Elterngeld
Applying for Elterngeld in Bayern — which official form applies
In Bavaria the responsible body is the Zentrum Bayern Familie und Soziales, not the Familienkasse. Bavaria issues its own official form for the application.
What is filled in here is the federal Elterngeld application. The law requires written form for the application and no particular official form.
Under § 60 (2) sentence 1 SGB I, the official forms provided „should" be used. That is an obligation to co-operate, not a condition of validity.
What the law requires as to form
§ 7 (1) sentence 1 BEEG requires written form for the application and nothing else. § 26 (1) BEEG refers to § 9 SGB X: without a special provision the procedure is not bound to any particular form. And § 16 SGB I provides that applications are to be accepted. The same references appear as norms on the Elterngeld explanatory page.
Nothing is missing in substance
The federal application asks for every matter that the Bavarian official form asks for as well. These are details about the person, the child, income, nationality and residence abroad. In the federal version some of them are in separate annexes rather than in the application itself; the Bavarian official form bundles them into one document.
What the difference means in practice
The stack looks different from the one the office usually receives: an application with separate annexes instead of one bundled document. That does not change the content. Whether an office asks questions in an individual case cannot be said from here — that is for the office to decide.
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern
There the situation is the same: the state issues its own version, what is filled in here is the federal application, and the same references apply. The responsible body is the Landesamt für Gesundheit und Soziales.
The other federal states
Baden-Württemberg, Hessen and Nordrhein-Westfalen also issue their own official forms. There too the federal application is filled in. In the remaining eleven states it is the official form the state itself issues anyway.
What that costs
The price depends on how many applications are needed. If both parents apply for Elterngeld, each submits their own application with their own signature. For twins or triplets it remains one application per parent — for multiple births there is one entitlement, not one per child. The sample calculations are on the page about Elterngeld.