document translation

[86ti]

Hi,

we will be moving soon to the UK from Japan and I was wondering how documents need to be translated to be officially acceptable, e.g. marriage, birth, residence certificates. In my country only specially approved tranlators are allowed to do this. How is the situation in the UK?

[VictoriaS]

It is the same really.

Victoria

[belalybee]

Hi there,

As a legal translator (approved by the Maltese ministry of Foreign affairs) I can tell you that this is the way it works:

1) You can easily do everything in the UK - as our friend Victoria said in her reply.

2) Which I think would be easier on you:

You can go to any Legal Japanese translator in your country to translate all the documents you wish to translate into English - after this you will have to authenticate these translations at the Japanese ministry of foreign affairs and then stamp them again by the UK high commission in your country.

After that .. all the translated documents you have will be treated exactly as the original documents in the UK.

[86ti]

You can go to any Legal Japanese translator in your country to translate all the documents you wish to translate into English - after this you will have to authenticate these translations at the Japanese ministry of foreign affairs and then stamp them again by the UK high commission in your country.

Sorry, but I doubt that the Japanese ministry of foreign affairs actually does authenticate translations. What they do, however, is proof the authenticity of official Japanese documents, i.e. they attach an Apostille (the order is 1. Apostille, 2. translation as far as I know). Today I have been there to do exactly that but they said that they usually don't provice Apostilles for the UK. I still have to check that with the British Embassy in Tokyo. Does anybody know whether Apostilles are necessary for the UK?

[belalybee]

You can go to any Legal Japanese translator in your country to translate all the documents you wish to translate into English - after this you will have to authenticate these translations at the Japanese ministry of foreign affairs and then stamp them again by the UK high commission in your country.

Sorry, but I doubt that the Japanese ministry of foreign affairs actually does authenticate translations. What they do, however, is proof the authenticity of official Japanese documents, i.e. they attach an Apostille (the order is 1. Apostille, 2. translation as far as I know). Today I have been there to do exactly that but they said that they usually don't provice Apostilles for the UK. I still have to check that with the British Embassy in Tokyo. Does anybody know whether Apostilles are necessary for the UK?

If legal translators exist in Japan they must be approved by the Japanese ministry of foreign affairs my friend, which means the ministry has to authenticate any document translated by a japanese legal translator. Maybe there is a special case with certain countries, UK might be one of them, so in this case contacting the UK's high commission in your country is what you should do, ... GOOD LUCK.

[86ti]

Ok, this is what the British Embassy here in Tokyo recommends:

1) Document translation: have it translated or do it yourself (and sign it)
2) go to notary public, who will affix a notarial certificate and the apostille (unlike the Foreign Ministry does, the apostille is attached on a separate page)

Notarization of one document costs 11.500 Yen.