Processing Times for Apostilles and Embassy Attestation

Every effort is made by the legalisation team to complete orders as quickly as possible.

We provide estimated processing times on our website, and within email communications, based on experience and recent orders that we process. In general, these are a good guide to the expected time to legalise documents. If your order is time sensitive, we kindly advise that our processing times are approximate and not the essence of the contract when ordering a service.

Apostilles

We aim to complete most apostille orders on the next working day, after receipt of the document. You can read more about our Next Day Apostille Service here. We work very hard to expedite all orders and meet this target. However, this is not a guarantee or promise. Occasionally an order can take longer. The UK government are taking 3 to 4 weeks for apostilles.

The good news is - we are very good at what we do! Most orders complete on time and as expected.

Embassy Attestation

The processing time at embassies is different for each embassy. One may take 4 working days while another takes 3 weeks or more. Each of our website embassy pages has an estimated processing time to assist customers with their expectations and plans. They are estimates!

What can delay an order?

• The time the document arrives in our office. It may miss a deadline for processing.
• Document checks identify a problem with a document or we need to complete further verification on a document.
• Errors on orders and incorrect documents.
• Queries on orders. Every day we receive orders that need further investigation. The wrong service was ordered, the wrong document was sent, order references are missing, contact details are incomplete, and many more issues.
• Volumes of orders. We have a team of trained staff processing orders but they are human! They all work hard but we cannot process an infinite number of documents in one day. We also have absence, annual leave, and other reasons for staff to be away from the office.
• Government delays. Occasionally, the FCDO have technical issues or do not have enough staff to process orders. This can delay orders beyond our control.
• We use a range of delivery services to return documents to you. They may experience a problem delivering a document to you.

It is important that customers understand we work with many other organisations and we are impacted by their service levels. This includes government services, solicitors, registrars, embassies, couriers, and many other third-party organisations.

We understand many customers contact us with urgent orders. If you have left ordering your document legalisation to the last moment, we will do our best to help. We want to get your document processed to help you.

Processing times are a guide. They are provided to give customers an approximate completion time but are subject to change. They are not guaranteed!

If any service 'claims' to offer a quicker service than us, we recommend you order with caution. There are no fast track services or legalisation services with special arrangements with embassies.

We are here to help you get your document legalised as quickly as possible.