Travel, custody and relocation in Washington

The passport rules are federal and read the same everywhere. This page is the other layer — what Washington law and Washington’s own court forms say about taking your child on a trip, moving, and who holds the passport between journeys.

Which court decides — and why a trip does not change it

Washington custody jurisdiction sits under RCW ch. 26.27, “Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act”. The home-state definition is at RCW 26.27.021 (Definitions). Note that Washington’s UCCJEA definition of “child custody determination” expressly includes a “parenting plan”: RCW 26.27.021(3) – “‘Child custody determination’ means a judgment, decree, parenting plan, or other order of a court providing for the legal custody, physical custody, or visitation with respect to a child.”. The practical point for travel is this: a child’s home state is where they lived for six consecutive months before a case started, and a temporary absence counts toward that period. A summer with grandparents in another state does not start a clock there, and it does not let the other parent file somewhere new.

Abduction-prevention powers

Washington has not enacted the Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act. Washington has not enacted the Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act. It does not appear among the 21 enacting jurisdictions in the Uniform Law Commission’s own enactment data, and there is no UCAPA chapter in the RCW. Washington’s only statewide abduction provision in the Parenting Act is informational rather than remedial: RCW 26.09.315 requires that in any chapter 26.09 proceeding where custody or care of a child is at issue, “information on the harmful effects of parental abduction shall be included in any packet of information or materials provided to the parties, or in any parenting class or seminar,” and the statute then sets out the text of a “PAMPHLET REGARDING THE HARMFUL EFFECTS OF PARENTAL ABDUCTION.” Abduction-risk restrictions in Washington must instead be obtained as parenting-plan limitations under RCW 26.09.191.

Moving, and how much warning you owe

Who must give notice – RCW 26.09.430: “Except as provided in RCW 26.09.460, a person with whom the child resides a majority of the time, or a person with substantially equal residential time, shall notify every other person entitled to residential time or visitation with the child under a court order if the person intends to relocate.” How and when – RCW 26.09.440(1): “the notice of an intended relocation of the child must be given by: (a) Personal service or any form of mail requiring a return receipt; and (b) No less than: (i) Sixty days before the date of the intended relocation of the child; or (ii) No more than five days after the date that the person knows the information required to be furnished under subsection (2) of this section, if the person did not know and could not reasonably have known the information in sufficient time to provide the sixty-days’ notice, and it is not reasonable to delay the relocation.” Contents – RCW 26.09.440(2)(a) requires an address for service during the objection period, “a brief statement of the specific reasons for the intended relocation,” and a warning; and the notice is not in substantial compliance “unless the notice contains the following statement: ‘THE RELOCATION OF THE CHILD WILL BE PERMITTED AND THE PROPOSED REVISED RESIDENTIAL SCHEDULE MAY BE CONFIRMED UNLESS, WITHIN THIRTY DAYS, YOU FILE A PETITION AND MOTION WITH THE COURT TO BLOCK THE RELOCATION OR OBJECT TO THE PROPOSED REVISED RESIDENTIAL SCHEDULE AND SERVE THE PETITION AND MOTION ON THE PERSON PROPOSING RELOCATION AND ALL OTHER PERSONS ENTITLED BY COURT ORDER TO RESIDENTIAL TIME OR VISITATION WITH THE CHILD.’” RCW 26.09.440(2)(b) adds the new street address, mailing address, home telephone number, “[t]he name and address of the child’s new school and day care facility, if applicable,” the date of the intended relocation, and a proposed revised parenting plan; (3) imposes “a continuing duty to promptly update.” Same-district moves – RCW 26.09.450: “When the intended relocation of the child is within the school district in which the child currently resides the majority of the time, the person intending to relocate the child, in lieu of notice prescribed in RCW 26.09.440, may provide actual notice by any reasonable means… (2) A person who is entitled to residential time or visitation with the child under a court order may not object to the intended relocation of the child within the school district in which the child currently resides the majority of the time, but he or she retains the right to move for modification under RCW 26.09.260.” Safety exceptions – RCW 26.09.460 lets notice be delayed 21 days for a parent entering a domestic violence shelter or “relocating to avoid a clear, immediate, and unreasonable risk to the health or safety of a person or the child,” protects address-confidentiality-program participants, and allows an ex parte hearing to waive or trim the notice. Objection – RCW 26.09.480(1): the objection “must be filed and served, including a three-day waiting period if the objection is served by mail, within thirty days of receipt of the notice,” in the form of “[a] petition for modification of the parenting plan pursuant to relocation.” RCW 26.09.480(2): “the person intending to relocate the child shall not, without a court order, change the principal residence of the child during the period in which a party may object,” and if the objector notes a hearing within fifteen days of timely service, the move is stayed pending that hearing. Failure to object – RCW 26.09.500(1): “Except for good cause shown, if a person entitled to object… does not file an objection with the court within thirty days after receipt of the relocation notice, then the relocation of the child shall be permitted,” and under (5) the proposed revised schedule can be entered ex parte. Standard – RCW 26.09.520: “There is a rebuttable presumption that the intended relocation of the child will be permitted,” rebuttable only by showing “that the detrimental effect of the relocation outweighs the benefit of the change to the child and the relocating person,” on eleven unweighted factors. Equal-time carve-out – RCW 26.09.525(1): “If the person proposing relocation of a child has substantially equal residential time: (a) The presumption in RCW 26.09.520 does not apply,” and “substantially equal residential time” means “arrangements in which forty-five percent or more of the child’s residential time is spent with each parent.” Evidentiary bar – RCW 26.09.530 forbids evidence, before the relocation decision, on “whether the person seeking to relocate the child will forego his or her own relocation if the child’s relocation is not permitted.” Every order must restate the rules – RCW 26.09.490: “Unless waived by court order, after June 8, 2000, every court order shall include a clear restatement of the provisions in RCW 26.09.430 through 26.09.480.” Applicability – RCW 26.09.405 applies the Act to orders issued after June 8, 2000, and to earlier orders only “if the existing court order does not expressly govern relocation of the child”; the legislature stated its “intent… to supersede the state supreme court’s decisions In Re the Marriage of Littlefield, 133 Wn.2d 39 (1997), and In Re the Marriage of Pape.” RCW 26.09.520 was most recently amended by 2025 c 166 s 7.

Relocation and vacation are different questions, and orders often treat them in the same paragraph. A trip is temporary; a move changes the child’s residence. Read your own order for which one your plan actually is before you assume the relocation rule does not apply.

What the standard order says about travel

Washington publishes a statewide parenting form or guideline — Parenting Plan, FL All Family 140 – a MANDATORY statewide form (current version 07/2025), promulgated under RCW 26.09.016, .181, .187 and .194. Washington has no default possession schedule; instead RCW 26.09.184 requires a permanent parenting plan in every case, and the mandatory form is the vehicle.. That matters, because its default wording is what lands in a lot of orders unchanged, and it is where your travel terms probably came from.

The statutory requirement is at RCW 26.09.184(6): “The plan shall include a residential schedule which designates in which parent’s home each minor child shall reside on given days of the year, including provision for holidays, birthdays of family members, vacations, and other special occasions.” On the mandatory form, the vacation provision is a fill-in in the Summer Schedule: “The Summer Schedule is the same as the School Schedule except that each parent shall spend ___ weeks of uninterrupted vacation time with the children each summer. The parents shall confirm their vacation schedules in writing by the end of (date) _____ each year.” International travel appears only as an example of a decision the parents may want to allocate: “Important! Parenting involves decision-making in many areas. If you believe there are other decisions that are important to your family, list them under ‘Other’ above. Some examples include: extracurricular activities, international travel, cell phones, driver’s licenses, tattoos, and haircuts.” That is the only reference to international travel in the form, and it is a prompt, not a rule. Section 8 (Transportation Arrangements) is about exchanges – where the children are picked up and dropped off and which parent arranges it – not about trips. Section 10 is a blank “Other.” What the form DOES contain in detail is the relocation summary required by RCW 26.09.490, printed as section 9 “Moving with the Children (Relocation),” including: “If the move is to a different school district, the relocating person must complete the form Notice of Intent to Move with Children (FL Relocate 701) and deliver it at least 60 days before the intended move”; “If the move is within the same school district, the relocating person still has to let the other parent know. However, the notice does not have to be served personally or by mail with a return receipt. Notice to the other party can be made in any reasonable way. No specific form is required”; “During the 30 days after the Notice was served, the relocating person may not move to a different school district with the children unless they have a court order allowing the move”; and a warning that a relocating person who does not give notice “may be found in contempt of court,” with sanctions that “can include requiring the relocating person to bring the children back if the move has already happened.” The word “passport” appears NOWHERE in FL All Family 140, and there is no itinerary requirement and no advance-notice period for ordinary vacation travel.

Who holds the passport

Nothing in Washington’s statutes or standard forms addresses who holds the child’s passport. That is not a gap you have to live with — it is a clause you can ask for, and the federal rules above are the reason to.

What catches people out in Washington

Sources for this page

• Custody jurisdiction statute: https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=26.27.021
• Abduction Prevention Act: https://www.uniformlaws.org/committees/community-home?CommunityKey=c8a53ebd-d5aa-4805-95b2-5d6f2a648b2a
• Relocation rule: https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=26.09&full=true
• Statewide parenting form: https://www.courts.wa.gov/forms/documents/FL%20All%20Family%20140%20Parenting%20Plan%2007.2025.pdf

Every fact above is taken from the source linked beside it. Where a figure could not be confirmed from an official source, this page says so rather than printing a plausible number. Found an error? Tell us — it goes on the corrections page with the date.

Every state