Question for UK brides?

[Tinker74]

Hi...I got married this August during our wonderful holiday. Not At disney but at bahama bay in Davenport. I had applied for our wedding licence through the post so had a notary sign and witness it here {uk} a couple of weeks before the wedding.
A few weeks after we came home our wedding certificate arrived in the post, I was expecting it to look different. It is just our marriage licence with the bit on the bottom filled in and signed by our officiant.
It got me thinking.....what actual proof is there we are married?? In the this country..(uk). There is a public record of all marriages that take place at home. But there is no recoed of our marriage. It just makes me feel weird.

Am I right? Is their a record? I suppose there is but it is in Florida.
I remember we didn't even sign anything on the day...all the weddings I have been to the couple sign the regisrty on the wedding day. Why not in Florida.

Perhaps I'll feel more married when I get round to changing my na,me on bank cards and such?

 

[redz]

WOW, how spooky is this,
we were discussing this exact topic last night,
We married at the wedding pavillion in disney on the 10th Oct, and received our wedding certificate yesterday in the post (mrs redz was very happy to have it at last )
and were both thinking, like you, that it didnt seem like anything special, just a photocopy really, with an official red stamp on it, saying it was an official copy and signed by an orange county official!!!!
but i guess the fact that they send a copy means they keep the original, so i guess it's kept as a a record!
we thought we might have to register it here and called the records office here in Aberdeen, but they said we dont need to register it with them! just so long as we have a marriage licence if we were asked for one, what we have is more than good enough!
Mrs redz has been changing her bank stuff, driving licence etc today now that we have the certificate, shes like a kid at christmas!!!
REDZ

 

[karentan]

if you get married abroad, you have the option to get the marriage registered in this country but you're in no way obliged to do so. i havent done anything apart from changing my name.

 

[janine]

I could be wrong, but I thought they said a copy of it is sent to somewhere in the UK so that it is official, otherwise the details they keep about you wouldn't be right.
In other words, how would customs know that you have changed your name unless you tell them yourself? Surely a copy is sent on to customs & excise. I wouldn't like to try and get through passport control with my old name on the passport just in case they say stop, ' You are now a Mrs, go change your passport.'
I will have to look into this and fins out for sure.

 

[Rascal1003]

There is a register that your marriage is entered onto, through the local Courthouse where you were married.
There is no system that allows you to register your marriage here in the UK. You can have a copy of your marriage certificate recorded in the public records but they do not register the marriage....however, the UK recognises marriages from a huge number of other countries, so there is no need to register here.

You will need your marriage certificate for all formal name-changes such as banks etc and they all recognise US certificates, so it will feel quite normal.

I believe your license to get married comes in the form of the wedding certificate that just needs to be signed by the officiant, hence the same document. The officiant returns this to the courthouse to be registered and then you receive a copy of the same document.

I found a phonecall to the local authorities helped clarify all of this info (may have been an email actually).