Frequently asked questions

It describes the translation, not the translator. A certified translation is a complete translation with a signed certificate attached saying who did it, that they are competent in both languages, and that it is complete and accurate. There is no American licence or register behind the word, which is why this site has a whole page about it.

That is their decision and nobody can sell you a guarantee of it — a company that offers one is offering you a refund policy under another name. What we will do is tell you before you buy which form of certification the office you named usually asks for, and put right, at no charge, anything refused because of our work.

A single page in one of the commonest languages is the page rate on the rate card, and small jobs meet the minimum charge. The estimator on this site will give you the figure in about a minute, and it shows the arithmetic rather than just the answer.

Two hundred and fifty words, which is the convention in this trade and is not the same as a sheet of paper. A one-sheet birth certificate is usually one page. A dense sheet of a court judgment can be three. Count the words rather than the sheets and your estimate will be close.

Usually not. Most immigration filings take a certificate of accuracy with nothing further. A notarial signature is needed where a consulate asks for one and always where an apostille is going to follow, and what it attests is who signed — not that the translation is right.

We prepare it, lodge it and bring it back. The apostille itself is issued by a Secretary of State and by nobody else, and it authenticates a signature and a seal rather than saying anything about content. Where the destination country is outside the Hague Convention the equivalent is consular legalisation, which takes longer.

Two working days for most single records, and the estimator gives a date for whatever you describe. Next working day costs half as much again, and same day is possible on short documents that reach us before eleven in the morning — we say no to that more often than yes, and the morning is when a no is still useful to you.

For some work, openly, at about half the rate, and it is on the rate card as machine translation with human review. What it cannot do is sign a certificate, because a certificate is a person taking responsibility and a model is not a person anybody can hold to anything. There is a page here about exactly where the line is.

No, and anybody at a translation counter who tells you confidently is doing something they should not. What we can do is describe what other people in your position have usually been asked for and what the difference between two versions of a document is, so you can put a better question to your attorney or to the office that wrote to you.

No. That is a credential evaluation and it is bought from an evaluation service, not from a translator. Ask the university or the board that wants it which evaluators they accept before you pay anyone, because the answer changes what you should buy. Most of them want the translation first, and that part is us.

No. Courts appoint their own interpreters and being competent is not the same as being appointed. Ask the court — it is their job and it costs you nothing. We cover everything around a case that is not the proceeding itself.

Send it anyway and we will tell you what can be read before you commit to anything. What cannot be read is marked as unreadable in the place where it sits, never guessed, and where the unreadable part matters we will tell you to go back for a fresh copy rather than sell you a translation with a hole in it.

We keep the translation and the source file so a further copy later costs a copy rather than a job, and so the terminology matches if you come back with the next document in the same matter. You can ask us to delete everything and we will, and say when it is done.

Twenty-four with a standing panel — the official languages of the European Union other than English, and Haitian Creole. Several indigenous languages of the Americas come through here in real matters and are arranged case by case through community organisations, which takes about a week; the languages page says so plainly rather than implying somebody is waiting.