4 posts were merged into an existing topic: Sending Money to Portugal for the Golden Visa
This page gives rolling updates on apostille processing delays:
I roughly estimate from this data that the State Department processing delay is shrinking at 1 week per 2 weeks.
3/30: 90-100 days
5/3: 56 days
6/23: 28-42 days
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I have spoken to couple of lawyers and this is a lot of confusion around the requirements of Legalization, Certification and Apostilling requirements of GV supporting documents.
What is clear to me is we have to get the background checks, marriage certificate and dependent birth certificates apostilled. In my case these are all in English.
Do these require translation to Portuguese ? Where can we get these translations done ? Can the lawyer themselves do the translation ? Do these require Apostilling after the translation ?
One lawyer recommends translations from sworn translators in country of residence and translations certified by Portuguese Embassy.
Have any of you had to legalize documents from Portugal Embassy of USA ? If so which documents required legalization ?
Say for the documents needed to open the bank account or the SEF GV application.
summary: It Depends On Which Lawyer You Ask. Do What Your Lawyer/Banker Says. (And potentially this is a cost differentiator between lawyers.)
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For the criminal background check, SEF accepted a certified translation by languex, in PDF form, which was fast, easy, and inexpensive. The apostille was overnighted directly to Portugal by the expediter, Monument Visa Services, for a very reasonable price. My lawyer contracted translation of that document out to her preferred service provider in Portugal; the cost was around 25 Euros and the turnaround was quick.
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Iād say the opposite - never do what your lawyer or banker says without verifying it yourself or at least without challenging their opinion.
I had a situation some years ago where if I did what my lawyers told me to do, I would have been deportedā¦
Strictly speaking they were my employerās lawyers not chosen by me, but you get the ideaā¦
There is an official SEF requirement for translations here:
https://imigrante.sef.pt/en/solicitar/residir/art98-1/
Look up Notes section, bottom paragraph.
Still leaves room for a few practical questions but at least itās officialā¦
Comments in line in Bold.
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It looks like the US State Department processing times might be speeding up (or I just got lucky). I did my own documentation and sent in the FBI background check to the US State Department to apostille via USPS Expres. They received it on Saturday, July 3, and sent it back on Thursday, July 15. 7 business days.
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That sounds faster than pre-COVID!
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My criminal record was authenticated by the issuing country and legalised by PT consulate in the issuing country. I sent this legalised crimial record together with other english documents to my lawyer and she did and certified the translation.
I followed, as Jeff mentioned, what banker and lawyer told me to do.
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If I understand correct as of July 15, 2021 the fee for apostille increased from $8 to $20.
Please be aware if you are sending in or you may be rejected and hit with delay.
This is adding more insult to the very long delays and lack of expedited processing.
Perhaps they added a $12 storage fee ($4/month). At least they havenāt raised it to $2,350, as they did for the renunciation fee.
Monument Visa hasnāt changed their pricesāFBI apostille service is still $55. I trust that theyāve got the situation under control for my latest apostille in progress. Their $60 fee for FedEx to Portugal is an amazing bargain.
Iām glad my passport isnāt going to expire any time soon:
My compliments to all the State Department folks for scoring 18 months of paid vacation.
Thatās strange. I am getting mine back within 4 weeks. I heard about the backlog too, so I decided to renew my passport now since my passport will expire in June 2022 and we donāt know when we will get the biometrics appointment. They received my application on June 29 and I got a notification that it is being mailed back to me. My new passport will be delivered on July 28. I did request the expedited service.
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FBI background check apostille update:
I ordered my apostille electronically through Monument Visa on July 8th. I just received a notification that my apostille is ready for shipment today, on the 28thājust under three weeks later.
From several anecdotal data points, I had estimated that the State Department is shrinking the backlog by one day per business day. The processing time of my apostille aligns perfectly with that estimate.
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My FBI apostille just got done today after four weeks to the day. I used Monument Visa, and had them ship it directly to my lawyer in Portugal.
FBI background check apostille update:
I ordered my apostille electronically through Monument Visa . I just received a notification that my apostille was shipped. Monument estimated 3 weeks and it was exactly three weeks.
Thanks for the heads-up on that! I ordered mine through SESpanish on Oct. 5, and got it back in my hands on Oct. 20 (they were surprised it was so fast), and then my spouseās on Oct. 7 through Monument, so maybe weāll have it by the end of this week.
WDC Apostille came through againā¦this time even faster! We used them last year and had a quick turnaround time, and we are now refreshing our FBI reports/apostilles. We got fingerprinted at the post office on Friday 10/15 and received our FBI report on the way home from the post office. We emailed the FBI reports to WDC Apostille (apostille-legalization.com) on Monday 10/18, and received the apostilled documents back on Friday 10/22!
Another update - Last week our attorney got Jake (the primary applicant) an SEF appointment for 11/17 in Coimbraā¦still waiting/looking for an appointment for Ann for family reunification. Progress!!
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What are the costs of WDC Apostille services? Do they certify/apostille, translate, and courier/post/mail to our attorneys in Portugal? You can email them the documents that need apostille? What is required besides FBI background check- birth certificates? Marriage certificate? (Itās just my wife and I). Passports too?
Sorry for all the questions but weāre in the 11 the hour and time is of the essence.
Thanks for any input
Curtis