Apostille vs. Embassy legalisation for Vietnam
An apostille is a single certificate that one country's authority adds to a public paper so another country will take it at face value. Consular legalisation is the older, longer form of the same idea: two or three offices sign in turn, ending with the destination's own mission. For Vietnam the second form is what works today, and the first is what will work later.
Vietnam's Hague status and what it means
Vietnam signed up to the Convention in 2026, but signing and switching on are two separate events. The treaty starts to bite there on 11 September 2026, and only from that morning does a stamp from Milan travel on its own. Before it, the Vietnamese mission in Italy is still the last desk your file has to pass.
The Milan to Vietnam route step by step
Work backwards from the desk in Vietnam that will read the paper. First get the record itself in the right form — an extract from the comune, a transcript from the university, a certified copy of a company deed. Then the Prefettura in Milan legalises the signature on it, or the Procura della Repubblica does so for court and notarial papers. The consular office in Italy signs last.
Cost, timing and the 2026 switch
Budget for the €16 tax stamp on each document, minus the ones the law exempts, plus whatever the consular office charges for its own signature. Timing is driven by the last leg rather than the Italian one, so a file with a hard date in Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City deserves a head start. After 11 September 2026 that leg disappears and the corridor gets predictable.