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Translating the Documents in a Chinese Asylum File

Chinese asylum files are unusual in one respect: the documents often arrive already carrying an English translation. That translation is not the one USCIS asks for, and this page explains why. It is about documents and translation, not about anyone's case.

The notarial certificate, and its built-in English

Mainland China does not issue a birth certificate the way most countries do. What is issued for use abroad is a notarial certificate (公证书) from a local notary public office (公证处) — a booklet with a watermark, a seal and a red stamp, giving the name, sex, date and place of birth, ID number and both parents' names. The same office issues notarial certificates for marriage, for no criminal record and for kinship.

These booklets are produced bilingually, with a Chinese page, an English page and a statement that the two correspond. It is reasonable to assume that settles the translation requirement. It does not: the notary office's translator certification does not state the translator's competence in both languages and is not signed, which is exactly what the USCIS standard requires. Attaching a proper certification is the ordinary fix, and it is what we provide.

Hukou, and what else recurs

The hukou (户口簿) household register is the document that locates a person in a family and a place, and it appears in these files constantly. Alongside it:

• Resident identity cards and passports
• Police summonses, detention notices and administrative penalty decisions
• Court documents and judgments
• Work unit documents, dismissal letters and disciplinary records
• Church, house-church or organisation documents
• Medical records, including those relating to family planning enforcement
• Messages, notices and photographs submitted as evidence

Simplified, traditional, and names

Mainland documents are in simplified characters; older documents and those from Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan are in traditional. Both are translated — see our Chinese page. Romanisation varies too: a pinyin spelling on a passport and an older Wade-Giles or dialect spelling on a family document frequently differ. We follow the passport and flag the difference rather than silently choosing one.

See also our Chinese birth certificate page.

Translated as written, because credibility is the issue

An asylum file is judged largely on whether the account holds together. That makes a translation unusually consequential, and it makes the temptation to improve things actively dangerous. A vague sentence rendered precisely, a torn line reconstructed from context, a threat translated more fluently than it was written — each of those creates a discrepancy between the document and the testimony that was never in the record.

So: everything legible is translated, at the register it was written in. Anything genuinely illegible is marked illegible rather than guessed at. Nothing is softened and nothing is heightened. Where a document is damaged, partial or a photograph of a photocopy, the translation says so plainly — which is worth far more to the person reading the file than a clean-looking rendering of something nobody can actually read.

One packet, both forums

An affirmative application goes to USCIS under 8 CFR 103.2(b)(3). A defensive one is filed with the immigration court, where 8 CFR 1003.33 and the EOIR practice manual also want the translator's name, address and telephone number attached. Our certification carries both, on letterhead and page-numbered, so the same translation serves either — see what it states. Where one certification needs to cover a bundle of exhibits, it will list them.

Files here name people who may still be at risk. Everything is translated by professional human translators and handled confidentially — never pasted into a public machine-translation tool. What we do not do is advise on the claim, tell you what evidence to gather or assess whether a document helps you. That is your attorney's work, and this is the point in a case to have one.

How it works

Upload a photo or a scan of your document, pick the language pair and check out online. You never have to mail originals: a legible copy is all we need.

A professional human translator, never machine translation, translates the document word for word and mirrors the layout of the original. Every certified translation ships with a signed Certificate of Translation Accuracy that meets the requirements of USCIS, courts and universities.

Your translation is delivered digitally, usually within 24 hours for documents of one to three pages, and same-day delivery is available. If anything needs adjusting, we revise it.

Certified vs. standard translation

A certified translation is a word-for-word translation accompanied by a signed statement attesting to its accuracy and completeness. It is what official bodies require: USCIS, courts, universities and government agencies. Certified translations are $24.95 per page, where a page is up to 250 words.

A standard translation is for business or personal use where certification is not needed, such as CVs, client intake forms or marketing material, and is billed at the same $24.95 per page of up to 250 words.

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