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nyla54
Joined: 17 Jun 2009
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 Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 12:06 am Post subject: Apostilled Documents in Southern California |
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I know there are a few strands including information on going about receiving an apostille. However, I thought it might be useful to post another with a specific focus on Southern California as the madness to send in documents is well under way.
First and foremost, yes, you must notarize. According to a representative of the Secretary of State, to notarize a document should not cover above $10.
Now, you have two options: send your document to Sacramento or go local.
If you send your document to Sacramento, you would be mailing your documents to the main office of the Secretary of State. They are the only office able to apostille with ONLY a notary. However, keep in mind this involves the time to send, receive an apostille, and receive your documents.
The local option provides an additional step. After notarizing your document, you must go to your country clerk to have your document "certified" ($9). After which, you are now able to go to a branch office of the Secretary of the State for an apostille; your first apostilled document is $26 and $20 for each after.
Note: You can go through various private agencies to apostille your documents. However, from what I have read, they can be expensive, slow, and unreliable. |
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SFValley
Joined: 18 Jun 2009
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 2:06 am Post subject: Re: Apostilled Documents in Southern California |
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| nyla54 wrote: |
I know there are a few strands including information on going about receiving an apostille. However, I thought it might be useful to post another with a specific focus on Southern California as the madness to send in documents is well under way.
First and foremost, yes, you must notarize. According to a representative of the Secretary of State, to notarize a document should not cover above $10.
Now, you have two options: send your document to Sacramento or go local.
If you send your document to Sacramento, you would be mailing your documents to the main office of the Secretary of State. They are the only office able to apostille with ONLY a notary. However, keep in mind this involves the time to send, receive an apostille, and receive your documents.
The local option provides an additional step. After notarizing your document, you must go to your country clerk to have your document "certified" ($9). After which, you are now able to go to a branch office of the Secretary of the State for an apostille; your first apostilled document is $26 and $20 for each after.
Note: You can go through various private agencies to apostille your documents. However, from what I have read, they can be expensive, slow, and unreliable. |
Private agencies, from my research, were able to take care of it more simply and quickly, however, almost all of them were over $100 US. |
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RobLeeTeach
Joined: 20 May 2009
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 2:31 am Post subject: |
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| I did mine through a private company. 125 or something like that per document. It was too much of a hassle to do it on my own, plus would've lost more money than I spent from driving all over Southern California and missing a day of work. The Secretary of State office to Apostille is downtown, but the County Clerk's office is 3 hours round-trip. You can get your documents notarized at the County Clerk's office, too. My private apostille was a lady downtown and it took 1 business day. Maybe it was two business days. I forget. |
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tired of LA
Joined: 06 Nov 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 4:23 am Post subject: Re: Apostilled Documents in Southern California |
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| nyla54 wrote: |
I know there are a few strands including information on going about receiving an apostille. However, I thought it might be useful to post another with a specific focus on Southern California as the madness to send in documents is well under way.
First and foremost, yes, you must notarize. According to a representative of the Secretary of State, to notarize a document should not cover above $10.
Now, you have two options: send your document to Sacramento or go local.
If you send your document to Sacramento, you would be mailing your documents to the main office of the Secretary of State. They are the only office able to apostille with ONLY a notary. However, keep in mind this involves the time to send, receive an apostille, and receive your documents.
The local option provides an additional step. After notarizing your document, you must go to your country clerk to have your document "certified" ($9). After which, you are now able to go to a branch office of the Secretary of the State for an apostille; your first apostilled document is $26 and $20 for each after.
Note: You can go through various private agencies to apostille your documents. However, from what I have read, they can be expensive, slow, and unreliable. |
Not true. IF you're doing a state background check, you can tell them that you need to get it apostilled. They will attach a letter with an original signature and stamp to you background check, which then can be apostilled WITHOUT a notary. This is because the document was issued by the state. I know this for a fact because I did it last year. |
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RobLeeTeach
Joined: 20 May 2009
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 5:15 am Post subject: Re: Apostilled Documents in Southern California |
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| tired of LA wrote: |
Not true. IF you're doing a state background check, you can tell them that you need to get it apostilled. They will attach a letter with an original signature and stamp to you background check, which then can be apostilled WITHOUT a notary. This is because the document was issued by the state. I know this for a fact because I did it last year. |
Thanks for the info. Too late for me. I wasn't aware, offered, nor did I see any information about that, but hopefully someone else can benefit from the info. (or maybe they changed the rule since you did it. who knows) |
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youcollme
Joined: 07 Jun 2009
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 6:33 pm Post subject: Re: Apostilled Documents in Southern California |
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| nyla54 wrote: |
I know there are a few strands including information on going about receiving an apostille. However, I thought it might be useful to post another with a specific focus on Southern California as the madness to send in documents is well under way.
First and foremost, yes, you must notarize. According to a representative of the Secretary of State, to notarize a document should not cover above $10.
Now, you have two options: send your document to Sacramento or go local.
If you send your document to Sacramento, you would be mailing your documents to the main office of the Secretary of State. They are the only office able to apostille with ONLY a notary. However, keep in mind this involves the time to send, receive an apostille, and receive your documents.
The local option provides an additional step. After notarizing your document, you must go to your country clerk to have your document "certified" ($9). After which, you are now able to go to a branch office of the Secretary of the State for an apostille; your first apostilled document is $26 and $20 for each after.
Note: You can go through various private agencies to apostille your documents. However, from what I have read, they can be expensive, slow, and unreliable. |
Personally, I think the easiest and quickest way to go about doing all of this in Southern California is to head to the LA County Clerk Recorder's office in Norwalk. They have a notary upstairs (this cost is more like $20-$30), then you go down a floor and can have it authenticated (but they ONLY take cash). Once you're finished notarizing and authenticating your documents, you can head straight to the Secretary of State in LA and get the apostille. I did all of this in one day, took a total of about 4 hours (lines + driving from OC). Not too shabby. |
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Car0lina
Joined: 18 Jul 2009
Location: North Carolina
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 6:58 pm Post subject: Thanks for all the info! |
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| I'm in NC, but it still helps- |
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iisabrane
Joined: 24 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 7:20 pm Post subject: |
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I had both my diploma and criminal background check apostilled without the notary or county clerk's signature. The Secretary of State's office can verify and apostille almost any document without a notary seal as long as the signature on it is done by an agent of the state.
As mentioned before, state level criminal background checks can be directly apostilled as they can verify signatures made by the Department of Justice. Also, if you graduated from the UC system, the governor is the head of the UC Regents and his signature is on your diploma (Arnold "signed" mine). Because of this, I had no issues getting my diploma apostilled. Hope that helps some of you. |
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tired of LA
Joined: 06 Nov 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 8:22 pm Post subject: |
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| iisabrane wrote: |
I had both my diploma and criminal background check apostilled without the notary or county clerk's signature. The Secretary of State's office can verify and apostille almost any document without a notary seal as long as the signature on it is done by an agent of the state.
As mentioned before, state level criminal background checks can be directly apostilled as they can verify signatures made by the Department of Justice. Also, if you graduated from the UC system, the governor is the head of the UC Regents and his signature is on your diploma (Arnold "signed" mine). Because of this, I had no issues getting my diploma apostilled. Hope that helps some of you. |
Not too sure if its still acceptable, but I never got my diploma apostilled. I just went to the Korean consulate in LA and made copies there on their copy machine and paid them 5 dollars or something like that and they certified the copies for me. I sent in that certified copy instead of my original. Its cheaper than getting your diploma apostilled. |
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timmayyyyy
Joined: 18 May 2008
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Tue Aug 25, 2009 1:06 pm Post subject: |
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| tired of LA - just curious, about the degree certification, that was your experience last year right? Because it worked for me too in 2008, but I just went to the embassy a couple weeks ago and now they won't do it...said I had to get it notarized and apostilled just like the CBC...pain in the a$$ |
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tired of LA
Joined: 06 Nov 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Tue Aug 25, 2009 4:04 pm Post subject: |
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| timmayyyyy wrote: |
| tired of LA - just curious, about the degree certification, that was your experience last year right? Because it worked for me too in 2008, but I just went to the embassy a couple weeks ago and now they won't do it...said I had to get it notarized and apostilled just like the CBC...pain in the a$$ |
Yeah, that was last year. Guess they aren't accepted anymore. That sucks. It might be cheaper to get a second copy of your diploma from your university and send that in than to get a copy notarized and apostilled. |
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