Medicare name change
Updating your name with Medicare is free, and one phone call does it. Here is the number to ring, why the myGov online account cannot do it for you, what proof they accept, and when your new card turns up.
Get StartedCall 132 011. It is free and it is done on the call. Medicare is run by Services Australia, and a legal name change cannot be submitted through myGov: online only updates your contact details and your preferred name. Phone is the fastest route, or take your certificate into a service centre. Your Medicare number never changes.
Step by step
This is the fastest way. Tell them you are updating your name after a change of name, and prove your identity on the call. There is no form to fill in and no fee.
Your Births, Deaths and Marriages issued marriage certificate or change of name certificate. The decorative ceremonial certificate from your wedding day is not accepted.
Visit a Services Australia service centre with the same certificate if you would rather not call. What you cannot do is submit a legal name change through the myGov online account.
Your Medicare number stays the same. Once Medicare is updated, your My Health Record and immunisation records follow automatically.
This is the part that catches people out. myGov has no "change my name" button. It does not hold your name at all: it copies it from the services you have linked to it. So there is nothing to change in myGov itself, and the name field you can edit online is only your preferred name and contact details, not your legal name.
Three records feed myGov, and they are the three to do first: Medicare, the ATO and Centrelink. Each is updated separately, and each in a different way.
Do the ATO and Centrelink in one sitting rather than weeks apart. If your linked services end up holding different names, myGov can unlink them, and sorting that out takes longer than the original job.
Once Medicare is done, your My Health Record and your immunisation history follow automatically. That is the whole reason this update sits near the front of your plan.
Medicare is a foundation update worth doing early, alongside your driver licence, because together they give you ID in your new name that the rest of your organisations readily accept.
Your Medicare is just one of around 55 updates. Enter your details once and Surname Switch prefills your official forms, drafts every email, and gives you one ordered checklist of your actual companies, so nothing is forgotten. See the full checklist.
Medicare name change questions
Straight answers to what people actually ask about changing their name on their Medicare.
Call Medicare on 132 011 and update it on the call, or take your certificate into a Services Australia service centre. You cannot submit a legal name change through the myGov online account, which only updates contact details and your preferred name. Either way it is free, and a new card arrives in about three weeks.
No. Updating your name and being issued a new Medicare card is free.
Yes, and it arrives in about three weeks. Your Medicare number does not change, so nothing you have linked to it needs redoing.
Not a legal name change. Your Medicare online account and the Express Plus app let you update contact details and a preferred name, but a change of legal name has to go through the phone line on 132 011 or a service centre in person.
Your official Births, Deaths and Marriages issued marriage certificate, or your change of name certificate. The ceremonial certificate you were handed at your wedding is not accepted.
Keep going
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