Certificate of birth, marriage, divorce, name-change ...
Do you need a certified translation of your document?
If you are sending a document to a public body or authority in a non-Nordic country they will require a certified translation by a statsautorisert translatør (state-chartered translator) — a specially-trained legal translator whose stamp and signature carries the same authority as a notary. We provide this service. English is accepted in most countries. If the original document has been issued by a Norwegian public body (for example, Skatteetaten) check whether the body is able to re-issue the document to you in English. If they can, that would be cheaper and will save you a lot of bother!
Is that all I need?
Probably not, as it is difficult for foreign bodies to validate the documentation. Exactly what you need depends on the country in which you will be using it. We can advise you about this. Those countries that have subscribed to the Hague Convention for Legalisation for Foreign Public Documents, also known more concisely as the Apostile Convention (see list of countries here) require an apostile. An apostille stamp confirms that the state-chartered translator’s signature on a document is genuine and that the translator actually has the authority to issue it. If you are sending your document to a country that has not signed the Apostile convention (Canada and various far-eastern countries are the most common of these) then you should consult that country's Norwegian embassy for information.
What is the procedure?
Before we can produce a certified translation we need to see the original document, or at least a photocopy that is stamped and signed as a certified copy by an approved public body (local courthouse, police station, town hall, church office etc). We return this together with our translated document. The translation will specify whether we have seen the original document or just a certified copy. It is your responsibility to make sure that a translation of a certified copy will be accepted by the body to which you are sending the translation.
Assuming that the country to which you are sending the document accepts an apostile, you will need to take or post the translated document that you receive from us to your local county governor’s office (Fylkeshus). They will charge a fee to issue the apostile.
Unfortunately, because Norway does not publish a current list of state-chartered translators the various county governor’s offices (Fylkeshus) - which previously each maintained their own lists for the purpose of validation – have introduced a new practice requiring all legal stamps to be re-stamped by a local notary public at the county court. It is as daft as it sounds. So before we send the translation to you we take it to a local county court to be stamped by their notary public (see details here).
What does it cost and how long will it take?
Our charge for the entire service — translation, stamping by the authorised translator and stamping by the notary public (including the county court fee of 293 kroner) and returning the documents by post — is 1000 kroner.
Normally we can send documents back to you on the third day after we receive them, but since the post in Norway no longer delivers every day you should allow at least a week.
Where do I send my documents?
Before you send anything, you need to check with us that we have capacity to take the booking. Send us an email and we will confirm availability and supply an address in Norway to which you can send the documents.
