Expiration of Birth Certificates and Other PSA Documents
You have a transaction with an office that requires you a copy of your birth certificate. You have one in your file, but it was issued by the NSO in 2011. Can you use it? Or do you have to get a more recent copy from the PSA?
YOU CAN USE THAT DOCUMENT which was issued in 2011. PSA documents, and even those that were issued by the NSO before it was renamed, DO NOT EXPIRE. It does not matter who issued it, i.e. PSA or NSO, or when it was issued. You can use it anytime. If the person you are dealing with refuses to accept it on allegations of expriration, or being issued by the NSO instead of the PSA, print the document attached to this post and show it to him.
The only time you may want to get a "newer" copy of your record is if you expect an annotation on it which you want to use. For example, if your marriage has been annulled and you expect the annotation of the annulment decree; or if a child has been adopted, and you expect the annotation of the adoption decree, or of the decree changing the child's name. But if all the data you need is in that copy you are currently holding, you do not need to get another one.
AND AS A SIDE NOTE, what happened to NSO? Where did it go? NSO is still there. It was not abolished. It just changed its name to PSA. It is no different from a woman who got married and who changed her surname to that of her husband's. It means that all documents issued by the NSO prior to its change of name are as valid as if they were issued by PSA.
