Name Change Order Authentication for Lebanon

If your name changed by a Florida court order, your Lebanese civil extract still shows the old one, and a mismatch can block passport renewals, registrations or land transfers. The certified, legalized order connects the two names. Order the certified copy from the Clerk of the circuit court that granted it, and send it with any registration that uses your new name.

A certified copy of the final judgment of change of name with the clerk's original certification and seal or official e-certification, complete with the judge's signature page. The former and new names must match your other records exactly. The state fee is $20, included in our price.

Request it from the clerk of the county that granted the change, online, by mail or at the counter. If you were born in Florida, the change is reported to Vital Statistics, and many foreign offices also want an updated certified birth certificate from VitalChek or the Bureau. Clerk and Vital Statistics fees are not included in our $220.

State fee for this document: $20 — included in our price. Full details on the name change order page.

After we return your document with its Florida authentication certificate, it goes to the U.S. Department of State for authentication, which Lebanon's embassy requires for documents such as powers of attorney and life certificates. Next, the Embassy of Lebanon in Washington, D.C., whose jurisdiction includes Florida, legalizes it. Ask the office in Lebanon whether the document also needs to be certified by Lebanon's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. We don't handle, arrange or refer anyone for these steps.

We don't handle or arrange the U.S. Department of State or embassy steps. See how non-Hague authentication works.

Florida falls under the Embassy of Lebanon in Washington, D.C., according to its published jurisdiction list; there is also an Honorary Consulate of Lebanon in Tampa. The embassy legalizes documents and registers births, marriages, divorces and deaths of Lebanese citizens. In Lebanon, documents go to the personal status registry, religious and civil courts, the land registry, notaries, banks and pension funds.

Lebanon's embassy translates Lebanese documents into English but doesn't publish a rule for translating U.S. documents into Arabic. Lebanese courts, registries and notaries generally work in Arabic and may require a translation, often made in Lebanon. Ask the receiving office. If it accepts a Florida translation, the translator certifies it, a different notary notarizes it, and it is authenticated in Florida with the original.

The embassy's published pages don't set a document-age rule for most documents. Lebanese registries and courts may want recent certified copies, so order fresh Florida records and ask the receiving office how recent they must be.

Consular office serving Florida: Embassy of Lebanon, Washington, D.C. (its jurisdiction includes Florida).

$220 per document, $380 for two and $160 each for three or more — the state fee, request form, in-person filing in Tallahassee and FedEx shipping inside the U.S. are included. Shipping the finished authentication to Lebanon is a flat $100 per order.

Not included: whatever the issuing office charges for the certified copy or certificate, and notarization (online notarization is $40 for the first document — $10 notarization fee + $30 technology platform fee — and $20 for each additional one).