Adopting stepson and name change.

[stament]

I'm British currently living outside of Thailand but will be moving to CM on a non immigrant O visa soon.

 

My Thai wife (who holds Thai and British passports).

 

My step sonhas British and Thai passports) and currently lives in CM with his mother (my wife).

 

Confused yet..... ????????.

 

1/ I want to adopt my step son

2/ We want to change his surname to mine.

 

From my basic understanding, 2 is very easy in TH but 1 is very difficult.

 

Grateful for any advice on this.

 

 

[scorecard]

Might help if you share the boys age.

 

The written permission of the boys biological father might be needed.

 

One avenue could be to approach the interior ministry and meet them and get solid advice. Plenty of appropriate officers there who can speak advanced English.

 

I did this when I adopted my son, and I found the ministerial people very welcoming and friendly, they gave good clear specific advice, and very polite. No 'gifts' were offered and not a hint of same during our 2 discussions.

 

Not knowing where to start I called the ministry main telephone number, they quickly passed me to an English speaker, a polite lady who listened well then transferred me to the correct team, they invited me to visit them and we agreed to the next morning, all very pleasant.  On the second visit my son (teenager) accompanied me and he was interviewed separately, he was initially frightened but the lady and man who spoke to him quickly put him at ease. After some general chit chat, they asked him 'is Mr. xxxx a nice man?' then 'would you like him to be your official / legal father and change your family name to his name?'

 

A bit later one of the interviewers explained that they did some general chit chat to just get him to relax and talk with confidence in both Thai and English and to create as easy atmosphere that it was an important discussion, then when they asked the questions in the paragraph above he gave a quick strong response, in English, of 'YES PLEASE'! 

 

Let me add in these cases everybodys' circumstances are a bit different, I was lucky that my son's bioligal father had signed documents before he passed away to allow adoption of his son.  

 

By the way I admire your intent, good luck and I'm sure with some patience you can achieve it. 

Edited September 26, 2019 by scorecard

[stbkk]

I'm not sure if this is still the case, but when I looked at doing this with my stepson (natural father was already dead), I found out that an adoption in Thailand was not recognised in the UK, so I didn't bother going any further with it. 

[scorecard]

13 minutes ago, stbkk said:

I'm not sure if this is still the case, but when I looked at doing this with my stepson (natural father was already dead), I found out that an adoption in Thailand was not recognised in the UK, so I didn't bother going any further with it. 

 Why not go ahead anyway? And would it not be possible to go through the steps again within the UK system?

 

  

[abrahamzvi]

19 minutes ago, stbkk said:

I'm not sure if this is still the case, but when I looked at doing this with my stepson (natural father was already dead), I found out that an adoption in Thailand was not recognised in the UK, so I didn't bother going any further with it. 

You as well as your wife and her son are British. Why not arrange for the adoption in the UK. I now that a UK adoption is fully accepted legally in Thailand and thus all the problems are solved.

One point I should mention is that in the UK the adoption will also require an agreement of the father of your to be adopted son

Good luck!

[RockerC]

I have been through this process, but we were living outside Thailand at the time.  My son only had a Thai passport at the time.  The Thai Adoption Centre uses the services of a non-Governmental Organisation in other countries, to prepare all the paperwork/interviews etc, and then does a full review themselves.  The whole process took about 3 years and was very complicated and, at times, confusing. 

 

Regarding name change on the birth certificate - we decided not to do this given my sons age (by then early teens), but my understanding is that this is potentially difficult also.  It will depend upon the type of custody agreement your wife has over her son. 

 

Regarding recognition in other countries.  Yes, generally, a Thai adoption is not recognised, or only recognised under certain conditions.  However, if the adoption is done under the provisions of the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption and an Article 23 Certificate is issued at the completion of the process, then it is generally recognised and certainly was in our case (it would not have been if we had not obtained the Article 23 Certificate).  Thailand is a signatory to the Hague Convention.  However, when we went through our odyssey, the Thai Authorities knew very little about the Hague Convention and even less about issuing an Article 23 Certificate (which is not issued from the Thai Adoption Authorities but from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs).  But as your son already has a British passport and if you carry out the adoption in the UK this would not be an issue, as long as the Thai Authorities recognise a UK adoption.

 

I remember the relief we all felt when it was finally over - 3+ years and then my son's new citizenship and passport were issued within one week!

Edited September 26, 2019 by RockerC

[RichardColeman]

32 minutes ago, scorecard said:

 Why not go ahead anyway? And would it not be possible to go through the steps again within the UK system?

 

  

Be very wary about this - first thing to remember is that this is going to cost you £2,000 just to get started with UK adoption for them to process your application paperwork to adopt and you are going to have to approach your local government council about it first anyhow !

 

I cant see how old the child is, but my wife tells me that Thai child when 12 or such can sign papers to choose their parents, no matter who their biological parents are. 

 

 

https://www.gov.uk/child-adoption/adopting-a-child-from-overseas

 

[Mavideol]

contact this office, they will provide all the answers either by phone or by email, it would help if your wife can contact them in Thai, from experience it will move things faster, good luck.

https://www.dcy.go.th/webnew/main/index.php

[thailand49]

I did this a long time 12 years?  The boy has to be a certain age and you must have resided in Thailand a minimum of 6 months straight before applying.

There are a few post that suggest an agency like post #2 and another of a government agency in Bangkok, when I first went I spoke to a number of Thai ladies all spoke excellent English, once they found out I was going to adopt and stay in Thailand to raise him the adoption was done for free. It took me around a year to complete the adoption and get the official papers.

I remember, needing a police report from back home so get one before you return so you don't have to make trip back home just to get it, Had to do another at police HQ in Bangkok Also went to the U.S. Embassy a number of times to obtain something but can't remember now? 

As noted, if the Thai father is alive he will need to be contacted and a release must be given. This I've heard can be the tough part especially if he is a deadbeat and will try to blackmail for some cash to release?  In my situation my Thai son father was dead so we had to go up to her village to obtain the death certificate.

They will want financial income verification to show you can support him they also made a number of visit to Pattaya to see where we were living and a number of interview. There is a final interview in Bangkok in a room with a number of Thais thereafter it is approved or denied two months later we had the documents.

I took everything to have it officially translated in English never had a problem adding him on to some of my benefits from my work even after I retired.

I took all the documents with wife down to the local Amphur here in Chon Buri and changed his name it was quick and easy. When he got older I told him since you are Thai and living in Thailand, if and when you start work particularly if it is with government you might want to change your name back it is my belief he won't get very far with my name in Thailand working for the government.

The agency if the right one is contacted will guide you through everything!

 

Good luck

[stament]

18 hours ago, scorecard said:

Might help if you share the boys age.

 

The written permission of the boys biological father might be needed.

 

One avenue could be to approach the interior ministry and meet them and get solid advice. Plenty of appropriate officers there who can speak advanced English.

 

I did this when I adopted my son, and I found the ministerial people very welcoming and friendly, they gave good clear specific advice, and very polite. No 'gifts' were offered and not a hint of same during our 2 discussions.

 

Not knowing where to start I called the ministry main telephone number, they quickly passed me to an English speaker, a polite lady who listened well then transferred me to the correct team, they invited me to visit them and we agreed to the next morning, all very pleasant.  On the second visit my son (teenager) accompanied me and he was interviewed separately, he was initially frightened but the lady and man who spoke to him quickly put him at ease. After some general chit chat, they asked him 'is Mr. xxxx a nice man?' then 'would you like him to be your official / legal father and change your family name to his name?'

 

A bit later one of the interviewers explained that they did some general chit chat to just get him to relax and talk with confidence in both Thai and English and to create as easy atmosphere that it was an important discussion, then when they asked the questions in the paragraph above he gave a quick strong response, in English, of 'YES PLEASE'! 

 

Let me add in these cases everybodys' circumstances are a bit different, I was lucky that my son's bioligal father had signed documents before he passed away to allow adoption of his son.  

 

By the way I admire your intent, good luck and I'm sure with some patience you can achieve it.

Good point he will be 13 years old in January.

[stament]

16 hours ago, Mavideol said:

contact this office, they will provide all the answers either by phone or by email, it would help if your wife can contact them in Thai, from experience it will move things faster, good luck.

https://www.dcy.go.th/webnew/main/index.php

Thanks for this, I will ask my wife to call.

[stament]

Thanks all for the informative responses and for sharing your experiences.

 

Just to add a bit more information. My step son will be 13 in January. My wife has sole custody of him as given by the courts which his father wilfully gave when we went to live in England a few years back.

 

Whilst I am keen to adopt I'm also conscious of a lengthy process.

 

Having discussed this further, whilst my wife and I want him to have the same surname as us and this is more the priority over adoption since if anything were to happen to my wife god forbid her family and I would agree jointly what's best for our son (not his natural father). Further, if adoption would take c3 years he would be 16yrs by then which kind of reduces the importance of adopting since he will be close to being an adult.

 

This leads me to a question, is it possible to change his surname without going through the adoption process or is this a necessity? 

 

Thanks all for the posts.

 

I will get my wife to call the number provided and report back her findings.

[Goinghomesoon]

On ‎9‎/‎26‎/‎2019 at 11:16 AM, RockerC said:

 

Regarding recognition in other countries.  Yes, generally, a Thai adoption is not recognised, or only recognised under certain conditions.  However, if the adoption is done under the provisions of the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption and an Article 23 Certificate is issued at the completion of the process, then it is generally recognised and certainly was in our case (it would not have been if we had not obtained the Article 23 Certificate).  Thailand is a signatory to the Hague Convention.  However, when we went through our odyssey, the Thai Authorities knew very little about the Hague Convention and even less about issuing an Article 23 Certificate (which is not issued from the Thai Adoption Authorities but from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs).  But as your son already has a British passport and if you carry out the adoption in the UK this would not be an issue, as long as the Thai Authorities recognise a UK adoption

 Actually plenty at the Thai Adoption Centre know about Hague-compliant adoptions since they process them every day for non-Thai expats both in Thailand and applying from overseas.  The problem is that step-parent adoptions of a Thai child are handled by another team.  We were stuck in the middle of the two (Thai/expat couple but wanting to adopt from an orphanage, not a step-parent adoption).  We were originally allocated a moron from the Thai-style-adoption team before being shifted to the Hague adoption team.  Once we dealt with them it was smooth sailing...well we never completed the adoption for another reason but it wasn't at all related to the Thai Govt process.