Did you know that there’s a PH Law that permits the correction of typographical errors of a person’s birth certificate? This is Republic Act (RA) No. 10172 and it has existed since 2012.

The Judicial Order is one of the main reasons Filipino netizens rarely had their child’s name corrected, if ever there were errors, because of the needed fees and the long process involved.

However, the existing Republic Act No. 10172 eliminates the need for a Judicial Order whenever there is a typographical error that the civil registrar officially recorded.

Under Section 1 of the Republic Act, changes or corrections must have judicial order, unless it concerns clerical or typographical errors, alongside changing of first name or nickname and person’s date of birth or sex.

Section 2 then defines the error as a mistake committed by the civil registrar during its performance of clerical work in writing, transcribing, typing, or copying an entry. In addition, parents or guardians who want to change their child’s name into a completely different name are not allowed.

The Republic Act’s Section 5 then described the required documents to honor the filed petition. The necessary documents include a certified true machine copy of the certificate or the page of the registry book, at least two (2) private or public papers that show the correct entry, and other documents that the civil registrar considers necessary and relevant.

The mentioned process still requires the payment of a fee by those who want to avail of it. Section 4 states that all fees collected by the city or municipal civil registrar or the consul general will accrue to the funds of the Local Civil Registry Office or the Office of the Consul General. 

The accrual is said to be for modernization of their offices, alongside hiring new personnel and procurement of supplies, subject to government accounting and auditing rules.

On Monday, May 23, senators approved the Senate Bill (SB) No. 2450, establishing a permanent validity for certificates, such as live birth, marriage, and death.

The approved bill mandates that certificates of live birth, death, and marriage issued by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) and its predecessor local civil registries and the National Statistics Office (NSO) will have permanent validity regardless of the issuance’s date. – WhatALife!

Source: (sugbo.ph), (rappler.com), (inquirer.net)

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Also read: How to get PSA Birth Certificate 2022, Requirements and Steps