Divorce applications will be dealt with at fewer than 20 courts across England and Wales, as part of efforts to crack down on fraud.
The first of the specially designated centres are now operational in the North East. Doncaster will cover South Yorkshire and Humber; Durham will handle applications in Northumbria, Durham and Cleveland; and Bradford will be responsible for North and West Yorkshire.
The three centres will be the single point of access for all divorce and financial remedy applications in the area.
The remaining regions of the UK will be centralising administration over the course of next year and all the divorce centres are expected to be up-and-running by December 2015.
HM Courts and Tribunals Service believe that reducing the number of venues dealing with divorce will make it harder for people trying to cheat the system.
Only a couple of months ago, it emerged that 179 applications had been made by Italian couples, all of whom had given their place of residence as the same bogus address in Berkshire.
The company who co-ordinated the fraud used 137 different county courts to cover their tracks and the scam went unnoticed for the best part of 18 months.
The problem only came to light after an eagle-eyed official at Burnley County Court noticed that two different couples had given the same address in Maidenhead – over 200 miles.
By centralising the administrative handling of divorce, the Government hopes to curb the level of fraud, as well as being able to better monitor the loophole in which immigrants are able to gain status in the UK through artificial marriages.
Sir James Munby, president of the family division, has welcomed the reform of the family courts, although he warned that the new arrangements wouldn’t be infallible.