Our Apostille Adventure: Notes from the Journey Away

When I first heard the word apostille, I thought it was some sort of delicate European pastry. You know, the kind where flour and chilled butter are rolled and pounded into layers of flaky deliciousness.

An apostille and a coffee, por favor?

Guess again.

For others unfamiliar with the term, an apostille is a certificate showing that a locally approved legal document has been authenticated for international use. Think of it as a level above a notary public’s stamp and signature … one with international cred among the 91 countries in The Hague Convention, of which the U.S. is a part.

Though not exactly an everyday term in the United States, we’ve used apostille around our house more often these days than doughnut, cocktail and theocratic regime.

Why? Because we must have two apostilles for our move to Portugal. One for our certificate of marriage in Georgetown, Delaware, in 2013, and one for the recent FBI background checks required for a Portuguese visa. Though they are meant to make international authentication of documents easier (yeah, right!), apostilles have been the most challenging of the dozens of paperwork requirements for our move abroad.

(For those who don’t know, we’ve changed our relocation plans from Alicante, Spain, because we couldn’t get reasonably priced private health insurance there. In Portugal, expats are eligible for the national health care plan after living in the country for four months, while in Spain, two years of residence are required.)

Getting the FBI apostille was a piece of cake.

But an apostille from the Secretary of State of Delaware for our marriage certificate was a different story. Not that the Secretary’s office was uncooperative. They were a joy to work with. It was more a comedy of errors on the way there.

(A little background: The U.S. Department of State issues apostilles for federal documents like FBI background checks. For state-issued documents like marriage certificates, the apostille has to come from the Secretary of State’s office in the state where the document originated. Hence our work with Delaware.)

It took three tries over a span of eight weeks to get the apostille for our marriage certificate.

But we finally got it right.

We began in mid-April, when we took photo scans of a newly certified marriage certificate (the original won’t do for a visa) from the Sussex County Clerk of the Peace who married us in 2013.

Our first apostille application was aborted because I had removed the staple that held our marriage certificate to the cover letter bearing the seal of the Sussex County Clerk of the Peace. I had thought separating the documents would improve the quality of the photo scans required for the Google file we shared with our relocation firm. I goofed.

Removing the staple, the firm told us, made it look as if the documents had been tampered with, as shown above.

In other words: No staple. No cigar.

So, back to the Sussex County Clerk of the Peace for another newly certified copy of our marriage certificate. We received it May 2, and after a few weeks of grief over the dashing of our Alicante plans, we sent it via United Parcel Service (UPS) in a what-we-thought-was-sturdy cardboard mailer to the Delaware Secretary of State’s office.

Wrong.

“It looks like someone wadded up your certificate and sat on it,” said the kind and gracious Delaware state official who phoned me when he received the document from UPS.

And it does, doesn’t it, in the photo above? Though the envelope was creased across the middle, as if it had been forcibly folded in half somewhere along the way to Dover, Delaware, everyone who sees this crumpled certificate says it looks as if someone removed it by hand from the envelope, wadded it up and then attempted to smooth it out.

Why? We might never know.

Though the Secretary of State official said Portugal is lenient in accepting non-pristine documents for visa applications, he suggested we might want to play it safe, get a fresh certificate from Sussex County, and submit a new apostille application. Or risk having our visa denied by the Portuguese consulate because of improper or questionable paperwork.

Back to Square One.

And all the while the clock was ticking. We needed the apostille for our June 24 appointment in Washington, DC, to apply for our visas to Portugal. And here it was June 2. We didn’t have time to waste.

Our third try was the charm.

On June 9, we received yet another certified copy of our marriage certificate from Sussex County (at $25 a pop). We then sent it via UPS two-day delivery … in a cardboard mailer this time reinforced by two substantial pieces of corrugated cardboard.

Voila!

It arrived undamaged at the Delaware Secretary of State’s office, was quickly apostilled (like most people we know who have gone through the process, we’ve morphed apostille into a verb) and sent June 11 to our Atlanta address. It arrived two days later in pristine condition, thanks again to those reinforcing sheets of corrugated cardboard, because the cardboard envelope was creased down the middle just like the earlier one.

Whew!

To add even more fun to the process, a work crew was renovating the floor of the lobby in our building the day the apostille was scheduled for delivery. It was roped off to residents and delivery folks; entry was verboten. So I waited outside our building’s entrance for the UPS truck to arrive. After a little more than an hour in the Atlanta heat and humidity, there was the UPS truck a few minutes after 3:00 p.m.

With a beautiful smile, the driver handed the envelope to me and wished me a happy weekend.

“Happy weekend to you!” I crowed, the envelope clutched to my chest.

At last, we had all the paperwork we need for our June 24 appointment in DC.

And apostille is no longer a four-letter word in our house.

We have filed a claim with UPS for the crumpled delivery. Status pending. Our local UPS Store has been most helpful, but has no control over the corporate office’s decision.

So … we wait.

And evangelize to all who are considering a move abroad:

• Two sheets of corrugated cardboard in a UPS mailer are essential for shipping documents that can’t be sullied, like those requiring an apostille.
• By no means remove a staple binding official government documents together.
• If you need to order a copy of a government document, order two or three. It might cost a little more, but it will be worth it to have extras if things go awry in your supply chain, as they frequently do.
• Above all, allow plenty of time for the process.
• Expect it to cost more in dollars and stress than you ever imagined.
• Breathe deeply.
• Try to relax.
• And be grateful for the unexpected sunny islands in the dark seas of bureacracy–like the official in the Delaware Secretary of State’s office who went out of his way to get us what we needed. And the smiling, Johnny-on-the-spot UPS guy.

You might call the above our Apostille Creed.

Sorry. Couldn’t resist.

We also try to quash the inner scowl that surfaces at the requirement of paper rather than online documents anywhere in today’s harried world. And worse, when we think how we would have avoided the long-distance rigmarole in 2025 … IF SAME-SEX MARRIAGE HAD BEEN LEGAL IN OUR HOME STATE OF GEORGIA IN 2013. We could have obtained the apostille by a simple 12-mile drive to state government offices in downtown Atlanta. Proving, once again, that we are still under the thumbs, in countless niggling little ways, of the homophobes and LGBTQ+ haters in this country.

But that kind of thinking only leads to ulcers.

Besides, we have Portugal to look forward to.

We’ve been there before. Twice. And we know it’s worth all the time and stress it takes to get there.

Please wish us luck in DC in June 24!

Bom dia!

A selfie at the Lisbon waterfront on September 3, 2014.