5711 Seward Park Avenue S Seattle, WA 98118 US
APOSTILLE SERVICES
APOSTILLE
An Apostille is a certificate issued by the Secretary of State or the U.S. Department of State (depending on the document) to verify the license of the credentialed signing authority (notary/attorney) and to authenticate the origin of a public document (birth certificate, business license or patent, marriage license, death certificate, adoption certificate, transcripts, etc.) from the granting country/state. Such document is intended to be delivered to a requesting foreign entity. Both the requesting entity and the granting entity must be members/parties to the Hague Convention Conference (HCCH).
AUTHENTICATION
If the requesting entity is located in a country that is not a member of the Hague Convention Conference, the Secretary of State may still provide document certification by Authentication. To determine whether the nation state of the requesting entity is a party to the Hague Convention Conference view the status chart on the HCCH website.
DOCUMENT TRANSLATION
Public documents originating in the United States that are to be presented to a non-English speaking receiving authority in a foreign country may need to be translated into the language of the receiving entity (depending on the type of document). Documents received from a foreign government at the request of a U.S. entity may also need to be translated into English before final delivery. If that is the case, the applicant will need to find an appropriate translation service to produce the interpreted documents. Applicants will need to secure jurat/acknowledgement for each document(s) if notarization is required on the document(s). However, only one apostille certificate will be required to authenticate both sets of documents.
