Category Archives: WCS News

Following the government’s guidelines to reduce paper consumption, the Federal Drug Administration began, on December 3, 2021, issuing electronic CPP’s (Certificates of Pharmaceutical Product).

The European Union and Canada and several other countries have already implemented electronic pharmaceutical certificates, using secure electronic signatures, as requested by the World Health Organization.

A critical document in the export of pharmaceutical products to overseas markets, the new eCPP will continue to require apostille and legalization, depending on the countries to which they are being exported.

WCS, who had previously worked closely with the U.S. State Department to resume normal turnaround times for document processing, is now verifying the workflows, yet undefined, that will allow for timely processing of the FDA’s new e-documents.

On behalf of our pharmaceutical customers, we will print out the e-certificates and deliver them to the State Department for processing, as per the usual practice.

Whenever the State Department authorizes electronic processing, we are prepared to cut-over to a paper-free processing environment.

Stay tuned for further developments and contact us with any questions.

WCS recently engaged a cybersecurity firm to conduct a penetration test. 

The testing confirmed that our processing application, WCS Express™, exceeds software-industry requirements—including the stringent data-privacy standards of the European Union.

The recently completed “pen test” highlights a commitment to advanced customer solutions and technology investments that have been hallmarks of our enterprise. A major advancement in this area was completed in 2018, when we developed and rolled out WCS Express™, enabling state-of-the-art online ordering. With WCS Express™, customers can place and track document orders, include special instructions, and submit questions. 

WCS Express™ does even more: Customers can track payments and pay invoices directly from the application. Do you want to know if your document is currently at the U.S. Department of State or an Embassy? Do you need to confirm your document was shipped? You can check and confirm it in your WCS Express™ account. You can also check on estimated date-of-completion, as well as run activity reports detailing your previous documents with line-item cost analysis.

Soon after launching WCS Express™, we created and trademarked another tech platform, WCS SecureShare™. This platform secures the highly confidential documents we handle, as well as the growing number of documents with exclusive electronic handling. With WCS SecureShare™, documents are scanned and sent between WCS and our customers in an encrypted format, guaranteeing confidentiality. This platform, combined with the recent pen test, confirms and enhances this commitment to ironclad cybersecurity. 

For 38 years, WCS has successfully processed over 500,000 US-origin documents. Now, with our cyber certification, WCS is expanding our services to clients with documents originating outside the United States—including international documents from the EU, UK, Latin America, Asia-Pacific, and the Middle East. 

Put another way: our services are now global, your sensitive information is safe-and-secure, and our network of service providers gets the job done economically and efficiently.

Let us navigate your vital documents through regulatory channels and provide an ultimate level of professional support for document apostilles and legalizations.

Set up an account today, directly from our website www.wcss.com , and let’s get started!

Dear Valued Client:

We want to update you on communications we’ve had with the U.S. Department of State, Office of Authentications, as organized by the Senator Van Hollen’s office.

In a recent conference call, the Managing Director of Consular Services pledged to enlist additional staff to assist with working the current backlog.

This should put DOS on a schedule to have the backlog caught up by June, with a steadily improving turnaround time for your submitted documents.

With an accelerated schedule of vaccines and gradual return-to-normal work routines, by late Summer DOS expects we can bring you much-improved turnaround times.

Please know, meanwhile, that we continue working diligently with government officials to reduce and ultimately eliminate the delays.

Thank you, as always. We are grateful and working diligently for your business.

The Team at Washington Consular Services