According to The Hague Apostille Convention of October 5, 1961, U.S. Department of State in Washington, DC is the Competent Authority of the 1st tier of the apostille system for documents issued mainly by the U.S. Federal Agencies (documents signed by a federal official with the official Seal of that agency), American Consular Officers, Military Notaries or Foreign Consuls.
Please note that the US Department of State does not apostille state-level documents. Please refer to this link for more information.
For public documents to be used overseas in countries-parties to the Hague Apostille Convention, it issues apostilles. For countries of use that are not parties to the Convention, authentication at the U.S. Department of State is required as a pre-final step in the chain legalization process prior legalization at a foreign embassy/consulate/mission.
How to Use Our USDOS Apostille Service
WDC Apostille & Legalization Services can speedily arrange apostille of clients' documents by the U.S. Department of State. We can offer regular or economy service with discounts for multiple documents. Please check out Our Service Fees.
It is super-easy to use our services if you follow the below suggested algorithm of actions:
- You contact us preferably by email explaining your document situation. If it is urgent, you can call us 24/7. Please provide as many details as possible about your documents but the key information we usually need is: 1) who issued them, 2) where you intend to use them, 3) how many you have, 4) are they originals or notarized copies, 5) how fast you need them back and 6) the destination they need to be sent to. If your shipment destination (after processing) is neither in the USA nor in Canada, then we would need the exact address including postal code so that we can give you exact courier quote.
- We will reply by email as well as fast as we can with our comments, suggestions, questions and/or confirmation with preliminary or final quote.
- You can then write us back with additional questions, comments or concerns. Or you may just be satisfied and ready to send your documents.
- At this stage we agree on the course of action and our services. You would make the payment, ship the documents and email us the tracking # so that we can start tracking your inbound shipment and provide you interim updates.
- We will complete your service request and ship the documents back to your agreed destination either in your attached prepaid envelope with filled out air waybill or in our envelope (but we would have to charge you extra for this service). If you prefer, we can scan the completed documents and email them to you prior outbound shipment so you would know that we did indeed do everything as previously discussed.
- After shipment is sent, we will email you the tracking # so that you can monitor the arrival.
Thus, prior sending documents to us, you are encouraged to get a quote based on your specific document situation or contact us if you have any questions. This is an important step as we can help you to ensure you did not miss any requirements by state agencies and foreign governments.
We hope to hear from you soon!
