Category: document translation

How to Get a Fast and Accurate Driver License Translation in Australia

There are several reasons why you may want your driver’s license translated into English while in Australia. The first is if you are visiting Australia you may need it to rent a car and the second is for identification purposes when booking into a hotel or other type of accommodation in Australia. You also may wish to open a temporary bank account in Australia and having an accurate translation of your driving license could serve as one of the means of identification required.
The most important move you should make when seeking a translation is to choose a NAATI-certified translator as translations from these experts are not only approved for government purposes but are recognized throughout Australia as accurate. One great benefit of getting your overseas license translated by a NAATI translator is if you are involved in a car accident, whether it is your fault or the other driver’s, it gives you the peace of mind that the police officer attending the accident will be able to accurately identify who you are at that you have a valid driver’s license.
Most Australian states require you to get a translation of your driver’s license into English from a NAATI-certified translator. Most NAATI translation services can offer translators in almost any language you want. So if you are visiting from Spain or Latin America you just need to go online and search for a NAATI translator who specializes in Spanish to English translations. You can scan your driver’s license and forward it to your chosen NAATI translator who will perform the translation and certify it to say it is accurate.

Going abroad with a NAATI translation of your driver’s license

To save you the time of getting a translation of your driver’s license before you go overseas it is a good idea to get it translated by a NAATI translator here in Australia before you leave. Many countries will accept the translation as NAATI translations have a good reputation for accuracy. You can use your translated driver’s license not just to hire a car abroad but also as identification when you are traveling around a country.

Coming to Australia on a working holiday visa

In order to enter Australia on a working holiday visa, you will need to have three important documents. One is a bank statement showing the availability of at least $5,000, the second is a credit limit of around $5,000 on a credit card and the third is a flight booked to leave the country once your holiday visa has expired. On top of this, you will need to provide identification for a host of other things like applying for a state driver’s license after 3 months of staying in Australia and an Australian bank account for your employer to use to deposit your wages. Having an English translation of your driver’s license provides one form of identification that you will need to access the above things.

How to get a fast driving license translation in Australia?

If you want a fast driving license translation in Australia you need to go online and find a translation company that offers a 24-hour turnaround service. You will need to follow the steps on your chosen translator’s website. The first thing you will need to provide is a photo or scan of your driver’s. You will then be asked to pay for the service online using either a credit card or PayPal. Once the translation has been completed you will be sent a digital copy of the translation of your driver’s license which will include a NAATI certification from the translator. If you want a hard copy of the translation mailed to you it will be necessary to pay the postage and provide a mailing address.

 

The Processing of Immigration Documents in Australia

Navigating Immigration Documentation: The Language Challenge

If you are preparing to immigrate to Australia and your first language is not English you may find it difficult to fully understand the intricacies of all the documentation you are required to submit before your application can be considered. You have to ensure you follow the correct process and provide all the right documents otherwise there might be a delay in the processing of your application.

NAATI-Approved Translation Services

Fortunately, there are many professional translation services that have NAATI translators who provide translation of documents for immigration purposes. In order for any foreign language documents to be accepted as part of your immigration application you have to use the services of a NAATI translator to undertake the translation otherwise they will not be accepted. NAATI stands for the National Accreditation Authority for Translators and Interpreters. A course is undertaken by translators and interpreters and an examination is taken which has to be passed in order to be awarded the status of a NAATI translator.

Document Translation Assistance

If you are finding the forms difficult to understand, a document translator can provide a translation which will help to ensure the information is filled in correctly. This translator can also provide translations of any other documents that you will need in support of your immigration application that are not in English. This includes:

  • Certificate of police clearance
  • Medical examination document
  • Birth certificate
  • Marriage certificate
  • Academic qualifications
  • Work record

Comprehensive Documentation

You are required to present a police certificate for your own country of origin and for any other place you have lived for more than six months after the age of 16. You will need to attend an interview and bring your original police clearance certificate with you even if you have already sent a scanned, certified translation.

Medical Evaluation

Every potential immigrant has to undergo a medical examination before being eligible to migrate which includes an evaluation of your medical history. You will need to attend a medical exam which will be conducted by a physician that is approved by the Australian Government. You probably won’t need a professional document translation as the physician will provide the certificate in English.

Locating a NAATI Translator

However, all your official identification documents including birth, marriage, academic qualifications, and work record will need to be provided with a translation. You won’t have any problem finding a good NAATI translator as you only need to go online and search until you find someone who is available to do your translation job.

Translation Options for Translating a Document

Today, people around the world share all types of information and in a variety of different media. However, it is not always in a language that is fully understood. You may access information on a website which really needs a NAATI certified professional translators before a full understanding of the content is possible. For example, you may see an interesting image which is reviewed in a language you don’t fully understand. Or you may have bought a product while overseas and its manual is written in a language you are not familiar with. Whatever the document is about and whatever language it is in, there are various tools available which can enable you to carry out a useful document translation so that you understand at least the gist of it.

Apart from hiring a NAATI professional translation service to unravel the meaning there are some free web tools available for you to use. So far, Google Translate has been proven to be the most useful tool. The reason for this is that without too much of a problem a complete web page can be translated without the need to copy and paste it into another context. It also supports a surprising number of languages and the tool is constantly improving the quality of its translations

WorldLingo is a great translator that can be found online and is nearly as good as Google translate but does not offer as many languages. It is grammar is not nearly as good as a professional translation but it does offer a reasonable idea of what a text is all about. SDL FreeTranslation offers a bit more than other translation tools as if you are prepared to pay it can organise a professional document translation. With just a single click, an estimate can often be provided of the cost of a human professional document translation.

You may not have discovered this translation tool as it hidden behind the review tab in Microsoft Office. You can select a language and get the gist of a document to keep you going until you are able to find a professional NAATI translator.

Most of the online tools for undertaking translations are perfect to get an idea about the meaning of words and phrases but they don’t have the capacity to perform in depth translations especially when it comes to getting the translation just right.

2 Tips for Handling Global Foreign Language Documents

Today, globalisation is embedded in both the individual and business worlds. That means that documents that are written in foreign languages are commonplace on our desktops, both virtual and the real time office desk too. It gets to a point when if we are unable to translate this overwhelming amount of data something has to be done. If you run a business you might be missing out on valuable customers. If you are an individual you could miss the best price for a sought after garment.

One of the main things you can do to ease the impact of this overflow of words you don’t understand is to think in a multilingual context. Don’t shrug off this aspect of globalisation because it’s not going to go away in the near future at least.

Tip #1 Multilingual thinking is the way to go

Once your document stockpile in a foreign language whether paper or virtual has got far too much you should seek out an experienced NAATI translator who understands the language of the documents you need to handle. You can get this translator to skim through each document in turn and give a summary in your own language so you can select the documents that are of most use to you and need a comprehensive document translation.

A NAATI translation is different from your average translation because to be awarded that status rigorous testing takes place before the translator can add NAATI to his or her name. The NAATI translator will know how to fast-track your documents by seeking out significant keywords which will be presented to you.

Tip #2 Consider the translation options

There are different methods used for translating such as machine translators but they may be okay for quick summaries that may not be totally accurate unless the translator has been programmed with all the word usages and idioms used in your type of industry. They don’t always convey the complete meaning of a sentence and often omit key words that cannot be found in their programmed dictionaries. It is a low cost choice, but basically unreliable if the full meaning of a document is sought.

In the end, a professional translation service anywhere in Australia is a cost effective translation solution as it hits the nail on the head first time round.

Tips for a Better Translation

Whether you are an accredited NAATI translator or a newly qualified individual just starting out with your own translation business there are always ways you can improve your translation techniques and provide better document translation services or whatever type of translation you decide to specialize in. Here are five tips for a better translation outcome.

Tip no. 1 Make sure you invest in some good translation equipment

By translation equipment, we don’t necessarily mean translation software or machine translation technology, but more down-to-earth things like a variety of dictionaries. If you intend to specialize in any particular type of document translation services like legal, medical, technical, or scientific translation you are well-advised to invest in bilingual dictionaries that cover those sorts of terminologies. If you intend to do a lot of marketing or literary translation then dictionaries of idioms and idiomatic sayings and bilingual jargon would be useful.

Tip no. 2 Pre-reading gives you the big picture

By pre-reading a document or text to be translated we mean skimming through it fairly quickly so that you get the general gist of what it is all about. This is something you might want to consider if you are just starting out to make sure it is a translation task that you can handle and also to know how much to charge. By pre-reading a document you will also know what sort of extra equipment in the form of dictionaries as has already been mentioned will be useful.

Tip no. 3 Work out the style and meaning of the text

Every individual piece of text has its own well-defined style. You will want to maintain that type of style when the text is translated. You will also wish to maintain the overall meaning of the text or document after translation. This depends on the fluency you have obtained in both the original and target languages.

Tip no. 4 Proofreading allows perfection

Proofreading cannot be stressed enough once you have finished translating, but there are many ways you can proofread your documents. One way is to read the text out loud. This allows you to check that the meaning of the text has been preserved. Re-read the translated text to double-check grammar and spelling mistakes. Another way to do this is to read backward from the end of the document or get someone else, preferably a native speaker to check the text. The native speaker will particularly notice nuances like idioms and jargon which may not have been translated properly or sound clumsy.

Why Translators Should Not Make Mistakes

History shows a record of terrible translation mistakes that have occasionally caused international tensions to rise and even the possibility of war. Thankfully, most translation mistakes are far less critical than that and may even cause a laugh. However, it is unlikely that the individual or business that asked for the translation would be laughing once they discovered that their mistranslated document or marketing slogan or web page they had spent money on was being laughed at itself.

There are many reasons why translators should not make any mistakes and why anyone searching for a reliable business document translation service should choose their translator(s) carefully.

Legal documents are full of technical terms and should be translated by legal document translation services that have the expertise to handle legal terminology. Any small mistakes may mean a lost business contract or misunderstanding which could slow down negotiations, business approval or immigration requirements.

Medical documents may include things like medical manuals, prescription requirements, medical records and vaccination certificates. Even small mistakes could end in disaster if the wrong procedure was used, a medical instrument was not calibrated properly or the wrong dosage was administered because of the message being incorrect.

Marketing material is also something that needs to be correctly translated. It is marketing material that is so often the butt of jokes because of errors in translation. Usually this is because of idiomatic expressions being translated directly from one language into another. Marketing messages are targeted at specific markets that usually have their own language and expressions.

Translation has become an important part of international business and should be treated seriously. There is no point in trying to cut back on the budget when it comes to translation tasks. Translation is the work of professional translators who are trained and certified and are unlikely to make mistakes. Good quality translation services will always make sure that their translated copy is proofread thoroughly before being released by a first language speaker with experience in the subject matter being translated.

How to Translate Idioms

Idioms are expressions that have found their way into common usage in most of the world’s languages. They not only have unique meanings but tools like “Google Translate” have difficulties in coming out with the correct translation for many idioms. It’s usually virtually impossible to provide a word-for-word translation for idioms because of their uniqueness. This is because one idiom has often evolved from a small group of people living in a specific area. The culture of that area may have developed an idiom that fits in nicely with the group’s surroundings. Once the idiom is circulated outside the group its meaning may have no relevancy. For example, the idiom ‘as rare as hen’s teeth’ would have no relevance in a place where hens never existed.

Because of this difficulty in translating idioms, a wealth of literature has emerged explaining possible translation tactics. One such book is by Mona Baker and is called “In Other Words: A Course Book on Translation“.

There is a useful chapter in the book called, “The translating of idioms: strategies” If you are working as a translator for translation services in Australia you will be mostly handling translations that use British English. If you come across an idiom in English that you have to translate into the target language that is the language you are translating into the first step is to search the target language for an equivalent idiom in that language. That means it has to use identical words to the English idiom, structured in the same way i.e. the order of the words and the meaning is the same too.

Sometimes you are lucky and you will find the same idiom that has either been passed to other languages or has evolved in a similar fashion to the English version. If this fails look for an idiom in your own language that is made up of different words which have a structure that is not the same but the meaning is exactly the same. If this option fails, look for an idiom in your own language that is made up of different words with a structure that is different and the meaning is not quite the same but nearly. You can perform a translation of this with an added explanation.

If you are really perplexed about translating an idiom say into German and you can’t find a group of German words that fit the English meaning then you may have to find a translator who is a German speaker who works with you at translation services in Brisbane who can help you find the correct combination of words that best expresses the English idiom in German. In an emergency, you can try the internet website http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/ to source a suitable translation. You do have to get the translation near to perfect when translating a document for document translation services.

Is Translation Automation Technology a Smart Choice?

Most translation services in Sydney and elsewhere in Australia have followed the global trend in translation technique and use translation automation technology to a greater or lesser extent but is this a smart choice? Is reliance on translation automation downgrading translation quality?

Automation is nothing new. Virtually every human activity in the twenty-first century makes use of some kind of automation and little of this is controversial. When it comes to translation automation the aim is to make use of any technology that becomes available that can speed up translation, achieve more effective consistency and help to process greater volumes of work without reducing the final product.

There is no single translation automation technology. It consists of a number of different tools available to any company that provides document translation services. No serious NAATI translator would contemplate using translation automation to replace human translation entirely, but it can be very useful in dealing with repetitive and monotonous content. This sort of automation cuts down translation times considerably and saves the client money.

Glossaries and style guides have become an accepted and very useful tool for companies that have a lot of translation work to be done and build up a strong working relationship between themselves and their translation service provider. These automated tools help to store a memory of text that has already been translated many times before and helps to maintain consistent terminology as well as speed up translation times.

In addition to the sort of automation technology that is specifically related to translation, there is also a lot of routine and mundane work that the average translator does which can be left to automation. This includes things like receiving emails, communicating with clients, and ensuring documents for translation are received online.

So in response to the original question of whether translation automation is a smart choice the answer is that wherever the technology helps to improve the translator’s work output, improve consistency and reduce the workload it is definitely a smart choice.

A Product Document Translation Service Will Help Grow your Product Globally

Almost all companies wish to grow and take up global opportunities, but there are challenges when this is undertaken. To ensure maximum gain is achieved through marketing globally the business has to cross the language barrier first. Many businesses believe that using English is good enough, as they think that the majority of the world’s population can understand basic English which is sufficient for the aims of marketing a new product.

The fact of the matter is that very few of the world’s population have even a basic grasp of the language. This means if globalizing a product is taken seriously its product description and marketing materials have to be translated into the languages of the countries where the product is most likely to attract buyers.

What does translating into another language do?

  • It breaks down language barriers
  • It connects potential buyers with the product.

What documents need translating?

If you are marketing your product in Australia and it has been produced in China you will need to get a NAATI translation of any official documents that may accompany your marketing campaign. If you are sending marketing personnel to Australia their passports and proof of their status as marketers will have to be translated into English and only a NAATI translation is accepted by immigration and other Australian authorities. This translation has to be completed by certified translation services which have a proven record for offering document translation services. Once the translation has been completed it is then presented to the relevant Australian authority.

When marketing a product in a different language, documents describing how to use the product will need accurate translations, as any misunderstandings could result in the product being misused. In some cases, this could even endanger the life of the user. Precautions for the use of the product need to be carefully translated as do any documents related to guarantee period and conditions. If all these translations are done correctly then more potential buyers are drawn to the product as it will have built up a reputation for accuracy and reliability.

Translations for Mobile Applications

Applications or apps, as they are more commonly referred to, are hitting the computer users market in their millions. They range from interactive navigation and mapping solutions to simple downloading of videos, music and games. There are also easy to use weather apps that find the weather for your place in seconds. If you have produced an app yourself you won’t want to limit it just to your neighbours but you will want it to reach all corners of the globe.

Mobile app sellers are global but to reach out to this global market you need to get your app translated into the languages of potential buyers. The next individual who comes across your app and thinks it’s just great could be situated in just about any part of the world. To ensure you take advantage of this potential market whether it’s an iOS app or an Android app an accurate translation of its use is essential.

In some countries, such as Australia, the best translation is that completed by a NAATI translation since to become a NAATI translator the person has had their competence as a translator approved. They specialise in all sorts of document translation services such as any documents associated with an app that the creator wants to market to the global market. Because a NAATI translator has received official accreditation they provide certified translation services which you can depend upon for accuracy.

Why does localizing your app to a global market matter?

Figures indicate that mobile subscriptions top 6 billion worldwide with more than 50 percent being based in the Asia Pacific region. The languages that cover these mobile subscribers include Chinese, a variety of Indian languages, English, Indonesian, Portuguese, Spanish, Russian, Japanese, Vietnamese, German, Tagalog and Bengali. Research has revealed that if you translate your mobile app into other languages then the downloading of your app rises significantly. In fact some app companies found that their sales increased by more than 25% once they had translated their app to suit the language of the country targeted.

Internationalization and localization

There are two different processes involved when preparing your app for the global market. The first one is internationalisation, when you ensure your software suits your targeted country’s language and culture. The other is localisation, when you have to find specific resources that have to be added to your software so that it supports your targeted country, both in terms of language and culture.