What if people change their surname, not because they have got married, but to do fraud or to disguise a criminal background?
Home Office Minister for Immigration and Security James Brokenshire said: “The security of official documents like the British passport or visas is vital and we take the prevention and detection of fraud very seriously. Changing your identity to support criminality is a serious offence, whether the motive is to bypass immigration laws, evade detection by police or defraud banks. Our policy will give us a much stronger platform for effective, systematic action to identify, disrupt and deter the gangs involved in this sort of organised criminality.”
Applications to change a name on official documents, such as the British Passport, Home Office travel documents and biometric residence permits – must now be supported by evidence to show the acquired name and the linkage to the previous name. Foreign nationals who apply to become British citizens may be registered or naturalised in their married name, however they must first change their name on their passports and travel documents to reflect their married name before submitting an application.
This doesn’t apply if you are a victim of crime, such as stalking, or a vulnerable witness, and have a reason for a change of name.
In case you want to change your name to something with numbers or symbols, a trade marked name, something ‘for purely commercial reasons’, or frivolous, or vulgar and ‘which is offensive or is deliberately or inadvertently likely to offend sectors of the community’ – you can’t.
For details visit the Home Office website for a guidance document.
