When you look into the adoption process one of the first questions that’s asked is “How long will it take?” It’s completely understandable that you want to know how long you can expect to be waiting to bring a child into your home. However, the true answer is that any adoption timescales you receive will be an estimate. There are several stages in the adoption process and there is a different waiting period for each, here are the common timescales:
Registration of interest
Once you’ve found a local adoption agency that’s within a 50 mile radius of your home you need to send them an enquiry stating your desire to adopt. After you’ve made an initial enquiry to an adoption agency, they will send you an application form so that you can make an official request to be assessed for adoption.
Expect this stage to take anywhere between a couple of days to 4 weeks, depending on how busy that agency is. If they are understaffed or have received a huge amount of applications it will take a longer time, whereas some agencies will have a much faster turnaround.
Formal assessment
If your request was successful, then this is the stage where the excitement starts to build up. The agency will begin to assess how eligible you are for adoption and make decisions of what type of children you would be best suited to. At this point in time they will be looking at your police records, medical records and personal references from your friends.
Again, the length of time this can take will vary between applications but you should be prepared for this to take up to 8 months to complete.
Social worker allocation
During the previous stage you will be assigned a social worker to help assess your suitability for adoption. This tends to be the most invasive of all the assessment as it involves them carrying out a home study to ensure that your place of living is suitable for children. They will also play an important part in matching you with the child.
Generally this will take no longer than 3 weeks simply due to the cost of the social worker’s wages. This is the most essential part of any assessment and once it is complete the social worker will send the paperwork to an adoption panel.
Adoption Panel
Once the assessment has been complete, the paperwork will be passed onto an adoption panel. This is the final hurdle in deciding whether or not you are suitable to adopt. If you’re fortunate enough to receive a positive result from the panel, then the agency can start searching for a child who’s a suitable match for you.
How long it takes to come to a decision should come within a month of completing the assessment. However, finding the right match can take anywhere between a few days to several months. The length of time will depend on what age range you are hoping to adopt and the amount of other people trying to adopt in the area.
After this it is just a waiting game to find a suitable child to adopt. Unfortunately, there is no real way of finding out how long this aspect of adoption will take. Most adoptions can be completed within a year, but don’t despair if yours doesn’t follow this exact timeline.