Legal Translation For International Business Expansion

When you think about expanding your business, it is important to remember that each country will have its own specific demands and regulations. And effective legal translation solutions play a vital part.

Why should you get Legal Translations for specific business purposes? Well, think about why your legal documents were drawn up in their source language. The protection you require for yourself and your business, the creation of trust with prospective clients, the hiring of staff, and the official cooperation with other parties and businesses.

This matters just as much in the global market, and the accuracy, completeness, and confidentiality, in which they were created, should be held to equally high standards in the target language(s).

Let us expand on why legal translation is so important for international business expansion, and expand on the essential legal translation types and how they can make a difference for your business.

Types Of Legal Translations Vital To International Business Growth

Let’s dive right in and get a detailed look at the specific types of legal translations that will benefit from translation, and why.

Intellectual Property Translations

Does your business produce innovations and new technologies to help boost efficiency and service quality? Then you will want to protect your intellectual Property Rights. And when you plan on expanding your business, you should make sure to translate these for each market you intend to introduce your innovations to. For example, we design our own tools and software to customize our localization services, which means that we will want to protect all of these as our own not just in English, but in any language we need, should we ever choose to export our tools to different countries and regions.

By securing your international intellectual property rights, you are not only keeping your product from being copied under another brand, but you also have legal power against anyone who leverages your product without proper legitimation.

Intellectual property translations can take various forms including:

Non-disclosure agreement translation: since these documents are intended to keep involved parties from disclosing any information on the project they are involved in; a translated version could prove beneficial when the team is built up from multilingual members, so any confusion is avoided.

Registered trademark translation: this will involve the actual registration of your trademark in the original language so that you will be fully covered in foreign markets. But there can be an extra level added in that the actual name of your product could be localization as well. You may think but a trademark is a registered name, how can it be translated?. But if you are intending to expand into specific markets where the name might not mean much or perhaps might even cause offense, it is best to check with local experts what your trademark will mean to your soon to be conquered market. Read our blog on Brand Name Validation: Is Your Brand Ready For The Global Stage? For more information!
Design right localization: the design is often as important as the name these days. Here too, the rights that this design belongs to your product or brand should be translated to the language of the markets you are expanding into.
Patent localization: your patent has made sure that your product is yours in your own country, and a localized version will ensure proof of ownership in other nations as well.

Privacy Policies And Terms and Conditions: To Translate Or Not To Translate?

A Privacy Policy refers to a statement or a legal document that explains the handling practices of any information. This could be an organization’s internal policy that applies to its employees and staff. It could also be a business external policy for (website) users, stakeholders, and partners, provided to inform them about how their personal data will be used and state that your business strictly adheres to the set requirements of privacy law.

Considering the importance of privacy laws, offering the document in several languages is something any business looking to expand beyond its border should definitely consider. As a business, you possess a moral obligation to let users know how you are using their data and what they can expect from you. on the other hand, you will want to avoid any possible legal and financial repercussions that could follow any unclear communications of your policies.

That is why offering accurate translations of your privacy policy will:

Enhance the consumer experience: With a fully translated website and privacy policy, you are telling your website visitors that you care about providing them with essential information in an accessible way customized to their language and culture.
Adhere to local privacy laws: You will also be compliant with any privacy laws your target region or country has set up. More on this below!
Build trust: People deserve to know how you are using their data and what they can expect from you. Consumers, organizations as well as businesses could interact with your online services, and while they may not always read every word outlined in your policies, they will identify you as a trustworthy and transparent brand.

Article 29 of the Working Party (WP29) briefly touches upon this in its Transparency Guidelines regarding Privacy Policies and concludes that the Privacy Policy should be translated into other languages whenever the business is specifically targeting a certain locale:

For example, where the controller operates a website in the language in question and/or offers specific country options and/or facilitates the payment for goods or services in the currency of a particular member state then these may be indicative of a data controller targeting data subjects of a particular member state.¹

The idea of targeting is key here, in if you are looking to expand into specific markets, translating every part of your website, including Privacy Policies and Terms and Conditions, will be highly beneficial from a cultural, linguistic, and legal perspective.

But before you decide to translate your privacy policy, make sure that you understand where you are starting from and consider the following:

Which languages are officially spoken in your country? If you have a Canadian business that is registered under the domain, take note that the official languages in Canada are both English and French, and that your website should, at the very least, include these languages. This also extends to other countries and, for example, Swiss-based companies must provide their website in German, Italian, French, Romansh.
If you are planning to expand into Europe, note that translating into the most common European languages is already a great place to start.
When making it big within the U.S., offering bilingual content in both English and Spanish will prove to be a huge plus for your business.

So, beyond the urgent requirements of your primary business location, what else should you do? You can’t translate your privacy policy into every language, but definitely consider translating the document into the languages your website is already translated into. Once you have translated your Privacy Policy, you will need to ensure that the content complies with the GDPR, CalOPPA and any other requirements that will make your policies easy to find and understand. Let’s look at some specific examples!

The California Online Privacy Protection Act (CalOPPA)² is a Privacy law specific to the state of California. However, this state law requires a global application. This means that no matter where your business is located if you include the data of California residents, you have to meet the CalOPPA regulations. To make it easier to understand, the Attorney General of the State of California has published a helpful guide³ that expands on best practices to follow and full legal obligations you should adhere to.

On the other side of the world, the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR),⁴ has been in full swing since May of 2018. No matter where your company is located, if your website has any visitors from the EU, the GDPR must be applied.

For a lot of businesses out there, the question of to translate or not to translate is an exercise in risk balancing. If the business receives visitors from an EU country, for example, but doesn’t offer a translation of their privacy policy, that business could be liable to the penalties under the GDPR. However, some view translation services as a costly service and would rather take that risk than to make what they see as a huge investment.

But considering the benefits you can reap and the complexities you can avoid, translation services can be the preferred road to take. So, make sure you rely on an LSP that has the operational as well as cost efficiency to hit the sweet spot between quality and affordability. Pay attention to qualified LSPs that use native, in-country experts and technologies to deliver streamlined services that lift the burden off your shoulders.

On the other side of the world, the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR),⁴ has been in full swing since May of 2018. No matter where your company is located, if your website has any visitors from the EU, the GDPR must be applied.

For a lot of businesses out there, the question of to translate or not to translate is an exercise in risk balancing. If the business receives visitors from an EU country, for example, but doesn’t offer a translation of their privacy policy, that business could be liable to the penalties under the GDPR. However, some view translation services as a costly service and would rather take that risk than to make what they see as a huge investment.

But considering the benefits you can reap and the complexities you can avoid, translation services can be the preferred road to take. So, make sure you rely on an LSP that has the operational as well as cost efficiency to hit the sweet spot between quality and affordability. Pay attention to qualified LSPs that use native, in-country experts and technologies to deliver streamlined services that lift the burden off your shoulders.

Contract Translations

While Intellectual Property Protection, Privacy Policies, and Terms and Conditions lay the foundations to protect yourself and build trust with your prospective clients, Contract Translation helps your business move forward and advance within new markets in a sustainable way. In such contracts, accuracy, confidentiality, and complete absence of ambiguity is paramount, so the value of highly skilled professionals with the required experience, background, and nationality should once again be stressed.

In this context, you may be wondering if you will be needing a Certified Legal Translation. While every legal translation will need to be executed with full accuracy, a Certified Translation attests to the full and accurate representation of the source document. This is achieved through a signed statement confirming its loyalty to the original, a stamp on each page, and a certificate verifying the translator’s credentials. This so-called Certificate of Accuracy can be provided by a professional LSP.

While this service is mainly requested for marriage certificates, immigration documents, and so on, it can also be very useful for the translation of business contracts between international parties to add an added level of trust and officiality.

Pro tip! Legal translation? Certified translation? Notarized translation? Which do you need? check out the answer in our article What is a Certified Translation Service?

Qualities A Top LSP For Legal Translations Has

In order to achieve this, there are certain requirements that legal translators or Language Service Providers (LSP) will need to possess in order to complete these translation types in a satisfactory manner.

Years of translation and experience should be backed by a native familiarity to the unique terminology tied to the country and region. For this reason, native, in-country linguists should be hired exclusively. In order to avoid ambiguities and possibly expensive issues, they should also be Subject Matter Experts and have proven experience in the legal industry and content type you are requiring a translation into.
The LSP or translator should also be familiar with the local laws and regulations native to each country and region you are planning to expand into.
Accuracy and consistency are the most important parts of legal translation. That is why the LSP should promote the use of effective terminology management solutions in order to maintain accuracy, save time, and keep costs to a minimum.
The LSP should boast a quick response time and ideally be available 24/7. This is far more easily achieved with an LSP since they often leverage a wide network of translators.
Strict confidentiality is needed in any legal exchange. For this reason, there should always be a non-disclosure agreement signed so that any information handled by them will never leave the confines of the translation team. Additionally, any online communications should be protected by end-to-end encryption.

Pro Tip! Need a detailed overview of what solid legal translation entails from regulations to effective terminology management? Check out our blog on legal translation: the best practices that ensure full accuracy.

Conclusion

Legal Translation is the cornerstone of international business transactions and expansions. Whether it is to protect your Intellectual Property Rights, set up international contracts, or offer full transparency by translating Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policies, accuracy, confidentiality, and consistency should always be maintained through the hiring of qualified translation professionals who tick all the boxes.

Laoret offers reliable Legal Translation Services provided by native, in-country interpreters highly experienced in the legal industry. Our intuitive Translation Management System (TMS) features a CAT Tool equipped to leverage advanced terminology management solutions. We adhere to a strict, streamlined workflow developed within full confidentiality to deliver top-quality products within your timeframe. We remain available 24/7 and protect all of our online interactions with end-to-end encryption.