Normally, I find they are pretty quick at sending out certificates when you order online, but I have ordered several certificates lately, and wondering why they had not arrived within the usual week, I looked at their website and found the following announcement:

Service Announcement – Thursday 29 April 2010

Current Despatch Times
Customers may wish to be aware that standard orders are subject to a delay of 7 working days. This additional time should be added to the estimated date of despatch given at the time of order.
The priority service remains unaffected and orders placed via this service will be despatched on the next working day from receipt of order, if received before 16:00.
GRO apologises for any inconvenience this may cause to our customers. We anticipate that normal service will be resumed by the week beginning 17 May 2010.

I’d better warn all my current clients who are waiting for information!

Anyway – if you’re wondering where your certificate is – that should answer it for you – though It would have been nice if they had given a reason.

Ros

To order a certificate at the GRO you will need to have a name, the year of birth, the quarter of the registration, the registration district and the volume and page number of the registration.  This means you need to search the Birth/Marriage/Death (BMD) indexes before you can order the certificate.

There are several places you can search the indexes online.  The one I recommend is Ancestry.co.uk, because for a monthly fee you have access to all their other resources, including the census and as well as building your family tree online, and being able to search others that people have placed there.  However, you can also carry out searches at Find My Past and FreeBMD (only partially complete).

At Ancestry.co.uk you will be able to search the FreeBMD records up to 1915 AND their own transcribed indexes up to 2005.  Enter as many details as you can into the search box.  Even if you are sure of the date of birth, always give at least 2 years each way because ages are not always accurate (I was always sure my grandfather was born in 1866, but it turned out to be 1865).

After clicking the SEARCH button, you should get one or more entries (usually depending on how common the name is) and then you can search through these to find the most likely.  Make a note of the district, volume number and page number.

If no entries come up, try the search again, but use less search criteria.  For example, try the search without a location and also make sure the EXACT boxes are UNticked.  Names change over the years, and they are also often mis-transcribed, so mis-spellings are very common.

Once you are sure you have the right entry, go to www.gro.gov.uk.   At the bottom of the screen click on Ordering Certificates Online.  If this is your first visit you will need to register and then wait for an email with your password.  After logging in, you can then choose the type of certificate you need (in this case, birth), click YES, for Is the General Register Office Index Known? and enter the year.

You will be asked to confirm your address and then you will need to enter the volume and page number details that you found in the indexes.  Make sure all the details are correct and submit to arrive at the payment screeen.

For the UK you will pay £7, which includes postage, and they usually arrive within seven days.

If you are unsure of whether this certificate is the right one, you can ask for a check to be made (i.e. you enter the known father or mother etc) and they will check these details on the certificate.  If it does not contain these details, they will only charge you part of the fee and will not send it.

However, mostly I prefer to skip this because even if the certificate is not for the person I want, it may give me some good clues if I am having difficulty finding the right one.

The process for finding marriage and death records is exactly the same, except with marriage certificates you can search under the bride or the groom and then cross reference them, which makes it easier to find the correct entry.  After March 1912 it is even easier as the surname of the spouse was listed on each entry.

Ordering birth certificates online is very simple once you get the hang of it, and there is nothing like the excitement of seeing the details of your ancestors when they come through the letter box!

Ros Bott

First make a note of any information that you do not have, such as your grandparents’ marriage, their dates of birth etc. Then you need to decide which certificates you will want to order.

To help you decide, you need to know what information is on the birth, death and marriage certificates so you only order what you absolutely need.

Birth Certificates will give you the following information:

• Date and place of birth
• Name of child
• Sex of child
• Name and surname of father
• Name, surname and maiden name of mother
• Occupation of father

As you can see, this can be a very useful certificate to have as you will find out the mother’s maiden name, which takes you to another branch of your family.

Death Certificates give you the following information:

• Age at death
• Residence at death
• Cause of death
• Name of person registering the death

This is fairly limited information, but can be useful if you want to establish an approximate date of birth (though age in death certificates can often be inaccurate), or if you are interested in the cause of death. The name of the person registering can also give a clue to family members.

My grandparents' marriage certificate

Marriage Certificates will give you the following information:

• Place of marriage, including name of church
• Date of marriage
• Ages of bride and groom
• Status (i.e. whether bachelor/spinster or widower/widow)
• Occupation of both
• Place of residence at time of marriage
• Names of both fathers
• Occupations of both fathers
• Names of witnesses

This is very useful information, particularly the names of the fathers. This may sometimes be the first time you see the next generation back and so is always an exciting moment!

Names of witnesses should not be overlooked as they can be clues to other family members – often siblings or cousins.

Where to find the Indexes

There are several places online where you can search the indexes. The two main places I use are Ancestry.co.uk and FindMyPast.com. At Ancestry you need to subscribe to the site and then you can search the indexes for free (I recommend this as there is lots of other information on Ancestry you will be using) and at FindMyPast you register for free and then pay for search units.

Searching the Indexes

The indexes are divided into quarters for each year (Jan-Mar; Apr-Jun, July-Sept and Oct to Dec). In the past, you had to trawl through all the indexes for each quarter, and if you were not sure of the date of the event, this meant a lot of time spent searching! Name search indexes such as the one at Ancestry.co.uk have now made this much easier. However, do be careful – these indexes have been transcribed by human beings and are subject to error. If you still cannot find your ancestor, even after trying several name variations, it is advisable to go to the main indexes.

When you find your entry, you will find the district name and the volume and page number of the relevant certificate, like this for my grandfather’s marriage:

Manley, Francis Reid Prestwich 8d 755

The surname Reid in this case is the maiden name of the spouse. This does not show up in earlier records.

You must make a note of all these details for when you order your certificates.

Ordering Certificates

Certificates can be ordered online at a cost of £8.50 each (at the time of writing) from The General Record Office. If you are not sure that you are ordering the correct certificate, you can ask for the certificate to be checked, if you have information that you know should be included. If it turns out to be the wrong certificate, the GRO will refund half of your fee.

Certificates should arrive within three days within the UK, five days in Europe and seven days for the rest of the world, unless they are extremely busy in which case it may take a little longer.

Once you have obtained all the birth, deaths and marriages certificates you need, the next step is to look at census records, which I will discuss in a separate article.