Legal translation is a broad field, and to people outside of the industry, it can seem very confusing. What place does translation have in the field of law? Can the same translator work on writing refund policies for foreign markets as well as help prepare documents for legal action? Letโs have a look at some of the different types of legal translation.
What is legal translation?
Legal translation is when any legal documents, files, or recordings get translated from the source language to a target language. Some of the most common items to get translated are marriage, death, and birth certificates for immigration or employment needs.
What do legal translators do?
Legal translators are responsible for translating a wide range of legal instruments. The translation process is similar whether you are using in-house translators, a freelance language service provider, or a legal translation agency.
First, a translator will carefully make an accurate translation of the document. The translation should then be proofread by a legal expert for accuracy. Many court documents or certificates also need to be properly formatted according to the preferences of different legal systems.
While this may sound simple, legal linguistic specialists need a lot of legal expertise and excellent knowledge of the source language and target language in order to get specialized legal translations right.
What are The Different Types of Legal Translations?
Legal translation includes work for a wide range of fields. Some of the most common types of translation are:
Contract Translations
Contracts underpin almost everything that businesses do. In order to protect businesses and customers from any negative legal consequences, contract translation is very important. This can include contracts for any type of domestic or foreign business, tenancy agreements, property documents, employment contracts, trademark licenses, and more.
Intellectual Property Translations
Intellectual property translations are another huge aspect of legal translation work. Within technology and design, it is vital to make sure that your intellectual property rights are protected.
Legal translation can also help a lot with making sure you have all the relevant information to help you sell to more markets โ for example, you can get intellectual property documents translated to make sure your products meet international standards before signing them. Once you are in business, you can get a range of important legal texts translated, such as product safety information, refund policies, and text for marketing campaigns.
Terms and Conditions
Translating terms and conditions is key to US and international laws. These are complex legal documents that require legal expertise to keep the legal terminology consistent across source and target languages.
Our legal translation company provides terms and conditions translations to meet jurisdictional requirements. Whether itโs an arbitration clause, confidentiality clause, or compliance with legal regulations, we ensure your documents are enforceable and clear.
We specialize in legal translation so businesses can protect themselves and their customers through precise legal writing, compliance with local laws, and notarized translations of official documents upon request.
Patent Translation
Patent translation is crucial to protect your intellectual property across multiple languages. Translating patents requires legal and technical expertise to keep the legal content and technical terms accurate. Our legal translators have experience with all types of legal documents, including affidavits, amendments and depositions related to patent filings and disputes.
We provide patent translations that meet the laws, regulations and statutes of your target market for litigation, arbitration or filing with international patent offices. We cover technical descriptions and claims to accompanying legal documents such as powers of attorney and notarized affidavits.
With Espresso Translations you can be sure your patent translations are accurate and confidential.
What is legal document translation?
There is a lot of difficulting in getting the right translated document. Many types of documents are used for legal purposes and a lot of government bodies, employers, or healthcare providers will only accept original documents, or sworn translations of documents as proof of identity, residency, or education. This is why legal document translation is vital.
Some documents often translated are birth certificates, marriage certifications, and diplomas, However, any document needed for legal processes can be translated, including litigation documents, financial documents or other business documents, or education documents.
What are the differences between legal translation and other types of translation?
There are various things that differentiate the types of legal translation from a regular translation service.
Legal language
The need to understand specific legal meanings and terminologies makes legal translation services far harder than regular translation. A lot of legal terms are in Latin, even though the rest of a document may be in English. These specialist terms have to be accurately translated to ensure that all the legal information is intact.
Legal consequences
Legal translations are often done by people who are sworn translators, who say that their translation is accurate and correct. This means that the document can be used as an official translation by a company.
However, there are consequences to having even a small error in any document translated for legal use. If a company was to inform customers in foreign countries of a special offer by accident, from a bad translation, it could cause a range of different problems. The need to translate legal documents such as tax submission forms for international jurisdictions also requires a high degree of accuracy to avoid financial penalties.
How does translation help the legal system?
Translation of legal documents is vital when navigating the legal field. Getting the proper language services can help make sure that you keep good legal relationships with other companies, law firms, or individuals.
Having all your legal texts translated by a sworn translator and signed by a notary public means that you can guarantee the accuracy of the translated documents. This means that there is no room for confusion or miscommunication.
As well as offering linguistic accuracy, a good translation company will also help format information in a logical structure, which can help make sure that the documents work with the legal systems in any country.
From contracts to marriage licenses to intellectual property translations, professional translation and linguistic services make sure that the legal system can be accessed and navigated by everyone, regardless of what languages they speak.
What are the requirements for legal translations?
Since legal translation is so important, all the different types of legal translation are under strict control. A lot of legal translations are usually what are called sworn translations. This is sometimes called a certified translation, where a professional linguist with language qualifications swears that the translation is true and accurate to the original document.
Getting a certified translation is important because even a minor inadequacy of translation can cause serious legal implications in the legal field.
Anyone who offers legal translation services in the United States should also be a first-class linguist. Generally, the most accurate legal translations come from someone who is translating the text into their own native language. When looking for an official translation, most people will find that it requires native familiarity with a language. If the translator is not native to the language, there could be a range of small inaccuracies.
Beyond this, you will find that some people specialize in a certain type of legal document. While any expert in legal language services should be able to help, the very best translation will always come from an expert in the field.
Leggi anche: How to translate legal documents?
What kind of legal documents can be translated?
Various types of legal documents can be translated by a legal translator. There are a lot of documents that can help businesses understand the legal aspects of their international relations with other countries, help guide their business decisions, or help marketing departments make the right marketing decisions โ and this type of legal support can help an international brand avoid legal trouble while working in a different country.
It is not surprising that companies want to avoid having legal action taken against their sales teams, marketing teams, or product designers. This is why having the legal backup of a trained legal translator can be so helpful to a range of industries.
Final thoughts
While it is simple to give a list of the main types of legal translation, the truth is that translation services for the legal field are not one-size-fits-all. Just as people use legal services for a range of reasons, translation of legal documents needs to be flexible to work for what people need โ whether that is contracts to help steer key business decisions, intellectual property translation to help protect peopleโs inventions, or preparing of certificates for immigration, the types of legal linguistic services are endless.