February 2025 - Changing Your Name When You Marry – What’s Involved

Planning a wedding involves a lot of details but nothing compared with those you’ll encounter if, like more than 80% of spouses today, you decide to change your name after your ceremony.

While many couples stick with the tradition of the bride adopting her groom’s surname, some choose to combine both surnames with a hyphen, others use a double surname with no hyphen, and still others use the bride’s maiden name as replacement for her middle name. Combining surnames allows couples to maintain their professional identities and helps to preserve a family name if one spouse is the last in line to carry that name.

No matter what format, a name change is a legal action that must be recorded. Your marriage license application must reflect your chosen name as this is the name that will be transferred to your marriage certificate. These two documents are different: the marriage license verifies that you’re legally eligible to marry while the marriage certificate proves you were married as of a specific date and time. The marriage certificate is the legal document needed to complete your name change elsewhere. Keep the original safe and order certified copies.

With certified copies of your marriage certificate in hand, you can now begin the laborious task of changing your name on all legal, financial, and personal documents.

Begin with the Social Security Administration. For a new Social Security card, you’ll need proof of your identity, your citizenship and your new official name. From there you can update other important documents including driver’s license or state-issued ID; vehicle registration and title; passport; voter registration; bank, credit union and investment accounts; and credit cards. (Note: if you made travel arrangements before changing your name, make sure your travel ID, i.e., driver’s license and/or passport, reflects the name used when making those arrangements.)

Now, don’t forget all your other personal information, including:

• Employer/work information
• Professional licenses/associations
• Mortgages/leases
• Insurance policies
• Utilities (including TV, cell phone, internet)
• TSA Precheck/Global Entry
• Email accounts
• Online subscriptions
• Loyalty programs

Congratulations and best wishes!