The death certificate is an important document that you can apply for as a relative in the event of death.
You can apply for a death certificate as soon as the death has been recorded in the death register.
The death certificate is important, for example, for
- the funeral and its preparation (e.g. for the coffin and transfer) and
- the settlement of the estate
- claiming statutory or private insurance benefits.
You can obtain the death certificate in various forms:
- As a death certificate, possibly with translation assistance for use in European Union countries.
- As a multilingual death certificate, which is valid in all countries that have signed the Convention of September 8, 1976 on the issue of multilingual extracts from civil status records. For more information, see Civil status law - Convention - No. 16: Convention on the issue of multilingual extracts from civil status records.
- As a certified printout from the death register. This printout contains all the data entered by the registry office when the death was certified.
