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Certified Bulgarian Name Change Document Translation
Certified translation of the documents that record a change of name in Bulgaria, including the marginal annotations and registry endorsements that carry the legal effect and that a reader unfamiliar with the system will otherwise skip.
$24.95/page
Flat rate per page, up to 250 words. No hidden fees.
100% USCIS acceptance
Every certified translation is guaranteed to be accepted by USCIS.
24-hour delivery
Most 1-3 page documents are delivered within 24 hours. Same-day available.
The court decides
Bulgaria is the outlier among its neighbours: a change of name is granted by the district court under the Civil Registration Act, where the name is ridiculous, shameful or socially unacceptable, or where important circumstances require it.
So the instrument is a court judgment rather than an administrative decision, and it is then sent to the municipality for entry against the birth act. We name the court, the case number and the date exactly.
Three name elements, not two
Bulgarian names have three parts: the given name, the patronymic formed from the father's given name with -ov or -ova, and the family name. A US form with two fields will lose one of them, and the patronymic is not a middle name.
Both the patronymic and the family name are gendered, so a daughter is Ivanova where her father is Ivanov. One family, and a change between forms is not a change of name.
The EGN, and what it encodes
The EGN is the ten-digit unified civil number encoding the date of birth and sex, with month offsets marking births before 1900 and after 1999. It does not change with a name.
We reproduce it exactly, including leading zeros, which are routinely lost when a number is retyped into a spreadsheet.
Cyrillic, and the 2009 transliteration law
Bulgaria legislated an official transliteration in 2009, and it does not always match what a family has used in the United States for decades — Гьорги as Gyorgi rather than Georgi, for instance.
A great many apparent "name changes" in Bulgarian-American packets are transliteration differences and not legal changes at all. We say which it is. See our Bulgarian page.
Ordering, and what the certification covers
Upload the document, choose certified translation at $24.95 per page of up to 250 words, and it comes back typically within 24 hours as a PDF formatted to mirror the original, with a signed certificate of translation accuracy on letterhead. Marginal annotations are translated in place, in the margin, so the reader can see that the change was recorded against the original entry rather than written into a fresh document. See how we translate and certified versus standard.
Frequently asked questions
Is a Bulgarian name change administrative?
No. It is granted by the district court, and the judgment is then entered against the birth act.
What is the middle name on my document?
A patronymic formed from your father's given name. Not a middle name, and a US two-field form will lose it.
Ivanov or Ivanova?
Masculine and feminine of one family name. Not a change.
My US documents spell my name differently.
Often a transliteration difference rather than a legal change. We say which it is.
Ready to get started?
Upload the order, the resolution or the annotated certificate and receive the certified translation, typically within 24 hours.