Notaries are public officials, authorised to confirm the authenticity and validity of acts and documents for international purposes. Documents prepared or certified by notaries may be relied on by governments, courts, embassies, companies, lawyers and individuals anywhere in the world. We therefore have a strict legal duty to make sure that what is being done is legitimate and that the people coming to see us have the capacity and authority to sign the document. We also have to register and keep a permanent record of every document we deal with and may be called on by officials to produce copies at any time in the future.

You may need a notary public for many things, such as selling or buying a property abroad, opening a foreign bank account, giving a power of attorney, certified copies of documents such as examination certificates, opening a branch office of your company or business abroad, getting translations of documents certified, if you marry abroad and so on.

The need for a notary public is dictated by the requirements of the country where the document is to be used. For example, if you are not in Italy, but wish to buy a property there, it is usually necessary to give your lawyer in Italy power to deal with the purchase and registration of your ownership.

This is done by means of a power of attorney, which is signed by you, the purchaser, in front of a notary. You cannot sign it in front of anyone else. The notary public will confirm your name and identity and sign the document and seal it with his or her official seal.

Quite often, an apostille is needed to verify the signature and seal of the notary.The document then will usually need to be further authenticated by having the U.K. Foreign and Commonwealth Office confirm the validity of the notary’s signature and seal. This is done by legalisation or authentication by the use of the FCO’s official certificate attached to the back of the document, known as an apostille. These are internationally recognised due to the Hague Convention.

Legalisation is a term that covers authentication by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) And/or the Consulate of the country the document is to be used in. For documents intended for countries that have ratified the Hague Convention of1961, legalisation by the FCO is usually the only extra authentication that is needed. This is known as an “Apostille”.

The FCO currently charges £30.00 (Standard service) and £75.00 (Express service) per Apostille.

We will advise if consular legalisation is also required. Each consulate charges different fees, and procedures and time scales will vary. Please note that the notarisation may be ineffective if the receiving country requires legalisation but it is not done.

You should therefore check with the authority which will be receiving the finished documents from you.

An apostille is a certificate issued (in the U.K.) by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). It confirms that a document was signed by the person whose signature is on the document. Often this is the signature of a notary, but the FCO also has other signatures registered with it, such as those of some officials such as Registrars of Births, Deaths and Marriages (if this was in the UK). Each document carries its own apostille.