Certified Copy of a Birth Certificate in Australia

Who should certify a copy of your birth certificate depends on who will receive it. For an Australian agency, a Justice of the Peace or another authorised person is usually enough, and free. For a foreign authority, you need a notary's certified copy, or no copy at all, because DFAT can often apostille the original registry certificate directly.

Key takeaways

• A certified copy is a photocopy that someone authorised has compared with the original and signed as a true copy. It says nothing about whether the details on the certificate are correct.
• For Australian recipients, including paper applications to the Department of Home Affairs, a Justice of the Peace or one of the listed occupations can certify the copy.
• A JP's certified copy is not accepted overseas and DFAT will not apostille it.
• For use abroad, the choice is between a notarised copy and sending the original to DFAT. Which one is right depends on whether you need to keep the certificate and what the foreign authority asks for.
• Whoever certifies must see the original. A copy of a copy, or a print of a scan, cannot be certified.

What a certified copy is, and what it is not

A certified copy of a birth certificate is a photocopy of the original with a signed statement on it, from someone the receiving body trusts, that the copy matches the original they saw. The certifier compares the two, page by page, and writes or stamps the certification wording, then signs and dates it.

That is all the certification proves: this copy is the same as an original that existed and was shown to the certifier. It does not confirm your parentage, your date of birth, or that the registry issued the certificate correctly. Only the registry of births, deaths and marriages that issued it stands behind those facts, and nobody else can add to them.

The practical question is therefore never "how do I get a certified copy?" in the abstract. It is "who will read this copy, and whose signature will they trust?" An Australian government agency trusts a long list of people. A foreign court, embassy or registry trusts almost none of them, which is where a notary and DFAT come in.

Copies for use in Australia

Most people who need a certified copy of a birth certificate need it for an Australian body: a visa or citizenship application, a university enrolment, a professional registration, a bank, or a state agency. For these, a notary is rarely needed.

The Department of Home Affairs sets out its own rules on its certified copy page. Those instructions are written for applications made on paper; an online application tells you in the form what to attach. For paper applications, the page says the certifier must:

• be an Australian citizen (or, if you apply from outside Australia and know no Australian citizen, a citizen of the country you are in);
• not be related to you by birth, marriage or a de facto relationship;
• work in one of the listed occupations, which include a Justice of the Peace, a legal practitioner, a police officer, a pharmacist, a nurse, a full-time teacher and a bank officer with five or more years of continuous service, among many others.

Other Australian bodies set their own rules, and many borrow a similar list. Some want the certifier's registration number; some want the copy certified within a recent period; a few want the original itself. Read the recipient's instructions before you go, because a copy certified by the wrong person is simply returned.

This is the point where honesty saves money. If the copy is going to an Australian agency that accepts a JP, a notary adds cost and nothing else. A notary's copy is accepted by those agencies too, but you are paying for a signature the recipient does not need. See notary or Justice of the Peace for the wider comparison.

Copies for use overseas

A foreign authority cannot check whether an Australian pharmacist or JP is who they say they are, so it will not rely on their certification. What it can rely on is a chain it recognises: a notary public's certificate, confirmed by DFAT.

A notary public in Australia is usually an experienced solicitor, appointed under state or territory arrangements, who keeps a permanent register of their notarial acts. When a notary certifies a copy of your birth certificate, they sight the original, compare the copy, and attach a notarial certificate with their signature and seal. DFAT holds notaries' signatures and can confirm them.

An apostille is the certificate DFAT issues to confirm that signature and seal for countries in the Hague Apostille Convention. For countries outside the Convention, DFAT issues an authentication certificate and that country's embassy or consulate then legalises it. Only DFAT issues either certificate in Australia; a notary cannot. Membership changes, so check the destination on the HCCH status table on the day.

A copy certified by a JP cannot join this chain. DFAT does not hold JP signatures for this purpose and does not legalise JP copies, so a JP copy sent overseas is a dead end however carefully it was made.

The option many people miss: no copy at all

A birth certificate is not a private document like a contract or a declaration. It carries the registrar's signature and the registry's seal, which makes it a public document DFAT can often apostille directly, with no notary involved. DFAT's list of documents it can legalise includes birth certificates, and it includes commemorative birth certificates too, although a foreign authority may still want the standard version.

The catch is that the original then goes overseas and usually does not come back. The table sets the three routes side by side.

Route	Who certifies	Accepted by	You keep the original?
JP or authorised person copy	A JP or a listed occupation	Australian bodies that allow it	Yes
Notarised copy, then DFAT	Notary; DFAT confirms the notary	Foreign authorities that take copies	Yes
Original to DFAT directly	Nobody; DFAT confirms the registrar	Foreign authorities, including those wanting the original	No

Two facts often decide it. Some foreign authorities, marriage registries in particular, want the registry certificate itself and will not take a copy however it is certified. And some want a certificate issued recently, meaning the date the registry printed it, not the date of birth. A certified copy of an old certificate is still an old certificate. In both cases, order a fresh certificate from the registry in the state or territory where the birth was registered and apostille that. Apostilling a birth certificate covers that route in full.

Getting a notarised copy, step by step

1. Check the certificate first. Registries have issued different formats over the years, and some shorter formats leave out the parents' details. A certified copy reproduces exactly what the original shows. If the recipient needs information that is not on your certificate, no certification wording can add it; order a full certificate instead.
2. Bring the original. The notary must sight the registry-issued certificate itself, not a photocopy, a scan or a copy someone else certified. Laminated certificates are a problem later, because DFAT refuses laminated public documents.
3. Bring identification. The notary will check your identity against the certificate. If your name has changed since birth, bring the documents that link the names, such as a marriage certificate or change of name certificate.
4. Say where it is going. The notary words the certificate for the purpose, and needs to know whether the destination wants an apostille or authentication.
5. DFAT, then any embassy. DFAT apostilles or authenticates the notary's certificate. For a non-Hague country, the embassy or consulate legalises it after DFAT.

If your name differs between the birth certificate and your passport, the recipient may also want a declaration explaining the difference. That is a separate private document, signed in front of the notary, and it needs its own notarial certificate before DFAT will act on it. Document notarisation sets out what a notary can witness and certify.

A birth certificate issued overseas

Many people in Australia were born elsewhere and hold a foreign birth certificate. For an Australian recipient such as Home Affairs, an authorised person can certify a copy of it in the usual way, and a translation will usually be needed if it is not in English. For Home Affairs, a translation made in Australia should be by a NAATI-credentialled translator; see NAATI translation with a notary.

For use in a third country, it is different. An Australian notary can certify that a copy matches the foreign certificate they sighted, but cannot vouch for the foreign registry that issued it, and DFAT legalises Australian documents. A foreign birth certificate is normally authenticated in the country that issued it. Ask DFAT and the recipient before paying for a notarised copy that may not get you where you need to go.

Common reasons a copy is rejected

• A JP copy sent overseas, or a notarised copy sent to a body that wanted the original.
• The certifier is a relative, or is not in an occupation the recipient accepts.
• The copy is missing the certifier's occupation, phone number or date.
• The copy was made from a scan or an earlier certified copy, not the original.
• The certificate is too old for a recipient that sets an issue-date limit.
• The version on the copy lacks the parents' details the recipient needed.

If the problem is the certificate type DFAT issued rather than the copy, see the wrong certificate type.

Here is an illustration, not a real case

A nurse in Brisbane applies on paper for a family member's visa and also for recognition of her qualifications in Ireland. For the visa application, a colleague who is a full-time teacher, not related to her, certifies a copy of her birth certificate using the Home Affairs wording, and signs with her full name, occupation, phone number and the date. No notary is involved. For the Irish body, which asks for a birth certificate it can rely on, she orders a fresh certificate from the Queensland registry and sends the original to DFAT for an apostille, because she has no need to keep that copy. The only step she nearly got wrong was assuming one kind of certified copy would do for both.

In short

Ask the recipient first. For an Australian agency, a JP or listed authorised person can usually certify a copy of your birth certificate, and a notary adds nothing. For a foreign authority, either a notary certifies a copy and DFAT confirms the notary, or you send a fresh original to DFAT and keep none. For the overseas route, see apostille and authentication, or read birth certificate notarisation for the notary's side.

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