Time is of the essence and most people are usually on the go and working on a schedule. When travelling overseas it is always important to know the waiting period of when you can get your apostilled documents. That way you will be able to schedule it properly within your travelling date. South Africa as a member state of the Hague Convention of 5 October 1961, chose the South African High Court and the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) as the two legal entities to issue apostilles. This blog post will go into detail about how long it takes to have a document apostilled in South Africa from both the South African High Court and from the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO). 

South African High Court

The High Court is one of the departments that issue Apostille Certificates. It can take anytime between a day to 5 days to have your document apostilled. This is because they allow walk-ins, where you can personally submit your documents, with no appointment needed. You need to submit your documents through the registrar of the High Court, as they are the ones that usually deal with administration. After submitting the documents you can expect to receive them back within a week. Using an Apostille agency can also come in handy as they are able to fast-track the process.

Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO)

DIRCO takes about 4 to 6 weeks to get your documents apostilled. It used to take a maximum of two days but has since changed due to Covid-19. This is also partly due to the fact that they don’t allow any walk-ins, instead, you have to mail your documents to them via post office or use a courier service. This brings us back to scheduling your time properly in order to get all your documents ready. As soon as your apostilled documents are ready, you’ll be notified by email. You need to schedule an appointment for collection. After scheduling the appointment, you can either choose to come collect your documents yourself or have them couriered back to you.

How you can get your documents apostilled within record time

People usually find the process of apostille certification jarring and lengthy and most often prefer to go to a secondary organisation, such as Global Apostille Legalisation to help them through the process. Agencies can fast process your documents especially if you are in a hurry and make sure that you get your documents within two days. Some people don’t know about Apostilling documents until they have to apostille them and waiting for a period of 4 to 6 weeks doesn’t always work for them. Meaning they have to find an alternate way to apostille their documents. This leads to contacting an apostille agency, for fast, legally authenticated documents.

Global Apostille legalisation services

Global Apostille is a Pretoria-based legalisation agency that assists corporations and individuals  in getting apostilles and embassy legalization services in South Africa for documents to be used abroad. We make the legalization and apostille of South African documents simple for our clients.

Understanding that document authentication can be challenging and time-consuming, our main aim is to ensure our clients feel at ease. Our goal is to lessen this load by offering top-notch apostilling services at reasonable rates, without any hidden charges.

Global Apostille can handle various types of documents on your behalf from Birth Certificate to Power of Attorney. Our service offers a comprehensive solution, ensuring both official translation and legalization processes are straightforward. If you want to know more about our services, feel free to get in touch with us.

Tel: 012 348 3134 | 081 347 6060
Email: info@apostillelegalisation.co.za

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How long does it take to have a document apostilled in South Africa

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In the article, you'll find the waiting period for getting your documents apostilled, either at the South African High Court or the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO), for legal use in countries contracted the Hague Convention.

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Global Apostille Lagalisation

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