Any Foreign Public Document should be legalised in order to have validity in Andorra, just as any Andorran Public Document should be legalised in order to have validity abroad unless a convention exempts from that obligation or both countries have decided in that way.

This legalisation can be done by two procedures:

  • With the HagueApostille procedure, that enables the legalisation of a document in a single procedure for all Member States of the Convention abolishing the requirement of legalisation for Foreign Public Documents, concluded on 5 October 1961.
  • With the traditional legalisation through diplomatic channels, for the rest of countries.

Consular legalization procedure

Andorra has acceded to the Convention abolishing the requirement of legalisation for Foreign Public Documents (known as The Hague Apostille Convention) on May, 12th 1996.

What is the Apostille and why it is used?

It is a single process of legalisation and consists of placing an apostille stamp which certifies the authenticity of the signature on the public document itself or in an extension thereof.

Documents legalised with the Apostille procedure are directly recognized in any other country member of the Convention withoutany further proceeding.

The Apostille procedure suppresses the requirement of the diplomatic legalisation.

On the following link you can find an updated list of countries members of the Apostille:

http://www.hcch.net/index_fr.php?act=conventions.status&cid=41

Procedure to be followed:

An application form for the Hague Apostille has to be completed and submitted to the Servei de Tràmits of the Government of Andorra, attaching the document issued by an Andorran authority needing to be legalised.

Sol·licitud de legalització de documents (Postil·la de l'Haia)

Andorran competent authorities:

The article 6 of the Convention establishes that each Contracting State shall give notice to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands (the depositary of the Convention) with the authorities who are competent to legalise a public document.

Currently, the designated Andorran competent authorities are:

  • The Minister of Foreign Affairs.
  • The Coordinator of Bilateral and Consular Affairs.
  • The Director of Multilateral Affairs and Cooperation.
  • The Head of the Service of General and Legal Affairs.

The legalisation procedure through diplomatic channels is applied to legalize Foreign Public Documents issued by a non-Contracting State of the Convention abolishing the requirement of legalisation for Foreign Public Documents, of 5 October 1961.

Procedure to be followed:

An application form for legalisation of documents has to be completed and submitted to the Servei de Tràmits of the Government of Andorra, attaching the document issued by an Andorran authority needing to be legalised.

Sol·licitud de legalització de documents (Postil·la de l'Haia)

Andorran competent authorities:

Currently, the Andorran competent authorities to legalise documents are:

  1. The Minister of Presidency, Economy and Corporations
  2. The Minister of Finance and Spokesman
  3. The Minister of Foreign Affairs

When the document is issued by a country member of the Apostille Convention, check the list of those countries at the following link:

https://www.hcch.net/fr/instruments/conventions/authorities1/?cid=41

When the document is issued by a country not member of the Apostille Convention:

Procedure to be followed:

Each of the authorities involved has to legalise the last signature of the document, creating a sequence of recognition of signatures, from the authority which issues de document to the authority which is going to receive the document.

The procedure of legalisation can sometimes be long and complicated, for this reason the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will be pleased to answer any question doubt you might have by calling the following phone number: +376 875 704.