Your family book is one of the essential documents to take with you abroad. True official identity document of the family, it gathers all the civil status documents of its members and it is obligatory.
Get your family record book
The family record book is created when the spouses marry or when the first child is born. It is normally to be collected at the town hall where the marriage was celebrated or that of the place of birth of the first child. Abroad, you will have to turn to the consulate or the embassy to recover it, specifies the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Update it after an event
The family book is then completed at the time of the birth of a child, the death of one of the spouses, a minor child, divorce or separation of the spouses. The central civil status service, the embassy or the consulate which hold the certificate in their registers are responsible for updating it.
In the event of separation, divorce, theft or loss, a request for a duplicate may be submitted by either spouse to the French embassy or consulate with territorial jurisdiction.
The news
Since May 2022, there is a new model of family record book. This takes into account medically assisted procreation (PMA), the new rule for choosing a name, the reform of adoption, the identity of children born dead and the death certificate of adult children, explains the site. of the French administration.
- For couples of women who have recourse to PMA, “filiation is established, with regard to the woman who gives birth, by her sole designation in the birth certificate of the child. With regard to the other woman, filiation is established by joint acknowledgment made in advance before the notary concomitantly with the consent given to medically assisted procreation..
- For a change of name, the new family record book adapts to the recent regulations stipulating that an adult can now choose his surname by simple declaration to the civil registry.
- For adoption, it also follows the new provisions which have made adoption possible for PACS couples and cohabitants living together for over a year and over 26 years.
- For a child born dead, parents can now declare their first and last names. the new booklet also makes it possible to register the death certificate of an adult child.
Please note: this new family record book was put into circulation on 1is June 2022, but the municipalities will be able to continue to deliver the old models until their stock is exhausted.