search fee and look through the indexes at the register office. I spent a very happy afternoon at Retford doing exactly that - the registrar even brought me a cup of tea! I don't think it was actually encouraged, they were a bit off with me when I first arrived, but I was so well behaved(!) that he took me down into the archives and showed me some of the original certificates for my family. Quite emotional seeing where ggg grandmother had made her mark to register the death of one of her grandsons in a typhus epidemic. Mind you - this was all back in the 80s when we'd never heard of the internet! Sheila