Apostille

Apostille services in Newmarket and York Region

Since 11 January 2024 Canada has been part of the Hague Apostille Convention, and a single apostille now does the job that authentication plus consular legalisation used to. The apostille itself is issued by the government, not by me — what I do is get your documents apostille-ready and handle the submission.

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Tell me the destination country first. It decides everything that follows. Fast appointments available · We speak Russian & English

What’s covered

The documents people bring — and what each one actually needs

The apostille is the easy part. Files come back rejected earlier than that, on the document itself: a photocopy where an original was required, or a notarisation on something that should never have been notarised. Here is what the common ones need.

01 Birth certificate: Must be the certificate issued by a provincial vital statistics office — in Ontario, from ServiceOntario. Ontario vital statistics documents, including the polymer birth certificate, are authenticated directly and do not need notarising first. A notarised photocopy is not a substitute: the authority verifies the issuing office’s own signature and seal, so a copy removes the very thing it has to see. If the original is lost, order a new one rather than notarising a copy.
02 Marriage certificate: The same rule, and the same trap. It has to be the certificate from the provincial vital statistics office — not the certificate handed to you at the ceremony, and not a notarised copy. A marriage certificate issued by a religious institution cannot be authenticated at all.
03 Death certificate: Again the vital statistics office original. Documents from a funeral home or a religious institution are not accepted in its place, even notarised. Burial permits, cremation certificates and coroner’s certificates are a separate matter — those do need notarising, and the death certificate has to travel with them.
04 Diploma or degree: Ontario public post-secondary degrees and diplomas issued since 1 January 2019 are eligible for direct authentication with no notarisation. Anything older, and anything from a private or out-of-province institution, generally has to be notarised first. Elementary and high-school diplomas always need notarising.
05 Transcript: Treated like the diploma: an Ontario public post-secondary transcript issued since 1 January 2019 goes through directly. A transcript from a Canadian institution outside that group needs notarising — as does any school report card or transcript below post-secondary level. Bring the official copy from the registrar, not the one you printed from the student portal.
06 Passport: You do not apostille the passport itself. What gets apostilled is a certified true copy: I compare the passport against a photocopy and certify that the copy is true, and that certified copy is what goes forward. The same applies to a driver’s licence or a permanent-resident card. Bring the actual booklet or card — the original stays with you.
07 Police check: Which authority depends on who issued it. An RCMP criminal record check from headquarters in Ottawa is a federal document: it goes to Global Affairs Canada and, provided it is signed by the Director General of Canadian Criminal Real Time Identification Services and carries the RCMP dry seal, it does not need notarising. A check issued by a provincial or municipal police service — York Regional Police, for example — does have to be notarised first.
08 Power of attorney: A document you draw up yourself, so there is nothing for the authority to recognise on it until a public official has signed it. You sign in front of me, I witness and seal it, and my signature and seal are what get authenticated. Do not sign it before you arrive — a signature already on the page cannot be witnessed.
09 Corporate documents: Ontario business registry documents issued since 1991 by the Ontario Business Registry or the Business and Personal Property Branch are authenticated directly. Federal records from Corporations Canada bearing an original signature or seal go to Global Affairs Canada instead. Anything the company produced itself — resolutions, letters, commercial invoices, certificates of free sale — has to be notarised.

This list is nowhere near everything: court orders, divorce certificates, adoption papers, pension and proof-of-life letters, medical records, licences and certificates of no impediment to marriage all travel the same road. If yours isn’t here, describe it on the phone. Two things can never be apostilled in Ontario, however they are prepared: a document issued outside Canada, and a document issued by a religious institution.

How it works

From your kitchen table to the authority

The order matters more here than anywhere else on this site, because the wrong first move — notarising something that shouldn’t be — is invisible until the file comes back.

Step 01

Name the destination country

Everything follows from this. If the country is a party to the Hague Convention — Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus all are — an apostille is the right certificate and no embassy step is needed. If it isn’t, the document takes the older route instead. Ask the office abroad exactly what it wants before anything else happens.
Step 02

We work out what your document needs

Original, certified true copy, or notarised — and which of the three is a per-document rule, not a preference. If the document is not in English or French, we settle the translation route at the same time.
Step 03

Notarised, certified, prepared

Where notarisation is required you sign in front of me and I seal it. Where a certified true copy is what travels, I make it against your original. Where a translation is required, it is either done by a certified Canadian translator or attested by a notary who speaks both languages — I can do the second between Russian and English.
Step 04

Submitted, and followed up

The file goes to the right authority — Official Documents Services for anything Ontario-issued or notarised here, Global Affairs Canada for federal records — and I deal with the correspondence if something is queried. You get the document back with the apostille attached to it.

Before you come

What to bring

One check on this list is worth more than any other preparation you can do.

The destination country — and, if you have it in writing, exactly what the office abroad has asked for.
The original document on paper, with a real signature and seal. Not a scan, not a photograph, not a photocopy — electronic documents are not authenticated.
Government-issued photo ID.
For a birth, marriage or death certificate: the certificate from the vital statistics office itself. If you only have a notarised copy, we start again with a fresh original.
For a passport, driver’s licence or PR card: the actual booklet or card, so a certified true copy can be made from it.
For a power of attorney or anything you drafted yourself: the document, unsigned.
For a document in Russian or another language: the original, plus any translation you already have.
How many copies you need. Each document gets its own apostille, so two countries or two offices means two of everything.

Not sure whether something belongs in the folder? Bring it. The wasted trip is nearly always the one made to fetch a document that was sitting at home.

Scope

I prepare the apostille. I don’t issue it.

This belongs at the top of the page rather than buried in the small print. In Ontario an apostille is issued by Official Documents Services, the province’s Competent Authority under the Convention — and for federal records, by Global Affairs Canada. No notary, no paralegal and no private company issues one. Anyone advertising themselves as a “certified apostille agent” is describing a job that does not exist. What I do is the work either side of it.

What I do

Tell you which authority your document goes to and by which route, before you spend anything.
Notarise, witness and certify the documents that have to be notarised — and, just as importantly, tell you which ones must not be.
Make certified true copies where a copy is what travels, such as a passport or a PR card.
Sort out the translation: commission the translator’s affidavit, or attest the translation myself between Russian and English.
Assemble and submit the file to Official Documents Services or Global Affairs Canada, and handle the back-and-forth if anything is queried.

What I can’t do

Issue an apostille. Only the Competent Authority does that — in Ontario, Official Documents Services.
Move you up the queue. Processing belongs to the authority and nobody in private practice has a back channel into it.
Apostille a document issued outside Canada. That has to be done in the country that issued it.
Confirm that the office abroad will accept what it has asked for. Only that office can tell you its own requirements — ask them first, every time.

Ontario’s Competent Authority is Official Documents Services, part of the Ministry of Public and Business Service Delivery. Canada’s accession to the Hague Apostille Convention took effect on 11 January 2024.

Licensed and in good standing with the Law Society of Ontario, and a commissioned Notary Public for Ontario.

Questions

Common questions about apostilles

Can you issue the apostille yourself?

No, and no one in private practice can. In Ontario apostilles are issued by Official Documents Services; documents issued by the federal government are apostilled by Global Affairs Canada. My part is getting the document into a state the authority will accept and putting it in front of them — which is where almost all the difficulty actually is.

I’m sending documents to Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan or Belarus. Does an apostille work?

Yes. All four have been parties to the Hague Apostille Convention for years, and Canada joined on 11 January 2024 — so an apostille is the correct certificate for all of them and no consular legalisation is needed on top of it. Still confirm with the office that will receive the document, because their requirements about translation vary.

Should I notarise my birth certificate first?

No — and doing it costs you the trip. Ontario vital statistics documents, the polymer birth certificate included, are authenticated directly from the original. What the authority checks is the issuing office’s own signature and seal, so notarising a photocopy replaces the one thing it needs to see. If the original is lost, order a new certificate rather than notarising a copy.

My document was issued in Russia. Can it be apostilled here?

Not the document itself. An apostille can only be issued by the country the document came from, so a Russian certificate has to be apostilled in Russia. There is one thing that can be done here: if you sign a document of foreign origin in front of an Ontario notary, Ontario’s authority can authenticate that notarisation. Tell me what the document has to achieve and we will find the route that exists.

What if the destination country isn’t in the Convention?

Then it takes the route Canada used before 2024. The document is authenticated and issued a certificate of authentication instead of an apostille, and it is then legalised by that country’s embassy, high commission or consulate. More steps, but a known process — and it is the reason the destination country is the first question I ask.

My document is in Russian. What happens about the translation?

Ontario requires that a document in a language other than English or French be issued in Canada, notarised by an Ontario notary and accompanied by a translation. The translation is either produced by a certified Canadian translator, or attested by a notary public who speaks both languages and certifies that the translation is accurate. I speak and read Russian, so that second route is open here.

Also here

The other things I do

Next step

Start with where it’s going

Call, say what the document is and which country wants it, and you will know the route and what to bring before you leave the house.

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Not a law firm. Paralegal services are provided within the scope permitted by the Law Society of Ontario.