International service of process made easy.

Inter-American Convention

The United States is a signatory to the Additional Protocol to the Inter-American Convention on Letters Rogatory (“Inter-American Convention”) for the purposes of legal service of documents only. ABC Legal receives and processes both incoming and outgoing requests for service pursuant to this Convention. For incoming requests, ABC Legal receives the request from the foreign Central Authority, serves the documents on the individual, and returns the Certificate of Service to the foreign Central Authority. Outgoing requests for service should be sent to ABC Legal by the party in the United States requesting service. ABC Legal will then transmit the request to the foreign Central Authority for service. Once the individual is served, the foreign Central Authority will transmit the Certificate of Service back to ABC Legal.

Requests for service pursuant to the Inter-American Convention must adhere to all translation requirements, include the Mandatory Form, and be sent in triplicate. The Mandatory Form is available here. There is no fee for requests sent pursuant to the Inter-American Convention.

Additional guidance is available through the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of International Judicial Assistance website here, specifically in the OIJA Guidance on Service Abroad in U.S. Litigation.