Federal Apostille Service Order Page

■ Next to each of the 86 different document types listed on the Select Document drop-down menu above, it will show either an RD, NRD, or CD. This will let you know if you need to get your documents notarized before you can mail or drop them off to us.

■ Recordable Document (RD) = These types of documents do not need to be notarized but they must be original or certified copies (no photocopies) and be issued from a Texas city or county clerk’s office or Texas Vital Statistics/Texas Vital Records if you want us to apostille them first at the state level (Texas Secretary of State) which you must do before they can be submitted to the federal level (U.S Department of State) for non-Hague member countries.

If your recordable documents were issued from another state (non-Texas) you can only receive a state-level apostille from the state in which your documents were issued from. You cannot email, mail, or drop off recordable documents to us that were issued from another state (non-Texas) or another country. TEXAS ONLY unless you got them apostilled from another state first and now you want us to help you with the rush federal apostille service process.

■ Non-Recordable Document (NRD) = These types of documents must be signed originals (no photocopies) and be properly wet ink or online notarized by a Texas or another state notary public. If your non-recordable documents were notarized by a non-Texas notary you can only receive a state-level apostille from the state in which your notary is licensed and you must do this step before your document can be submitted to the federal level (U.S Department of State) for all non-Hague member countries.

You cannot email, mail, or drop off non-recordable documents to us that were notarized by another state’s notary. TEXAS NOTARIES ONLY unless you got them apostilled from another state first and now you want us to help you with the rush federal apostille service process.

■ Corporations Document (CD) = These types of Texas corporation documents do not need to be notarized but you cannot mail or drop off these types of documents to us. You can only email us to start the Texas corporate apostille ordering process.

■ You can only choose ONE foreign (non-USA) country per document. The United States Department of State will only issue you ONE apostille or authentication certificate on ONE document and for ONE foreign (non-USA) country. This means the Department of State will not issue you multiple apostille or authentication certificates or for multiple countries on one document.

■ All federal government document filing fees are included in our flat fee rush federal apostille service pricing.

■ Because we will be rush filing your documents at the United States Department of State’s office on your behalf you do not complete or mail/email/drop off to us the Federal Apostille Form DS-4194. We have a different apostille order form that we must complete and submit to the State Department along with your documents.

■ The U.S Department of State does not and will not give us or anyone (you) status or order updates so we cannot give you order status updates once you place your order with us (welcome to the completely broken federal government system post-COVID). Only on the day the State Department finally issues a federal apostille certificate or authentication certificate on your documents will they notify us.

■ When creating and buying a FedEx, UPS, or DHL prepaid return shipping label they will ask you for a sender’s address (from address) which means if your documents get lost in the mail the sender’s address is the return address of where the undelivered documents will be sent back to by FedEx, UPS, or DHL.

You must put your name and address or your company’s name and address as the sender (from address) on the prepaid shipping label and/or on the customs invoice if shipping internationally. Depending on what foreign country you live in outside the U.S the FedEx, UPS, or DHL online system may see your foreign IP address and not let you put your foreign address in as the sender (from address). If this happens you must list a friend, relative, or company office address which is located in the U.S as the sender (from address).

You CANNOT put our company name (Apostille Texas) or our address as the sender because we are not the sender. The sender is you because you created and paid for the prepaid return shipping label, not us and you are 100% responsible for paying all shipping and customs charges when shipping internationally.

We will not mail your documents back to you if you mail, email, or drop off to us a prepaid return shipping label or customs invoice that wrongly has our company name, phone number, or address listed anywhere on it. FedEx, UPS, and DHL wrongly send us and try to collect from our company unpaid shipping bills because people and companies don’t pay their full shipping charges and customs fees when sending internationally.

■ The current estimated 2024 turnaround time for the U.S Department of State to issue a federal apostille or authentication certificate on a federal document that we rush file with them on your behalf is around 4-5 weeks. This can and does change at any time without notice to being longer from the USDOS please be aware.