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Our family is going on a trip to England to visit my husband's family in the fall. Husband has his passport, but the two kids and I need to get ours. The baby and I will have no problem, but my daughter... My daughter's father is not my husband. He disappeared in 2008. I have no idea where he is now, and we're all happier because of it. ANYWAY. The passport process does include a paper I can fill out explaining that we cannot find her other birth parent to get his permission, but there's a section where you indicate how many times you've attempted to contact them. He has no social media presence, no number, and when I did a paid search I was able to find 4 different addresses in another state, but I don't know which is current. I thought about mailing a certified letter to all 4 addresses with the paper he would need to fill out and a brief explanation, or alternatively just write that truthfully I'm not sure where he is. Which would be better? Related: we're also going to start the process to have his parental rights terminated, but I'm concerned that it will take longer than we have to get her passport.
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Feb 23, 2017 15:48
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| # ? May 6, 2024 16:06 |
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I don't know about the US, but at least in Canada you need a notarized letter from the other parent granting you permission to cross the border with the kid. The UK or the US might want something similar, you should look into it just in case. Sounds like a huge headache, sorry to say.
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Feb 23, 2017 16:18
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I wasn't able to get a passport till 18 for precisely this reason, my dad was MIA. Best of luck OP.
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Feb 23, 2017 17:09
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There is a form you can fill out to explain why the other parent can't give permission, but it doesn't necessarily guarantee that it'll get approved. I think I'm going to send the certified letters, attempt to get the passport using that and the form and then at the same time file for sole legal custody. Which I should have done years ago. If anyone has any other advice though, let me know. (My work offers free legal counsel starting March 1st so I can see what sort of advice they offer. Hey friends, don't abandon your kids! If you do abandon your kids then do everyone a favor and don't sign the birth certificate! Thank you!)
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Feb 23, 2017 18:30
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Palisader posted:There is a form you can fill out to explain why the other parent can't give permission, but it doesn't necessarily guarantee that it'll get approved. I think I'm going to send the certified letters, attempt to get the passport using that and the form and then at the same time file for sole legal custody. Which I should have done years ago. If anyone has any other advice though, let me know. IANAL, but that sounds like a good plan. Also, yes you should have obtained sole custody years ago but better late than never.
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Feb 25, 2017 21:21
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twerking on the railroad posted:IANAL, but that sounds like a good plan. Also, yes you should have obtained sole custody years ago but better late than never. Another good plan would be to talk to a lawyer specializing in family law. They may have additional ideas for how to go about tracking down your daughter's father.
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Feb 25, 2017 22:23
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Palisader posted:I was able to find 4 different addresses in another state, but I don't know which is current. I thought about mailing a certified letter to all 4 addresses with the paper he would need to fill out and a brief explanation, or alternatively just write that truthfully I'm not sure where he is. Which would be better?
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Feb 28, 2017 17:38
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| # ? May 6, 2024 16:06 |
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Passport acceptance agent here (the person you pay $25 for a first-time passport application to look it over, find discrepancies, and put it together to send out to the passport agents who will actually grant you a passport), so this question is up my alley. To put it briefly, there are two types of forms if a birth parent for an applicant under the age of 16 is not present. One form is for the absentee parent who can actually be accessed, and it's basically a notarized form with their signature and photocopies of their ID. Applications with this form are usually, if not almost always, approved. Then there is the form you have, which I'm sorry to say doesn't have a very high success rate. My advice, if you would like to apply for the passport now, is to state the lengths you have gone through to try to find the birth father, including the point you are at now. I would consult an attorney before you go sending those letters off to the four addresses, just because that doesn't sound very safe. This is the busiest time of year for passports since everyone is trying to get passports for summer break, so you wouldn't get your new passports until mid-April (routine delivery). Since your trip isn't until fall, you have the time to look at your options...though it seems like it would be difficult to get sole custody in time to get the passport, even if you went directly to the passport center in your state in order to get the passport in a matter of days. My only concern, if you did send off the application now, is whether the passport agent who sees the application will just pause the application and allow you 60 days to send additional information, or if they would reject it outright, making you lose the $80 for a child's book passport. I hope the free legal aid will be more helpful in narrowing down your options, because I really can't say what an individual passport agent will most likely do given the facts you've provided. (Although this question is up my alley, this wasn't very helpful, was it? I'm sorry, and I wish you the best of luck in this matter.)
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Feb 28, 2017 20:40
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