Municipal services: you can change not only your first name, but also your last name

During this ending year, 25 persons applied to the Civil Registry Department of the Alytus District Municipal Administration for name and surname changes. Five of them expressed their desire to change their name. This is a much simpler procedure, but changing your surname outside of marriage or divorce requires more work and effort. By the way, neither a changed name nor surname means a new life and a new personal history, which would erase the contribution of a lifetime.

Changing the surname means more business

“Currently, we have 25 name change cases. This has nothing to do with marriages or divorces,” explains Silvija Janulevičienė, head of the Civil Registry Department of the Alytus District Municipality Administration.

Some people apply to get back their pre-marriage surname, others want to shorten it or change it altogether because they don’t like the current surname, its sound, others – because of insults or nicknames associated with surnames.

“We have requests to shorten the traditional ending of the surname acquired during marriage or to return the surname we had before marriage, but in order not to reveal the status, to leave the ending “ė”. We have also had a case where a girl born was asked to be given a surname with the ending “ė”. By the way, when the surnames of parents with minor children are changed, a certificate about the parents’ surnames being changed automatically appears in the children’s birth records, but in order to change the children’s surnames, separate surname change files and procedures are required”, the presenter emphasized.

“Procedures for changing a surname are much more complicated than changing a name, because you cannot choose any surname – there are requirements for that.” It is possible to choose from the surnames of relatives – grandparents, great-grandparents, and for this you need to collect information supporting evidence of kinship, existing and former surnames”, explains S. Janulevičienė.

It will not save you from responsibilities

Names are much simpler – you can choose any name you like.

“Usually, residents apply for a name change to a more common, shorter name or to the name they are called by at home, instead of the one on their passport. Sometimes we also receive requests from people who have reached the age of majority to change their names, because they do not like the names given by their parents or they always wanted a specific different name. We have had cases where the same persons change their name more than once. Most of the time, these are residents who have returned from abroad and have issues with law enforcement,” the presenter tells about the trends.

True, changing your name and surname will not save you from impending or existing responsibilities, because the personal code remains for life and any changing information about the owner of the personal code is registered and available to all institutions.

By the way, when changing the name and surname, residents have to pay a little more than 16 euros for this service.

Information from the Communication Department of the Alytus District Municipality Administration