The authorities in a foreign jurisdiction rely on a notarial certificate because they see notaries as people who can be trusted to make sure that documents and facts have been properly authenticated.
However, when the document is received in the foreign country, the foreign authorities have no idea whether my signature and seal are those of a Notary, and have no easy way of checking. The only way in which this can realistically be done is by a process known as legalisation.
This is a process by one or more official body in this country confirms that the signature and seal that appear on your document are mine and that I am a Notary.
The UK body that confirms my status is the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in Milton Keynes. To obtain this involves sending my certificate to The Foreign and Commonwealth Office in Milton Keynes where they will legalise it by signing and sealing it. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office is at Norfolk House West, 437 Silbury Boulevard, Milton Keynes MK9 2AH and a map can be found here. The fee currently payable to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for this is £30. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office no longer allow people to attend at their office in Milton Keynes personally to have the documents dealt with. Instead it must all be done through agents or by post. This inevitably means it will take at least 3 days using this service. I use an agent who is allowed to attend and it will take about 3 days for the documents to be returned to me from him. However if the matter is urgent there is also a premium service available from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office which is a same day service, which only I can undertake, and which is more costly, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office fee being £75 and which usually requires the services of a courier to take the documents to the London office of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Many countries are parties to the Hague Convention which means that they will accept the Foreign and Commonwealth Office certification, then known as an Apostille, without any further steps being required.
Some countries, for example, United Arab Emirates and the Philippines also require that, either instead of, or in addition to, my notarial certificate being legalised by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, their embassy confirms that my signature and seal and/or the Foreign and Commonwealth Office legalisation is authentic, which they do by applying the seal of their own Embassy in this country and signature of an Embassy official.
