This sequence comes from the same verified data as the kit: every fee and deadline in it was read from the Montana agency page that publishes it. Last verification in this sequence: 2026-08-31. Requirements are re-checked weekly.
Do Social Security first, or you'll do the DMV twice: licensing agencies verify the name against your Social Security record, so updating them out of order means a second trip. The 8 steps below are the Montana sequence in the order the agencies themselves require. The first is open in full; the rest are in the kit.
Order certified copies of your marriage certificate before you start anything else.
Every agency below either keeps a certified copy or inspects one. Ordering them first is what keeps the rest of this from stalling for weeks in the middle — running out of copies mid-chain is the classic multi-week delay.
Fee: No state fee buys a certified copy in Montana, so none is printed here. What the state office sells is an index search: $10.00 for up to five years, plus $1.00 for each additional year, mailed to Montana Vital Records, PO Box 4210, Helena MT 59604, and processed in about 7 to 10 business days — and its own FAQ says that search "does not provide a certified copy of the certificate itself." The price of the certified copy is set by the county Clerk of District Court that holds the record and is not established by any page cited here. Order from that clerk; use the state index search only if you do not know which county to ask.
Source: dphhs.mt.gov — read 2026-08-31.
What to do here, the fee, the deadline and the official source are in the kit.
What to do here, the fee, the deadline and the official source are in the kit.
What to do here, the fee, the deadline and the official source are in the kit.
What to do here, the fee, the deadline and the official source are in the kit.
What to do here, the fee, the deadline and the official source are in the kit.
What to do here, the fee, the deadline and the official source are in the kit.
What to do here, the fee, the deadline and the official source are in the kit.
7 more steps — each with what to do, the fee, the deadline and the official source — plus your forms filled in, the documents list for every visit, and the certified-copy count, in the kit.
At least $12 in agency fees across the 8 steps; 4 of the offices set their own fee, and the kit says which. The kit is a single $19 on top of that, once.
None of the Montana steps in this sequence carries a hard published deadline, but the order still matters — each agency checks the one before it.
Each agency publishes its own list of acceptable documents, and several overlap. The kit lays them out per visit, tells you how many certified copies to order so you are not couriering one original between agencies, and fills in the official forms for you.
The kit does the rest. Answer seven short steps and get this sequence with your forms filled in wherever the agency's form allows it, the documents list for each visit, the certified-copy count, and the after-the-ID checklist — as one typeset PDF.
Start the QuestionsChanging your name after a divorce instead? Read the Montana divorce guide, or browse every state's guide.
RenameKit is a document-preparation service, not a law firm, and is not affiliated with any government agency. Every form we prepare is available free from the agency that issues it. The linked sources are the authority; if a page and this guide ever disagree, the agency's page wins — and our weekly check exists to make that disagreement short-lived.
You have answered some of them. Leaving now clears those answers — there is no account holding them, so nothing is saved until you reach your kit.