Send this page to someone via email TORONTO – The Ontario government says it is experiencing delays of up to three and a half months in processing some marriage, birth and death certificates. Service Ontario says on its website that due to longer than normal processing times, those requesting the certificates will experience delays that vary from 11 to 14 weeks. READ MORE: Ontario PC Party introduces legislation to replace Police Service Act The online notice does not explain what is causing the delay. People requesting the documents under urgent circumstances are asked to contact the government by phone. Story continues below advertisement Some people posting on the government’s social media pages have complained of delays of up to six months for those same documents.<doc-sep>Chris Herhalt, CP24.com Some Ontario parents are facing a wait of three to four months to receive birth certificates for their children and they say the wait has left their travel plans and education savings in limbo. A note on the Service Ontario website states “Due to longer than normal processing times, it may take up to 14-15 weeks to deliver this product.” Mississauga resident Samantha Cass questioned Service Ontario about it on Twitter on Tuesday. “@ServiceOntario why do you have a 15 week wait for long form birth certificates? ?” she asked. In response, Service Ontario noted there is a backlog. Cass told CP24.com that she and her husband requested long-form birth certificates for their children, 5 and 7, so they could obtain passports for them. Cass said she hoped to plan a vacation outside of Canada but was told there was a 15 week-long backlog to obtain a birth certificate. “That brings us to June (2019). If I fill it out now, who is to say it will still be 15 weeks,” Cass said. She noted that calling Service Ontario hasn’t helped. “I tried calling the number and all I got was a busy line.” Cass admitted her situation is not “an emergency” per se, but explained that her plans are in limbo over something completely avoidable. “I don’t want to take the risk of booking a package or booking plane tickets somewhere.” The wait was highlighted by a number of Reddit users back in Oct. 2018, with some users saying they were told of a “four month backlog” by Service Ontario. Milton resident Tim Vrablik told CP24.com that when his son was born in 2015, the process to get a birth certificate took one month, including a time where the process stalled because he and his wife had to correct an error on the original submission. This past fall, he and his wife welcomed a baby girl and wanting to avoid a similar delay, meticulously checked their submission to make sure there were no errors. After submitting the request and not hearing anything for a few weeks, Vrablik said he checked online and was told there was “no movement” on their daughter’s birth certificate. Service Ontario told him they had identified an error on their submission but that if he sent in a handwritten correction, via fax, the problem could be fixed and the birth certificate could be created. “Once that got faxed — we’re easily at one month and a half,”Vrablik explained. Another month went by and Vrablik said he heard nothing. By then, he said he concluded it was best to voice his frustration on social media. “At this point I am going to bother them online to see what is going on,” he said he recalled feeling at the time. At nearly five months after first requesting a birth certificate, they finally received one for their daughter. They were later told that nobody read the fax with the correction to their submission, and since the error on their original application was not fixed, it was removed from the pile. “They knew they had an error and someone dropped the ball with following it up,” Vrablik said. He also noted that he was told that the backlog was due to an increased number of birth registrations during the summer of 2018. It’s a suggestion Cass scoffs at: “I can’t see that high an increase of births over the summer, It’s a little weird.” As a stopgap, Service Ontario has offered a fax help line where parents can fax a “letter of explanation,” as to why they need their birth certificate application expedited. Parents must include unspecified “proof” that they need their documentation before it will be expedited. Vrablik questioned why he needed to be communicating with Service Ontario by fax machine in 2018. “Beyond certain businesses and lawyers nobody uses a fax anymore.” Without a birth certificate, Vrablik said the family could not travel to the U.S to visit their relatives because they could not apply for a passport for their daughter, and they also encountered difficulties starting a registered education savings plan (RESP) for their daughter. “It was extremely frustrating. Our daughter’s life was being put on hold to a certain extent. Luckily we didn’t have to leave the country for anything.” David Woolley, spokesperson for Government and Consumer Services Minister Bill Walker, who oversees Service Ontario, said Tuesday that anyone encountering difficulties should call them at 1-800-461-2156 or 1-416-325-8305. He said the backlog is due to “an increase in transaction volumes for some products and are experiencing an increase in the number of cases that require manual intervention, which can delay processing.” “Service Ontario is continuing to clear the backlog as quickly as possible, and has implemented mitigation strategies to address this matter.” The agency noted on Twitter that there is also a backlog for marriage and death registrations.<doc-sep>
Some people who applied for birth and death certificates in Ontario have been waiting for months as the ministry responsible for issuing them faces apparent delays. ServiceOntario, which is operated by the Ministry of Government Services, confirmed on Twitter that there is a “backlog” and warns on its website that applicants could face wait times of 14 and 15 weeks because of “longer than normal processing times.” Some Ontarians report waiting for nearly twice that long. “We have been waiting for our son’s birth certificate for almost 6 months,” wrote one Windsor, Ont., woman on ServiceOntario’s Facebook page earlier this month. She said she requested to have the document expedited so it will arrive before a planned trip in April. “Under no circumstances should this have taken this long. We live in a border city and we cannot cross without his certificate.” ServiceOntario has not responded to requests for comment from CTVNews.ca. Another woman wrote to CTV News explaining that she has been trying to get a death certificate for her mother since October. She was told that the service is experiencing a backlog, and that it doesn’t have paperwork due to the Canada Post strike. ServiceOntario has not publicly given an explanation for a processing delay. “I have called every week since the 14 week mark to try to find out the status and I keep being told to wait,” she wrote. The woman said she needs the death certificate to travel with her mother’s remains. “We have purchased the flights to travel and I fear that we won't have the documentation in time.” ServiceOntario is also responsible for providing other documentation, including driver’s licences, plate stickers, health cards and marriage certificates. Currently there is a backlog. Due to this backlog, birth registrations are taking approx 15 weeks. To request an expedited service, please fax a letter of explanation why you need it quickly (include your file/order number) + proof you need it urgently to 1-807-343-7445. — ServiceOntario (@ServiceOntario) February 19, 2019