Philippine Consulate in Des Moines, IA
The Philippine consulate for Des Moines is the Philippine Consulate General in Chicago. It is 335 miles away, about 6 h 16 min by road, and it is the only office that can process applications from Des Moines: an appointment booked anywhere else is a wasted appointment.
Where Des Moines is served from
The assignment is by state: the whole of Iowa belongs to the consulate in Chicago, whose district covers Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin. The detail, including how far each city in the state is from the consulate, is on the Iowa page.
The distance from Des Moines, 335 miles, 6 h 16 min, puts this in the category of trips you make once and want to make count. Most people who end up repeating it were missing a PSA document.
For distances like this, the consular outreach programme is the answer that actually gets used: consulates periodically set up temporary consular offices in cities without one, taking passports and dual citizenship oaths. Appointments are free, passport slots open at passport.gov.ph about a month before each mission, and they fill. The appointment guide explains how the schedule works.
Before you plan the trip from Des Moines
The most common wasted journey in this system is for a document the consulate cannot produce. There are three of them:
- Your PSA birth certificate or CENOMAR has to come from Manila. No consular office in this country can print one, and every other procedure asks for it.
- Documents signed by a US notary or issued by a US authority need a state apostille, not a consular stamp. The consulate has no role in that chain.
- NBI clearance is applied for by mail to the Philippines; only the fingerprint card needs a consular officer.
The counter is unavoidable for exactly three things: passport biometrics, the RA 9225 oath and signing a notarial document in front of an officer. Everything else deserves a second look before you drive.
philippineconsulates.us is an independent information guide to the Philippine consulates in the United States. We are not the Philippine Consulate General, the Philippine Embassy or any government agency. We do not book, sell or manage appointments: every consulate runs its own system. We check the details regularly, but they can change without notice, always confirm with the consulate before you travel.