[Mandy4President]

Okay guys, totally new at this. We've had our marriage certificate hung up because we were married in the bahamas so we had to order a new certificate (5 weeks of waiting) and now we had to send it to the Guatemalan Embassy in England for authentication and then we have to send it back to the Consulate in England for legalization. Has anyone else run into this problem and can you tell me how long they take over there! We get fingerprinted on Friday and other than that we have everything else finished and would be ready to accept a referral... I feel like my head might explode everytime I SPRINT out to the mailbox (I think my mailman things there's something wrong with me) HELP!!

[Maggie Beth]

I don't have any suggestions -- I just wanted to say good luck to you. I seem to remember someone else having this same issue last year. Hopefully if we keep bumping up your post, that person will see this thread and give you some info. Good luck!!!

[Mandy4President]

Thanks for your encouragement! I even asked if we could get remarried in our state at the courthouse or something and they told us no. Everything has to be made so difficult! Thanks again!

[shelbydog]

Hi Mandy - I so feel your pain! We got married in Turks and Caicos. First we didn't get the license "apostilled" by the highest Island authority and had to send it twice to T & C. Then we had to have ours authenticated in Dom. Republic. That is the office of the Guat. consulate that oversaw Turks and Caicos.

Did you use Fedex or a trackable type of mail? That kept me kind of sane because I could track when it arrived, who signed and when it left the island or office. It would make sense that England would oversee Bahamas. I wish I had advice for you but I don't. Our marriage lic. was the most frustrating item in our paper chase. We too wanted to go to a court to get a local license but were told no also.

Good luck - you could always call to follow up on it.

[honeycustard]

hi. well my husband was born in france and had to get some papers done there, and then had to go to the french embassy in NYC to have them translated and certified and so on.

we got married in Sandals in Antigua. so i thought just to go to the consulates office in NYC would be easy, but had to get some more originals from Antigua.
Pain in the but. who know, all about this.

[Mandy4President]

Thanks everyone. I actually called our agency today and they received our marriage certificate back (who knows why) from the Guatemalan Embassy in England and it was NOT authenticated. It came with a letter saying that we needed to get it authenticated in the country of origin. Isn't that what we were doing? Even our agency is stumped.

[LostMangoInParis]

Well don't rely on the Embassy as always being right. I caught the US Embassy in London out a couple of times when I used their £1 a minute help line.

I have a friend who needed a UK birth certificate authenticated for her Guatemalan adoption and that was done first by the UK Embassy here in the US (in Washington) and was then sent on to the Guatemalan Embassy also in Washington to authenticate.

I think you may have the steps back to front if I've read your email properly. It goes first to the embassy of the country of origin then to the Guatemalan Embassy. Sounds like you did it back to front. The Guatemalan Embassy can't authenticate it unless it is properly validated (authenticated) BEFORE it gets to them

Does this make sense

Kathy

[chica_latina]

I really hope that this works out for you!

My husband and I live in the U.S. and were married in Jamaica. We ended up having to hire assistant stork to help. This is what we had to do:

* Place a request online for marriage certificates to the Jamaican office in Jamaica - wait for confirmation

* Print confirmation out and send international money order to Jamaica for our marriage certificates

* Wait for them to receive and process it. Then wait to receive it by mail.

* Once received, we sent it to Assistant Stork who took it to the Jamaican embassy in Washington D.C. Then, she took it to the Guatemalan Consulate in D.C. for authentication.

* It was then sent to us and forwarded to our agency.


Unfortunately, it did not go that smooth. Jamaica lost our first online request and money order. We then had to start over.

We finally received our marriage certificates, but they sent 7 instead of the 3 that we ordered. Then there was some mix ups between the Jamaican embasssy and Guat Consulate in D.C... That eventually worked itself out and we received our marriage certificates.

A month after we sent our finalized and authenticated marriage certificate to the agency, Jamaica found our first request and money order and processed them too (even after we told them MANY times NOT to cash the check and send it back to us).

Well, this entire process took 3 months and we ended up paying over $200, and we now have 14 marriage certificates! ... lol...