Guardianship for child after being a legal parent

[Santzes]

Hey,

 

I went through the process in Juvenile Court to legitimize my child when she was really young, but the mother was sadly marked as the only legal guardian as she was mostly with her at that time. Things have changed and I'd like to be her guardian as well - is this a simple process that we can just do in Amphoe like it would be if we didn't do the court stuff before, or are there any problems?

[khunpeer]

you need a good experienced lawyer who understands your situation. I went thru this many years ago, lot of paperwork and meetings! but at the end it worked out well and I even could change my visa into 'dependant visa' with only 400.000 on the bank!

so yes, it is possible but you need to prepare it well!

[Santzes]

4 minutes ago, khunpeer said:

you need a good experienced lawyer who understands your situation. I went thru this many years ago, lot of paperwork and meetings! but at the end it worked out well and I even could change my visa into 'dependant visa' with only 400.000 on the bank!

so yes, it is possible but you need to prepare it well!

Thanks! Sounds terrible as I expected it be an amphoe trip.. How much did it end up costing you?

 

I can at least get the 2 month family visit visa with the current paperwork from juvenile court, is the 1 year different? I was just thinking to use that option..

[Foghorn]

I got full parental rights from the amphur , my ex wife had to sign some papers but in and out in 30 minutes , she was taken aside and talked to ,telling her if she relinquished her rights she would need my help to get them back , hope this helps , I have been in Thailand nearly 20 years ,had all the <deleted> and bs but a lot of the government departments are actually quite good and the family courts are very helpful, if the amphur are challenging try the family courts before the lawyers, the lawyers make things hard to charge more

[Santzes]

29 minutes ago, Foghorn said:

I got full parental rights from the amphur , my ex wife had to sign some papers but in and out in 30 minutes , she was taken aside and talked to ,telling her if she relinquished her rights she would need my help to get them back , hope this helps , I have been in Thailand nearly 20 years ,had all the <deleted> and bs but a lot of the government departments are actually quite good and the family courts are very helpful, if the amphur are challenging try the family courts before the lawyers, the lawyers make things hard to charge more

Thanks for the info. But did you legitimize your child in court before doing that? I'm aware that had I not done that it should be easy, but it looks like for some weird reason it might be much harder after doing it... Maybe I gotta check with the Amphur, but getting the mother do anything is tough so I was hoping to involve her as little as possible..

[Foghorn]

6 hours ago, Santzes said:

Thanks for the info. But did you legitimize your child in court before doing that? I'm aware that had I not done that it should be easy, but it looks like for some weird reason it might be much harder after doing it... Maybe I gotta check with the Amphur, but getting the mother do anything is tough so I was hoping to involve her as little as possible..

One child I was married to their mum so didn’t need to legitimize, the other we went to court to legitimize, no lawyers used , they would of only been used as translator if I had used one , it was easy , but had to go back to court to get another paper from them , cost all around 800 baht , 

the first paper the amphur would recognize , 50 baht for the second paper , sorry I don’t know what the papers are called but the family courts are so helpful , worth asking them 

[RedCardinal]

On 12/8/2022 at 8:31 PM, Santzes said:

I went through the process in Juvenile Court to legitimize my child when she was really young, but the mother was sadly marked as the only legal guardian as she was mostly with her at that time.

So your Legitimization document from the Family Court states that she is the sole custodian?  It seems very odd that a Legitimization process would result in this outcome, but perhaps it is the case.  How did you confirm the guardianship outcome you detail please? 

 

On 12/8/2022 at 8:31 PM, Santzes said:

Things have changed and I'd like to be her guardian as well - is this a simple process that we can just do in Amphoe like it would be if we didn't do the court stuff before, or are there any problems?

Some good info here already, and I'm just going to add 2 possible pieces of info that may help:

1. If the child is 7 or older, and the mother/child cooperate, you may be able to fix this an the local Amphur.  They can also process the Legitimization once the child is 7.  But I'm not sure what would happen when you already have the Family Court doc.  A trip to the Amphur might be a good start.

2. The Family Court process is going to be very dependent on the cooperation of the mother.  If she cooperates then (as stated above) you can do this yourself.  Depending on the region, you may or may not need a translator.  If the mother is not cooperative it's a different ball game, and you're likely facing some considerable costs, time and stress to achieve your goal.

 

So probably the most important question to ask is how cooperative will the mother be?  That's key here.