Schmidt & Schmidt offers the legalization of documents from Puerto Rico by apostille.
The Commonwealth of Puerto Rico acceded to the Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents in 1981. Therefore, no diplomatic authentication or consular legalization of documents from Puerto Rico is needed for successful legal communication with other member states of the Convention. The documents only need to be attested by an apostille certificate with an "apostille" stamp on it by the issuing state's authorities in order to be valid in the state of destination.
The apostille is a stamp of rectangular shape. It should be filled in in the official language of the issuing authority. The heading "Apostille (Convention de la Haye du 5 octobre 1961)" written in French is a necessary requirement for the apostille's validity.
Responsible for issuing the apostille are the following institutions:
- United States Department of State
- United States District Court - only judicial certificates
The following institutions responsible for issuing the apostille on the documents issued by Puerto Rico authorities and other authorized agencies:
- Deputy State Secretary
- Deputy State Secretary for Foreign Affairs
- Head of the Certification Department
- Chief of the Protocol department
- Deputy State Secretary for Home Affairs
Public documents issued by the authorities of Puerto Rico and other authorized bodies and drawn up in English or Spanish can be apostillized.
Legalizing public documents in Puerto Rico implies authenticating the origin of the document and the authority of the officials who have affixed the signature, seal or stamp on the document. After such verification, a special stamp - the apostille - is affixed to the public document or its certified copy. The apostille is usually placed on the back of the underlying public document or on a separate attached page.
The following documents can be authenticated by apostille:
- Certificates of civil status (certificates of birth, death, marriage and divorce)
- Education documents (school reports, certificates, diplomas)
- Excerpts from the commercial register
- Court decisions
- Notarially certified copies of documents
- Notarially certified translations
- Further notarial documents (power of attorney, last will, declarations)
- Commercial documents legalized by a state registration body (articles of incorporation, registration certificates, tax registrations etc.)
Requirements for the documents:
The apostille can be exclusively issued for the original document. Therefore, the underlying document must be presented in good condition, with all stamps and signatures clear and readable. Furthermore, it should not contain alien markings or labels.
Additional services
In addition to the legalization of your public documents, we can provide you with high-quality translations.
Should you require company information for use in court, it needs to be legalized as well. We can therefore provide you with extracts from the commercial register of Puerto Rico including the apostille certification and translation into the language of the document's state of destination.
On average, processing the documents takes up to 14 days.
