Reviewed by Carlos Vargas, Texas Licensed Funeral Director (TFSC #119648) ·
Texas is on neither list we could read
Romania publishes consular districts, which is more than several countries in these guides manage, and we read two of them in full. The Consulate General in Los Angeles covers eleven states: California, Washington, Montana, Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico. The Consulate General in Chicago covers twelve: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin. Texas is on neither.
That rules two posts out; it does not tell you which one is in. We did not get the remaining posts to open, so we are not going to name one. What we can give you is Romania’s own way of settling it. The Embassy of Romania in Washington has its consular section at 1680 Wisconsin Avenue NW, Washington DC 20007, on +1 (202) 332-2392, +1 (202) 332-2935 and +1 (202) 332-4858, open Monday to Friday from nine until three. Its consular email address carries an instruction worth following exactly: state your US state of residence in the message, so they can answer for your region. A Dallas family writing to that address should put Texas in the first line.
Ashes need no Romanian document at all
This is the fact that changes the most, and Romania states it plainly. On the consular page for shipping human remains: for shipping or transporting ash urns to Romania, there are no requirements of any documents issued by embassies or consular offices.
Read that against every other European guide on this site. France specifies the urn down to its shape and its seals. Poland demands the same certificate and the same county permission as a coffin. Germany asks where the ashes will finally rest. Romania asks for nothing — no consular certificate, no consular appointment, no consular fee, because there is no consular act.
A casket is a different matter entirely. For a body Romania requires a mortuary passport, issued by the consulate, and everything below is about that document. If your family is weighing cremation in Dallas against flying a casket, this is the sharpest version of that choice anywhere in these guides: one route has a consular process and the other route has none.
The mortuary passport costs nothing
The Chicago post publishes the fee and it is the shortest sentence in this guide: the consular fee for the issuance of the mortuary passport is currently 0 USD.
It is worth saying what that does and does not mean. It means Romania does not charge for the document. It does not mean the repatriation is free — the airline, the funeral directors, the embalming, the crate and the Texas apostilles all cost money, and only the consular act itself is free.
Who can ask for it also matters to a funeral director. The Los Angeles post states that the consulate issues the mortuary passport on the request of the deceased’s family members or their authorised agents, which is the wording that lets a Dallas funeral home act for the family under a power of attorney rather than requiring a relative to appear.
| Route | What Romania requires |
|---|---|
| Ashes in an urn | No document issued by any embassy or consular office |
| A body in a casket | A mortuary passport issued by the consulate |
| Fee for that passport | 0 USD, as published by the Chicago post |
| Who may apply | Family members or their authorised agents |
| Before any of it | A confirmed burial place in a Romanian cemetery |
The part that starts in Romania, not in Texas
Romania asks for something that cannot be arranged from Dallas at all, and a family that does not know this loses days to it. Before the consulate will issue the mortuary passport, it wants proof that the deceased has a burial place in a cemetery in Romania.
Both posts we read require it independently and word it slightly differently. Los Angeles asks for a certificate that the deceased person has a burial place in a cemetery in Romania. Chicago asks for a letter from the cemetery in Romania confirming the burial place, and says it may be sent by email or fax. Chicago adds a further layer where the deceased was no longer a Romanian citizen at death: an authenticated statement from the holder of the cemetery concession, with a copy of the concession document.
So the first telephone call in a Romanian repatriation is often not to a consulate in America. It is to a cemetery in Romania, and somebody there has to put something in writing. Start it on day one.
Two apostilles, at fifteen dollars each
Romania is inside the Apostille Convention. The HCCH status table records accession on 7 June 2000 and entry into force on 16 March 2001. So a Texas death certificate is authenticated by apostille and there is no consular legalisation step after it.
The Texas side is unusually well documented this week. The Secretary of State issues a universal apostille which it says acts as both an authentication and an apostille and is accepted in every country. Its page for requesting one prices it at fifteen dollars per document, and states expressly that this is per document and not per page. Payment is by check, money order, card or exact cash, and an in-person appointment is capped at ten documents.
Now count the documents, because the consular checklist is specific about quantity. Chicago asks for two certified copies of the death certificate, each one apostilled. Two apostilles at fifteen dollars is thirty dollars before anything else on the list. That arithmetic is ours, from two published figures; the consulate has not published a total, and your document count may be higher if a power of attorney also has to be apostilled.
Questions families ask about a return to Romania
- Is it easier to send ashes or a casket to Romania?
- Ashes, by a wide margin. Romania states that shipping an urn needs no document issued by any embassy or consular office. A casket needs a mortuary passport from the consulate.
- What does the Romanian consulate charge?
- Nothing for the mortuary passport. The Chicago post publishes the fee as 0 USD. The costs in a Romanian repatriation sit with the airline, the funeral directors and the Texas apostilles.
- Which Romanian office covers Dallas?
- We could not establish it. We read the Los Angeles and Chicago districts in full and Texas is in neither. Write to the embassy consular section in Washington and name Texas in your message, which is what that office asks you to do.
Sources checked and case confirmation
Sources checked September 22, 2026 on the Romanian consular pages for Los Angeles and Chicago covering consular jurisdiction and the shipping of human remains, the Romanian embassy contact page for Washington, the HCCH status table for the Apostille Convention, and the Texas Secretary of State pages for authentication and for requesting a universal apostille. What this page deliberately does not claim: which Romanian post holds Texas in its district, because no post we could open publishes Texas and we will not infer it from geography; how a death abroad is transcribed into Romanian civil records, because neither shipping page addresses it; and any Romanian customs, public health or port of entry rule, because none was found and the Chicago post refers crate construction to the airline rather than to a Romanian standard. No airline, route or crate specification is stated here. Contact Vargas-London with the county in Romania and where your relative is now, without sending medical or identity documents through the inquiry form.
