Embassy and Consulates of Belgium in Canada
Home Consular services Civil status Transcription in Belgium of foreign civil status certificates

Transcription in Belgium of foreign civil status certificates

When you send a certificate to the Consulate general in Montreal in order to notify any change in you civil status, the relevant data will be entered in the consular register as well as in the National register. The certificate itself will however not be registered.

The civil code allows in its article 48 however for foreign civil status certificates to be transcribed in the civil status registers of a Belgian city administration. This transcription is highly recommended for certificates that have been issued in countries where it is difficult, if not impossible to obtain an original certificate. The transcription can be done by the administration of the city where you will live once your return to Belgium. If you continue living abroad : the city where you last lived, or the city where your parents live, or the city where you were born. In the absence of any of the aforementioned you can ask the city of Brussels to do the transcription. If you were married in Belgium, the divorce judgment proclaimed abroad will have to be transcribed by city administration that registered your marriage.

Once the transcription is done you can always ask for a literal copy or an extract thereof. The city administration can provide more detailed and practical information.

For more information, please visit the website of the Foreign Affairs Centre.

Important notice: A foreign civil status certificate can only be transcribed in Belgium when it is duly legalized and translated into the language of the city administration.