As of January 12, 2024, 121 countries follow the Apostille process. These countries include Albania, Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Germany, Greece, Honduras, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Mauritius, Mexico, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, and Venezuela.
In Canada, the government issued documents can be apostilled by Global Affairs. The other documents need to be submitted to the Provincial authorities.
For the country that have not signed the Hague Convention, the first step i.e. Authentication of documents is done by the Department of Global Affairs Canada. To be authenticated, a document must be an original document bearing a recognized signature (and seal, if applicable). Authentication proves that the signature and the seal on the document are genuine. The Department of Global Affairs put a red seal on the document.
Some provinces and territories also offer authentication services for the public documents issued in their jurisdictions.
The second step is the legalization of the document by an embassy or a consulate (in Canada) of the country where the final document will be used. Different countries have different requirements, procedures, and fees for the legalization of documents, ranging from very simple to very complex processes. The term “Legalization” is also sometimes referred to as “Super-Legalization”, “Authentication” or “Apostille”.
Once a Canadian document is authenticated by the Department of Global Affairs Canada and legalized by the embassy, it can be officially used as a valid document in that country.
Here is a list of commonly submitted documents for authentication and legalization:
-RCMP’s Certified Criminal Record Checks
-Name & Date of Birth Based Police Checks (CPIC)
-Birth Certificates
-Marriage Certificates
-Death Certificates
-Education Documents
-Fingerprint Forms
-Power of Attorney
-Incorporation Certificates
-CRA Documents
-Court Orders etc.
Some of the Challenges Faced by the Applicants
The authentication part of the process is pretty straightforward, however, for some applicants, it is difficult to drive to Ottawa to submit documents to the department of Global Affairs in person, or to wait for the time taken by this process after sending the documents via mail or courier.
The embassies of different countries have different requirements. Some of the embassies do not accept documents via mail or courier. Some of them ask the applicant to first apply and pay online and some others accept money orders in US dollars only.
Different embassies have different legalization fees and it keeps on changing. It becomes difficult to find out the correct fee and sometimes the documents are returned to the applicant for this reason.
One has to go to the website of the embassy or consulate or call them to find out the correct procedure for sending the documents for legalization. Some applicants find it difficult to understand this process.
To avoid these complications, the simple solution is to get the services of the companies who take care of the whole process. Since such companies deal with these matters on daily basis, therefore they are aware of the process and the frequent changes made by the embassies in their fee structure and procedure.
How Worldwide Forensic Services Inc Can Help You?
Worldwide Forensic Services has been helping people for over 15 years. We have proficient agents in Ottawa and Toronto.
Our agents in Ottawa go to the Department of Global Affairs in person to submit the documents for authentication and pick them up. For urgent matters or for embassies that do not accept documents via mail or courier, our agents also go to those embassies to submit the documents in person.
We ensure your documents are properly authenticated and legalized in the fastest possible way. Since we receive lots of documents, we are able to keep our pricing reasonable.