Civil Ceremony

 Civil Ceremony

  Civil ceremonies are the most popular type of wedding in the UK, accounting for seventy per cent of all marriages. To book a civil ceremony you need to call up your local register office and give notice to marry. Wichita Falls Wedding Photography This costs £35 each. Yes, already adding up isn’t it? You must do this with your local register office even if you do not intend to get married in your local area. You can do this up to a year before your wedding but you must do it 15 days before. This is the same for heterosexual and homosexual marriages.

  You will have to attend the giving notice appointment with your fiancé and will also have to bring along proof of identity and proof of address. These could be your passport and a bill. The registrar will tell you what to bring and make sure that you do because if you don’t you will have to do the entire thing again. If either of you is divorced then you will have to bring your decree absolute. If either of you is widowed you will need to bring the marriage and death certificate. You and your fiancé will be interviewed separately but it is nothing to worry about. You will just be asked a few questions. After the appointment a certificate of marriage will be issued and you can marry after sixteen days. You will need two people to sign the marriage register and act as witnesses. It will help to let them know they are doing this as we forgot to inform our witnesses so no one came forward when the registrar asked them to.

  After you have given notice the papers will be posted within the registry office for public view. If anyone wants to oppose the marriage they have fifteen days to do so. If no one objects, and why would they? you can collect the marriage licence after fifteen days if you are marrying outside of your district. Otherwise the registrar will take it to the venue.

  Your certificate will only be valid for twelve months and only for your chosen venue. If you change your venue or don’t get married within the year then you need to register again.

  For a civil ceremony you have to marry in a licensed venue or a register office. The venue has to be open to the public and the doors cannot be locked. The venue also has to be a permanent structure. If you have any doubts contact your local authority. You have to have lived in the district you are giving notice in for at least seven days. This can be a hotel if you are based abroad. If the venue of your choice is not in your district you still have to register in your district first and then you can contact the register office where you want to get married or your venue is based.

  A civil ceremony generally takes about ten to fifteen minutes. This will depend on the vows you choose and whether or not you have asked a guest to come up and do a wedding reading or a song. In a civil ceremony you can include readings, music and a song but nothing religious.

  The registrar will make a short statement about marriage and then go into your vows. When you get the leaflet that has all of the vows on it can be intimidating but don’t worry, even if you choose them all the ceremony would not be that long. Just go through them and tick the ones you want or even write your own. Some of the vows cannot be changed as these are the part of the ceremony that is legally binding and a verbal contract.