Fees and steps checked on
Romania certificate attestation prepares a Romanian diploma, birth or marriage certificate, power of attorney or company paper for use in the UAE. Romania uses "supralegalizare", its full legalisation for countries outside the Hague Convention, at the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The UAE Embassy in Bucharest then attests the document digitally, together with MOFA attestation, so no separate step is needed in Dubai.
Price: Send a copy on WhatsApp and you get the total price plus VAT, all official fees included, before any work starts. See attestation fees.
Supralegalizare, not apostila
Romania also issues the apostila, but that only works for Hague Convention states. The UAE is one of the states where the apostila is not used and supralegalizare is required instead. Saying "Emiratele Arabe Unite" at the first office is what puts the file on the right path.
Supralegalizare can be applied to originals, legalised copies and legalised translations. Study documents need one more early step: a visa from the competent education authority before the ministry will act.
The Romanian chain
VFS Global, MOFA's attestation service provider, lists the Romanian chain as:
- Notarisation and translation by a Romanian notary and an authorised translator.
- Chamber of Notaries (Camera Notarilor), which confirms the notary's signature on notarial acts.
- Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, supralegalizare.
- UAE Embassy in Bucharest.
- UAE MOFA, included in the embassy's digital attestation.
How Bucharest works
The UAE Embassy in Bucharest is on MOFA's digital attestation service, with an in-person hand-over:
- We apply on the MOFA website with UAE PASS, choose Romania as the country of issue and pay.
- The original is submitted at the embassy, Monday to Friday, 9:00 to 15:00.
- The digitally attested document, certified by the embassy and UAE MOFA, arrives by email.
- The original is collected from the embassy in the same hours.
Romanian documents and their path
| Document | Before the MFA | At the UAE embassy |
|---|---|---|
| Diploma and transcript (diplomă, foaie matricolă) | University, education authority visa | Original or true copy |
| Birth certificate (certificat de naștere) | Civil status office, translation | Original only |
| Marriage certificate (certificat de căsătorie) | Civil status office, translation | Original only |
| Power of attorney (procură) | Romanian notary, Chamber of Notaries | Commercial content counts as commercial |
| Articles of association | Notary or trade registry | Attested separately from the memorandum |
Translation and names
Romanian documents need a certified translation into English or Arabic for MOFA. A Romanian translation legalised by a notary can go through supralegalizare together with the original, which avoids translating again in the UAE. Watch the letters ă, â, î, ș and ț, which UAE systems often drop, and keep the passport as the reference spelling. For Arabic, we use a licensed legal translator in Dubai.
Refused at the Bucharest embassy
- Documents issued outside Romania, including Moldovan documents
- Laminated documents
- Several documents certified as one bundle
- Commercial invoices and certificates of origin, which go through MOFA's eDAS system
If you also studied, married or had a child in Bulgaria, the steps for those papers are on Bulgaria certificate attestation.
If you are in the UAE
Nobody has to fly from Dubai. MOFA lets anyone apply on your behalf, and someone in Romania can take the original to the ministry and the embassy. For a Romanian power of attorney used in the UAE, see power of attorney attestation; for a spouse visa, see marriage certificate attestation.
