01244 390 938
01244 390 938
We offer a post adoption service to all adopted adults who were adopted through our agency (and any historic connection to our agency listed below) to provide you information on locating birth relatives, counselling, reunion services and support. This includes people who were adopted through the following registered adoption agencies:
We also hold records for:
Even if your adoption was not undertaken by our agency we can still provide an intermediary service by accessing your files and using our expertise to locating your family at an agreed cost.
Adoption Matters is committed to offering an intermediary service to all adopted adults and birth family members connected to Adoption Matters and its historic agencies. Intermediary services are delivered by specialised adoption agencies, like Adoption Matters, that help trace and facilitate contact and (in some circumstances) disclosure of information between adopted adults, their birth relatives and ‘persons with a prescribed relationship’, as well as provide counselling, support and advice.
As a children’s charity, we do not receive any funding or income to support this service but Adoption Matters is committed to continue to offer this vital service. Therefore, we would kindly ask that you make a one-off payment of £50 to help cover the cost of the subscriptions for the tracing resources we use to help trace the person/s you would wish to make contact with. This will allow us to continue to provide this tailored service to the families we work with. You will be invoiced for this payment at the start of us working together.
Tracing members of your birth family is known as a ‘Search and Intermediary Service’ for Adopted Adults
Prior to employing a search and intermediary service, we would recommend that you access the General Register Office website and add your details to the Adoption Contact Register. This means that if any of your birth family have added their names to this, you will be linked and you will be informed and given your birth relative’s details and last known address. They will not be given any of your details so that you have the control in this situation. There is a £15 one off charge for entering your name on the register. This is the link: https://www.gov.uk/adoption-records/the-adoption-contact-register
Initial consultation
This will include having sight of your ID and a discussion around what you already know and what you hope to achieve. A discussion will be had about the potential that the person you are searching for cannot be found or does not want any contact. We will give advice about accessing your adoption records, if you have not already done this. We will then make contact with the adoption agency who hold your records, and seek their view about any potential contact with birth family.
Tracing Service
Having identified the birth relative you wish to search for, we will endeavour to find them on your behalf. We will use public records, social media and subscription based services. We may need to access birth, marriage or death certificates, to validate the person’s identity. The cost of up to two certificates is included. If the search proves to be more complex then we will ask you to cover the cost of any additional certificates (currently £11 each).
It may be that you already know the whereabouts of the person you wish to make contact with and therefore you just want an intermediary service.
Intermediary service
Having identified the whereabouts of the person you wish to have contact with, we will begin the process of approaching them.
Once contact is established, we would then support you in gradually sharing and receiving information be that by letter, email or telephone calls.
The final stage would be a reunion, where you will meet with your birth relative in a safe environment supported by our staff.
If you are interested in accessing this service, or just want to learn more about what we support you with, please complete our enquiry form below