An Apostille Only China On The Horizon
At Pardus Bloom, we regularly see both individual and corporate clients who need their documents legalised for use in China with an apostille, be it their education certificates or corporate powers of attorney.
The current document legalisation process for China is complex, time-consuming and bewildering to anyone who has never needed to be familiar with it.
At the moment, documents intended for use in the People’s Republic of China require the following:
- Solicitor certification or Notarisation (Only if applicable, please check with our enquiries team if you’re uncertain.)
- Apostille from the UK FCDO
- Chinese Attestation
Notarisation is not always required depending on the kind of document you have. Original documents issued from UK authorities such as the General Register Office do not require prior notarisation before they can be issued an apostille. These documents include birth, death and marriage certificates.
Documents that do not bear the signature of a UK authority, such as a degree certificate or corporate power of attorney, must be first notarised by a notary public before they can be apostilled. This usually involves the notary verifying the authenticity of the certificate and the identity as well as the authority of any signatories.
Apostilles are certificates issued by the UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office that verify the signature of the UK official who signed the document—for example, the signature of the registrar or notary public.
Even when the notarisation and apostille steps are expedited through using Pardus Bloom’s express same-day legalisation services, the last step is what slows things down to a crawl. Document legalisation for non-Chinese citizens has to be conducted through CVASC, the Chinese Visa Application Service Center. Document attestation therefore depends on the center’s workload and work pace.
This long-winded process may soon be changing for the better. On the 7th of November 2023, the 1961 Apostille Convention will come into effect for the People’s Republic of China.
In theory, this means that past this date, document attestation at the Chinese Visa Application Service Center (CVASC) will no longer be necessary. Documents can be legalised for use in China through the process of notarisation, (if applicable), and then an apostille.
In practice, it can take some time for organisations and individuals in China to begin acting in accordance with the 1961 Apostille Convention and start to accept documents that have not been attested at CVASC.
We would strongly encourage you to double-check with your receiving party in China about their requirements before sending them any documents that have not been attested at CVASC. We will continue attesting documents for our clients for as long as this service is possible.
There have yet to be any official announcements from CVASC or the Chinese Embassy to confirm how document legalisation for China will change in the future. We have heard informally from CVASC that any necessary document legalisation in the future will be processed through the Chinese Embassy and from the start of November, CVASC will no longer offer legalisation services.
Whilst we await an official announcement, we can only speculate. In the future, it may be that only certain standard-form documents such as GRO certificates are exempt from Chinese Embassy attestation.
It may be that only documents for corporate clients will be accepted in China without Chinese Embassy attestation and all individual clients will continue to require attestation for all documents.
Even with an official announcement to say otherwise, what is required for a document to be accepted in China will ultimately be determined by the requirements of your receiving party.
Need to have a document legalised for use abroad? We offer remote, virtual notarisation appointments via video conferencing so that we can arrange document notarisation for our clients no matter how busy their schedules are. Hop onto a short video call with a notary during your lunch break, post us your documents or send scans via email and we’ll take care of everything else!
Have a query or concern you need to resolve? Contact our enquiries team today!