Pass Port and out of country travelling

[LittleBlessings]

We are planning an out of country vacation. DP and I have a feeling the bio mom is going to try and put a stop to taking skid with us. Has anyone gone through this and have any advice 

[VocalMinority]

If you're in the US and you need a passport for the trip, then both parents must sign the passport application unless one parent has sole legal custody.  So, if there's a poor relationship with Mom, you may just have to accept not taking the kid on out-of-country vacations until he's 18.  A lot of people live with restrictions like this.  

Most people who marry a guy with kids get that they're not going to spend Christmases at romantic resorts, just the two of them.  Limits on where you can take family vacations may seem much less reasonable or fair, but may also be "just part of the package", if you go into the marriage knowing there's a high level of conflict with the ex.  After all, foreign vacations aren't a right, like parenting time is.

The problem is, once there's a passport for the kid, whoever has him can take him anywhere.  A parent can notify the gov't not to let the child use his passport to travel here or there, but if that passport exists, you're relying on the diligence and thoroughness of low-level bureaucrats, to ensure your kid doesn't wind up in a country that's not a signatory to the Hague Convention.  All it takes is one person deciding to "keep the line moving" by doing only a cursory check of a kid's passport (because, after all, he's with a parent!)...and the other parent might never see their kid again.   Obviously, if there's no trust between the parents, that's a pretty scary prospect.  

If there's no history whatsoever of your DH making off with his son - or threatening to - and it's crystal-clear that Mom is just being difficult because she can, you may able to force her to sign a passport application, through the court.  It just sounds like an expensive way to go.

[JudiAU]

Assuming both parents have some sort of physical custody, they both have to agree. But once the passport is there, the other party may not be able to restrict travel. My brother refused until the kids where much older because he didn't trust his ex-wife (crazy). They got them this year and needless to say there were international phone calls for money, an unsupervised 15 year old alone in another country, and a weird phone call to grandma saying from a "friend" begging a $1,000 because the grandchild was in jail.

I would have to have absolute trust in the other parent to agree to one and any country visited would have to be a Hague signatory AND there could be no connection to any family that was not. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_child_abduction_in_the_United_States

It works both ways.

[lyra2007]

Yes, you can restrict travel.  The parent taking the child must have a signed note from the parent who is not travelling.  This is true whether you are married or divorced.

Kimberley

[LittleBlessings]

Originally Posted by lyra2007 

Yes, you can restrict travel.  The parent taking the child must have a signed note from the parent who is not travelling.  This is true whether you are married or divorced.

Kimberley

That is what i thought 

[Buzzer Beater]

Originally Posted by lyra2007 

Yes, you can restrict travel.  The parent taking the child must have a signed note from the parent who is not travelling.  This is true whether you are married or divorced.

Kimberley

I took my older dd to Honduras and Mexico with no note from her father. I don't see how travel could be restricted once a passport is issued.

[Smithie]

It depends on how conscientious the ticketing agent and the customs agents are. When I went to Canada, they did their job and protected my child from abduction. When I went to the UK, I could have been his estranged aunt for all they knew or cared - I offered up no documentation except two passport that had the same surname. 

[VocalMinority]

Originally Posted by Smithie 

It depends on how conscientious the ticketing agent and the customs agents are. True.

When I went to Canada, they did their job and protected my child from abduction. When I went to the UK, I could have been his estranged aunt for all they knew or cared - I offered up no documentation except two passport that had the same surname.  And wow.

[Buzzer Beater]

My passport does not even share the same surname as dd. And as for Canada- exdh has taken dd to Vancouver and Victoria repeatedly, though they do share a name.