Frequently, documents that have been notarially certified must be further legalised to be fully accepted in the jurisdiction where they will be used. Legalisation is a form of governmental authentication of the notary’s (or other public officer’s) signature, seal and capacity.
Very broadly, destination countries can be divided into three groups:
1. those for which no further legalisation of notarised documents is required – typically common-law or Commonwealth jurisdictions;
2. those that are members of a convention [the Hague Convention abolishing the requirement of legalisation for foreign public documents, 1961], for which a type of legalisation known as the apostille should be universally accepted;
3. other countries, for which consular legalisation is needed, i.e. authentication by the Consulate of the destination country – usually in addition to the apostille.
As this is a complicated area, for more specific guidance please use this page to select the country in question and find out what legalisation is required and approximately how long it should take.
Contact one of our offices at Newry , Dublin or Castlewellan for more information . Our services are offered throughout Northern Ireland though most of our clients come to us in Belfast , County Down and County Armagh
