EU to abolish authenticity stamps for public docs – ISA’s IMI solution helping to further cut red tape

Last week, the European Parliament adopted a regulation that represents a big step forward in cutting red tape for citizens in the EU. The new rules, binding on all EU countries, will abolish the current requirement to have an authenticity stamp (known as an apostille) on public documents (such as birth or marriage certificates) issued in one EU country before presenting them to a public authority in another EU country.

The regulation also simplifies formalities with regard to certified copies and introduces multilingual standard forms in all Union languages to be attached to public documents to avoid translation requirements. The areas covered by the new rules are marriage, registered partnership, divorce, birth, death, parenthood, adoption, domicile/residence, nationality, the absence of a criminal record and the right to vote in municipal elections and elections to the European Parliament.

If the receiving authority has serious doubts about the authenticity of a public document presented by a citizen, it will be able to consult the issuing authority through the Internal Market Information system (IMI) for back-office verification between authorities. IMI, a solution developed under the EU funded ISA programme, is an IT-based information network that links national, regional and local authorities across borders. It enables them to communicate quickly and easily with their counterparts abroad. Through IMI, public authorities can verify the authenticity of documents directly with the issuing country, through the use of a set of pre-translated questions.

Who will be affected?

The impact of the new rules will be considerable. Today, more than 13 million Europeans live in another EU country. They frequently have to interact with public administrations, both in their home country and in their country of residence. Citizens who are still based in their home country also increasingly have to deal with public administrations abroad. The new rules will save these citizens several cumbersome and costly administrative steps.

The new regulation is expected to save several hundred million euro in authenticity stamps, certified copies and translations, not to mention the amount of time saved for all parties involved. It will therefore contribute greatly to the completion of the European Union’s Single Market.

Once the regulation enters into force in the coming weeks, the EU countries will have 2.5 years to put all necessary measures in place to ensure a smooth application of the regulation at the end of this period. It should be noted that the new rules only cover the authenticity of public documents from other EU countries, but not the recognition of their content and effects.

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