Guidance

Names: HMPO names policy

Published 23 June 2023

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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hmpo-names-policy-caseworker-guidance/names-hmpo-names-policy

Version 4.0

About: His Majesty’s Passport Office names policy

This guidance tells His Majesty’s Passport Office operational staff about our names policy.

Contacts

If you have any questions about the guidance and your line manager or senior caseworker cannot help you or you think that the guidance has factual errors then email the Guidance & Quality, Operating Standards.

If you notice any formatting errors in this guidance (broken links, spelling mistakes and so on) or have any comments about the layout or navigability of the guidance then you can email the Guidance & Quality, Operating Standards.

Publication

Below is information on when this version of the guidance was published:

  • version 4.0
  • published for Home Office staff on 27 September 2021

Changes from last version of this guidance

This guidance has been updated to reflect the change in our sovereign from Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II to His Majesty King Charles III.

Names policy

This section tells HM Passport Office staff about our Names policy.

We will issue British passports using the name that the customer uses for all official purposes, as well as making sure it:

  • meets International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) guidelines
  • is suitable to use on the passport (for example, it must not be offensive or breach trademark or copyright laws)

Customers can change their name in their passport for many reasons. While most will be genuine (for example, because of marriage) some customers may change their name to hide their true identity. When dealing with a change of name, we ask customers for evidence to help confirm their identity and to make sure there is a clear link between their old and new names.

Customers must only use ‘one name for all official purposes’, making sure the name they want to be known as on their passport, matches the name on their official UK or overseas documents.

This helps us confirm the identity of anyone applying for a British passport and stops anyone who changes their name to:

  • commit a crime
  • avoid detection

We will only issue a passport when we are certain of the customer’s identity and that they use their name for all official purposes. In exceptional circumstances, we may issue a passport using the customer’s name on their passport application, even though it does not match the name on their supporting documents.

Unless our guidance tells is to, we will not issue a passport, if there is any doubt or differences between the name on the passport application and the customer’s supporting documents.

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