Q1219. What standards govern Romanian, Bulgarian, and Ukrainian document translations?

Answered by the NYC Visa & Translation certified translation team

Romanian, Bulgarian, and Ukrainian document translations serve the growing movement of people and business between Thailand and Eastern Europe, and each has its specifics. Romanian and Bulgarian (both EU members): the civil status documents may carry the EU multilingual standard forms (the EU regulation's standardised translations of birth, marriage, and death certificates — where the form is attached, the translation need is reduced for those documents); the commercial and other documents are translated normally; the legalisation chain runs through the countries' authentication and the Thai embassy accredited to them (the embassy coverage for the region is confirmed — some countries are served by a Thai embassy in a neighboring state); and the languages use the Latin script (Romanian) and the Cyrillic script (Bulgarian) respectively. Ukrainian: the documents use the Cyrillic script with Ukrainian-specific characters; the names' transliteration is a critical point (Ukrainian names romanise by the Ukrainian system — the passport's romanisation controls, and the translation must match it); the legalisation chain's current practicalities are confirmed with the relevant embassy (the regional situation has affected the consular services' operation); and the document types (the civil registry documents, the educational credentials) follow the Ukrainian formats. Points that matter for all three: the names' romanisation must match the passport exactly (the checked element in every official use); the documents' issuing authorities and their seals are described in the translation; and the translator pools in Thailand are limited — the timeline and pricing reflect it. Practice points: confirm the current legalisation route for the specific country before starting the chain; and for the EU countries, check whether the EU multilingual form covers the document.