How long does the whole thing take?

Two different clocks are involved, and it is worth keeping them apart.

Getting your kit

Your files start building as soon as your payment clears and appear on your kit page as each one finishes. The printed copy is not on sale yet; when it is, the digital files will still arrive straight away and the envelope will follow.

Getting your name changed

This part is not ours to promise. Each agency sets its own pace, several of them differ by state, and processing times move with the season. What we will not do is print a plausible figure — where we publish a number it was read off the agency’s own page, and the date we read it sits next to it.

1. Certified copies have to arrive before anything can start, and that is usually the longest single wait.
2. Social Security has to be done first, and the record takes a short time to propagate before other agencies can see it.
3. Your state license comes next; your state’s page carries its own fee, deadline and document list, with the date we checked them.
4. The passport, the IRS, your voter registration and the forty-odd companies can all be worked through once the government records agree.

Almost every failed name change is a sequencing failure rather than a paperwork failure — somebody at a counter before the records caught up. The order is what the checklist is for.