What is the purpose of a short-form birth certificate?

March 30, 2017 6:10 PM

Why does the government issue short-form birth certificates if they can't really be used for anything official?

When my baby was born, we did a newborn registration and got, amongst other things, a short-form birth certificate. I'm now applying for a passport for him and need to pay $45 to get a 'long-form' version which shows the parent names. This seems like a scam to me. Why have two versions in the first place if one of them is essentially useless? Why not just issue everyone the full copy and do away with the short version, and all the admin which goes with it, altogether? Or does the short form copy serve some purpose I don't know?

posted by ficbot to Grab Bag (14 answers total)

Anecdata: I've had no issues using the short form for getting driver's licenses in several states (MA, NH, CT, NY), so they're not completely useless for obtaining other forms of identification.
posted by smangosbubbles at 6:17 PM on March 30, 2017

When you say "the government", you have to realize that individual states are the ones (in the US) that issue birth certificates, so this is a state-specific thing. So, your question really pertains to a specific state (that you haven't specified).
posted by msbubbaclees at 7:02 PM on March 30, 2017 [1 favorite]

What state are you in? In California, my short birth certificate shows my parents names. The long form has a lot more medical information on it and takes more prof of identity to get a copy of.
posted by SLC Mom at 10:18 PM on March 30, 2017

A short-form certificate given at birth is basically like a receipt, it's quick to create with minimum information by the relevant official present. In some instances (in the past at least) it may not even reflect the information given on the main registration.

$45 for a full birth certificate? Sounds like a lot, unless you're ordering on a fast-track service or something.

The documents are inevitably required these days, and Register Offices do take time and resource to process certificates (locating the details provided for the original or most recent registration, transferring the registration to a certified certificate and all assorted administrative sundry) so the fee is not really exorbitant.

I've worked with registration of such documents in the UK, I know here local register offices here offer a much cheaper service at the time of the event (around £4 per long-form certificate), so you're usually advised to obtain multiple certificates for the low fee for official purposes.
posted by bumcivilian at 2:12 AM on March 31, 2017

I don't think I have a long-form birth certificate. Mine is wallet sized and I've used it for getting a driver's license, a passport, and entering/exiting Canada and the Caribbean back when you could do that with a birth certificate. I'm 38 and was born in NH, first licensed in VA.

So, not all short birth certificates are useless.
posted by mskyle at 6:26 AM on March 31, 2017

Response by poster: Clarifying, this is Canada. And they definitely told me I need to have the long-form to apply for a passport for him. So I'm not sure why they would issue a short form in the first place.
posted by ficbot at 8:30 AM on March 31, 2017

That's odd. I used my original birth certificate - little card with almost no information - to successfully apply for my passport in 2016. I would consider the possibility that the rules have recently changed, because I've used my original for everything from SIN to driver's license to extended passport with no trouble.
posted by Nyx at 8:36 AM on March 31, 2017

This is Canada-specific. The "short form birth certificate" (the govt-issued document with your name, DOB, and parents' names along with official seal and signature) is your birth certificate for all legal transactions in the USA.

The long form is basically the signed document submitted after the birth and held in archive by the government and is basically never used in the USA.
posted by deanc at 8:51 AM on March 31, 2017

You can use a short form birth certificate for an adult passport but not for a child one. No, don't know why.
posted by warriorqueen at 9:35 AM on March 31, 2017

I think this has to do with the fact that the short-form is cheaper and quicker to produce, and historically, the short-form has been just fine as a fundamental identification document showing date and place of birth. It's only more recently that long-form birth certificates have been required for children's passport applications (2011 in the USA, I believe), and some provinces/states/countries haven't caught up.

The reason why the long-form is needed for children's passport applications is because when the child is under a certain age, it is assumed that he or she won't necessarily have an ID document with a picture and signature, which is what is required to establish that an adult applicant is who they say they are. Even if they do, children's appearance changes so much that it can't necessarily be relied upon to identify the child. Instead, passport agencies rely on the parents to identify the child as their own, which is why they need a birth certificate listing both parents and for the parents to provide their own proof of identity. The other reason is that most countries require parental consent for children to get travel documents, and that again means you need to know who the parents are to know if the right people are giving consent.

All that being said, $45 CAD does sound awfully steep.
posted by exutima at 11:13 AM on March 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

Well, you can definitely use the short form for lots of things here in the U.S. - so maybe it's if you need a birth certificate for something in the U.S.

That seems far fetched to me, I admit.
posted by Toddles at 8:26 PM on March 31, 2017

In the UK short form birth certificates used to be (pre-1983) useful because they showed that you were born in the UK (and so qualified for a British passport). Nowadays you pretty much need a long form birth certificate because they need to know your parents details, and so short form is deprecated.
posted by plonkee at 1:54 AM on April 1, 2017

Former government identification services representative here - Exutima^^^ has it right in their answer. Adult passport renewal can be done with just the short form birth cert, as can health cards and drivers licenses here in Ontario. You are getting the long form birth certificate to prove the child's parental lineage/custody/access situation, as the parentage on the long form is adjusted/amended to remain current with the child's legal status (birth parents removed if child is legally adopted, etc). It is done for the protection of the child as an individual.
posted by NorthernAutumn at 9:38 PM on April 16, 2017

Response by poster: NorthernAutumn I appreciate the usefulness of the long-form. I always did understand what that was required for something like a child's passport. What I don't understand is why is both forms exist---a more useful one and a less useful one---they don't just give everyone the long-form and do away with the short form version completely. What purpose does it especially have that makes them keep issuing them to people as the default?
posted by ficbot at 6:42 PM on April 17, 2017