Where the free deed poll comes from#
There has never been a charge for changing your name in the UK. The National Archives puts it plainly: it has always been possible to change your name without registering the change with the government or any other official body, and it is legal for anyone over 16 to start using a new name at any time, as long as they are not doing so for a fraudulent or illegal reason. What organisations need is evidence, and the standard evidence is a deed poll.
GOV.UK publishes the wording. Its page on making an unenrolled deed poll gives the full text of a name change deed, tells you to replace the words in square brackets with your details, and says you need two witnesses aged 18 or over. Write it out, sign it in your old name and your new name in front of the witnesses, have them sign and add their names and addresses, date it, and you have a deed poll. GOV.UK says you can use it straight away as proof of your new name.
What a free deed poll does not include#
The wording is the easy part. The things that go wrong with home-made deeds are the things around it.
- The paper. A deed printed on ordinary paper is valid, but organisations are used to seeing a deed poll on certificate paper, and a member of staff who has never seen a home-made one may hesitate. GOV.UK itself warns that some organisations may not accept a deed poll you have made yourself.
- The names. A typing slip in either name, or a name that breaks GOV.UK's rules (symbols, numbers, a title, something offensive), is only discovered when a passport application is refused. A drafted deed is checked letter by letter before it is printed.
- The signing. HM Passport Office's guidance says a deed poll must be signed in both the old and new name, by at least one witness, in wet ink, and dated, or the customer is told to send a new one. A guide that walks you through that order is worth having.
- Copies. Organisations that keep a copy want a certified one, and a copy you certify yourself is not certified. Certified copies come with a drafted deed or from a solicitor at their own rate.
- Backing. If an organisation refuses a home-made deed, you are on your own with it. A drafted deed from us comes with a written guarantee: we take it up with the organisation, and refund you if it is still refused.
Free, £18.50 or £53.05#
Three routes, one legal effect. The free deed poll and the drafted deed poll are both unenrolled deeds, and in law they are the same thing; HM Passport Office's guidance says unenrolled deed polls have no set format or wording and can be done online or drawn up by the customer themselves. Ours costs £18.50 because a paralegal drafts and checks it, it is printed on certificate paper, it is posted the same working day with a signing guide and a cover letter template, and it is guaranteed to be accepted.
Enrolment is the third route and the one people most often mistake for the "official" one. It costs £53.05, takes several months and puts your name and address in The Gazette. GOV.UK describes it as optional, and it is not the reason an organisation accepts or refuses a deed.
"Replacement deed poll gov uk free"#
A lot of people search for a free replacement from the government when they have lost their deed poll. There is no such service. An unenrolled deed poll was never held by anyone but you, so nothing can be reissued; the answer is a new deed that records the change you made, which you can write yourself from GOV.UK's wording or order as a replacement deed poll. Only an enrolled deed poll has a copy on file, at the High Court, and copies of those are ordered from the court or The National Archives, for a fee.
