Bulgarian identity card

Bulgarian identity card (Лична карта)
Front of the card
Reverse
Issued by	Bulgaria
Valid in	Europe (except Belarus, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine) French overseas territories Faroe Islands Greenland (de facto) Georgia Jordan (organized tours through Aqaba airport
Type of document	Compulsory identity document

The front of a Bulgarian national non-biometric identity card

Bulgarian national non-biometric identity card

The Bulgarian identity card (Bulgarian: лична карта, lichna karta, literal translation: 'personal card') is a compulsory identity document issued in Bulgaria. The document is issued by the police on behalf of the Ministry of Interior and is the main form of identification on the territory of the Republic of Bulgaria. All Bulgarians are obliged by law to carry their identity cards with them at all times and are subject to fines should they not.

Since 1 January 2007, the Bulgarian identity card can be used for travel within Europe (except Belarus, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine) instead of a Bulgarian passport as well as to Danish and French overseas territories, Georgia and on organized tours to Jordan (through Aqaba airport) ^[1]^[2]^[3]

History

The Bulgarian identity card (лична карта in the Cyrillic alphabet, or "lichna karta" in the Latin transliteration of Bulgarian) is first issued and is compulsory after turning the age of 14. The new Bulgarian ID cards were introduced in 1999. They follow the general pattern in the EU and replaced the old, Soviet-style "internal passports", also known as "green passports". Since 29 March 2010 ^[4] new Bulgarian identity cards were introduced.

Physical appearance

The physical appearance of the Bulgarian identity card is similar to that of a credit card, the identity card is plastic and rounded-rectangular in shape. On the left side is the photograph of the bearer. On the top edge of the card, the name Republic of Bulgaria is available in two languages, Bulgarian and English, written in capital letters, below, the name of the card is available in the same two languages and also written in capital letters. The middle part of the flag of the Republic of Bulgaria and the Coat of Arms of the Republic of Bulgaria are also displayed on the identity card.

Furthermore, the following information is contained on the front side of the card:

The unique 9-digit ID number of the card
The cardholder’s full name, sex, and date of birth
The cardholder’s uniform civil number (Bulgarian: единен граждански номер; abbreviated ЕГН, EGN): a unique 10-digit number that serves as national identification number
Date of expiry of the card
Cardholder’s signature

The back side of the identity card contains the cardholder’s family name, place of birth, permanent address, height, and eye colour, as well as the place where the card was issued together with the date of issue. At the bottom there is a machine-readable zone according to ICAO specifications.

Obtaining an identity card

In order to be issued an identity card, one needs to fill in a form, which should be taken to the Identity Documents and Passport Regime Units within the District Police Stations. The forms could be obtained at all District Police Stations. When applying a digital picture of the person is taken, and—in the case of applying for a passport at the same time—fingerprints of the thumbs of the applicant. First-time applicants (i.e. persons turning 14) must also provide a valid birth certificate. It is possible for a person to apply for a renewal of the ID card via a representative with a notary signed permit, provided there are no significant changes in his or her appearance. There are, however limitations. If you apply via a representative, you must receive the new ID yourself. Vice versa, if you applied yourself, then an authorized representative may receive your ID. This does not apply to applying for passports, as fingerprints must be taken.

A monetary tax is paid for the issuing of the identity card; the price depends on the selected type of issuing which is basically the time needed for the card to be issued (the prices are listed in District Police Stations). The standard time for issuing a Bulgarian identity card is 30 days. There are, however, express services that allow you to apply for a 7-day or even 24-hour service. These cost extra (twice for the 7-day and quadruple for the 24-hour service). If you apply for a standard 30 day service there is a great chance your Id card will be ready way before that. The Ministry of Interior has provided an online service that allows you to check whether your ID card is ready.

For people ages 14 to 18 years, the identity cards are valid for four years, while citizens ages 18–58 are issued cards with 10-year validity; citizens over 58 years old are issued identity cards with no expiration date.

Identity card validity check

Anyone can examine the validity of Bulgarian identity cards on the website of the Bulgarian Ministry of Interior here; there's also a service by the Ministry of the Interior that can be used to see if an identity card is ready to be picked up (in Bulgarian). The services are free and only card number and birth date need to be given.

References

External links

National identity cards

Africa

Asia

Armenia⁷
Azerbaijan⁵
China
- Hong Kong
- Macau
Cyprus ⁷
Egypt ⁸
Georgian ⁵
India
Indonesia
Iran
Israel
Kazakhstan ⁶
Kuwait
South Korea
Lebanon
Malaysia
Pakistan
Russia ³
Saudi Arabia
Singapore
United Arab Emirates
Sri Lanka
Taiwan ⁹
Thailand
Turkey ⁴

Europe

European Economic Area & Schengen Area	Austria Belgium Bulgaria Croatia Cyprus ⁷ Czech Republic Estonia Finland France Germany Gibraltar ¹ Greece Hungary Ireland Italy Latvia Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Malta Monaco ² Netherlands (BES) Poland Portugal Romania Slovakia Slovenia Spain Sweden Switzerland ²

Other Europe	Albania Armenia ⁷ Azerbaijan ⁵ Bosnia and Herzegovina Georgia ⁵ Kazakhstan ⁶ Macedonia Moldova Montenegro Russia ³ Serbia (Kosovo ⁹) Turkey ⁴ Ukraine

North America

South America

¹ British Overseas Territories.

² Open border with Schengen Area.

³ Russia is a transcontinental country in Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. The vast majority of its population (80%) lives in European Russia, therefore Russia as a whole is included as a European country here.

⁴ Turkey is a transcontinental country in the Middle East and Southeast Europe. Has a small part of its territory (3%) in Southeast Europe called Turkish Thrace.

⁵ Azerbaijan and Georgia (Abkhazia; South Ossetia) are transcontinental countries. Both have a small part of their territories in the European part of the Caucasus.

⁶ Kazakhstan is a transcontinental country. Has a small part of its territories located west of the Urals in Eastern Europe.

⁷ Armenia (Nagorno-Karabakh) and Cyprus (Northern Cyprus) are entirely in Southwest Asia but having socio-political connections with Europe.

⁸ Egypt is a transcontinental country in North Africa and the Middle East. Has a small part of its territory in the Middle East called Sinai peninsula.

⁹ Partially recognized.

Biometric identity cards () are indicated in italics.

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Monday, April 04, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.