Resources and helplines for families fleeing Ukraine

If you're crossing a border:

❌ Don’t trust job or educational offers from anyone other than authorities, especially if you're pressured to commit right away or required to separate from your friends or family.

✅ Keep digital and paper copies of your passport, ID and other certificates.

❌ Never leave your passport, ID or other certificates with someone you don’t know.

✅ Stay with your family and friends as much as possible. It’s always safer to travel with people you know.

✅ If you must get in a car with someone you don’t know, take a photo of the license plate and send it to someone you trust. Tell that person where you are going and when you should arrive.

✅ Exercise extreme caution when giving your personal details to others, including on social media.

✅ If a stranger offers help and something doesn’t feel right, trust your instinct.

✅ Keep your phone charged.

✅ Be informed about the places that you are travelling through and to.

If you're travelling with children:

✅ Teach your children their full names, your full name and your phone number. Have them practice repeating it.

✅ Identify a meeting point and plan to go there in case you get separated from your children.

✅ For very small children, prepare an identity tag (like a bracelet or something attached to their clothing) with the child’s name and your contact details.

✅ For children with mobile phones, save your contact as 'AA Emergency Contact 1' and that of a trusted loved one as 'AA Emergency Contact 2,' etc.

✅ Talk to your children about the potential risks of travelling and encourage them to share with you anything that may be worrying them.

✅ As much as possible, allow your children time to rest, sleep and even play while travelling.

❌ Don’t allow your children to be taken out of your sight or to any location without you.

✅ If anyone is acting or threatening to act violent against you or your children, seek immediate safety before informing the authorities.

✅ While travelling, hold your child's hand or take other precautions to keep them close.

❌ Beware of anyone offering you a job, shelter or education for your children. Don't accept offers of services or support from anyone other than an authorized official.

If you're helping an unaccompanied child:

❌ Don’t assume the child is lost. A parent or caregiver may be close by.

✅ Ask others in the immediate vicinity if they know the child. Ask for the child's name and other family details.

❌ Don’t accept help from any stranger who offers to transport the child to safety.

✅ Keep the child's belongings with her at all times. These might help authorities trace her family.

❌ Don’t share information about the child with anyone else, aside from competent authorities.

✅ Contact a competent authority – such as the local municipality government, border police, or Ukraine’s consular services in the host country. Share the child’s information and location, and follow the authority’s instructions.

✅ Explain to the child what will happen next, without promising to find his parents. This could cause him additional confusion or distress.

✅ Don't leave the child until she is safely in the hands of a competent authority.