DS-260 immigrant visa: certified translation of civil documents

A DS-260 case needs a certified English translation of every civil document that is not in English, unless the document is in the official language of the country where the applicant will be interviewed. The National Visa Center (NVC) asks for a statement signed by the translator that the translation is accurate and that the translator is competent to translate from the original language. The official-language exception belongs to the NVC and the consulate only. Once a case is with USCIS, everything must be in English.

The DS-260 is the Immigrant Visa Application. After USCIS approves the petition and the case reaches the NVC, the applicant completes the form online and uploads scans of the civil documents to the CEAC portal. A foreign-language scan is not complete without its translation, so the two are prepared together. The petitioner or the law office decides which documents a given case calls for; the sections below describe how the translations of those documents should look.

DS-260 civil documents that need a certified translation

The set depends on the applicant's family and history. A birth certificate is needed for the applicant, and a marriage certificate translation is needed when the applicant is married. Divorce decrees and death certificates are added where an earlier marriage of the applicant or the petitioner ended. Police certificates come from every country where the applicant has lived. Military records, court records, and adoption records are added where they exist in the applicant's history.

Each document is translated on its own, in the language pair it actually requires. An applicant whose birth record is in Haitian Creole needs a Haitian Creole birth certificate translation, and an applicant who also lived in a Spanish-speaking country needs a Spanish police certificate translation for that country's record. Records in this language are covered by Haitian Creole translation services, and a certified document translation service handles the other languages these files commonly involve in the same way.

The NVC translation rule and the official-language exception

NVC and consular rules require a certified translation for any civil document that is not in English or in the official language of the country where the applicant applies for the visa. Every translation carries a statement signed by the translator that the translation is accurate and that the translator is competent to translate. A separate statement for each document is the safer practice, since the scans are reviewed one at a time.

The exception follows the interview location, not the applicant's nationality and not the country that issued the document. An applicant interviewed in a country where Spanish is the official language may upload a Spanish-language record without a translation. A record in any other language still needs one. The comparison between NVC and USCIS rules is covered in a separate post on NVC translation requirements compared with USCIS.

Reciprocity Schedule: which version of each document to obtain

The Department of State publishes the Visa Reciprocity and Civil Documents by Country schedule. For each country it lists which civil documents exist, which authority issues them, and which version is acceptable, such as a long-form record rather than an abridged extract. USCIS adjudicators and consular officers both rely on it.

Applicants should look up the issuing country before ordering a translation. Translating the wrong version wastes the work, because the extract still has to be replaced by the full record and the full record then has to be translated as well.

What NVC document review sends back

Document review compares each uploaded scan with the information typed into the DS-260. Four problems can be prevented before upload:

• An abridged extract or short-form record is uploaded where the Reciprocity Schedule calls for the full version.
• A foreign-language scan is uploaded without its certified translation.
• A translation has no signed statement of competence and accuracy attached to it.
• A name or date in the translation differs from the DS-260 or from the passport.

Name differences usually come from transliteration. A passport romanizes a name one way, and a civil record translated separately can produce another spelling. The translation company should receive the passport data page and any earlier translations so that every document uses the same spelling.

A translation is complete only when it covers everything on the page: body text, headings, form-field labels, stamps, seals, signatures described as "[signature]", handwritten entries, marginal notes, and the back of the page if it carries anything. Illegible parts are marked "[illegible]" rather than guessed, and blank sections are marked as blank. Machine translation alone carries no human certification and mishandles names, dates, and abbreviations, so it does not meet the requirement.

Police certificates, military records, and secondary evidence

A police certificate translation follows the same rules as a civil record: the full text, every stamp, and a signed statement for that certificate. Court records and military records are translated in full as well, with seals and handwritten entries described. Adoption records are included where the case involves an adopted child.

When a primary record is unavailable, the applicant first shows that it is unavailable. The proof is a written statement from the issuing authority, or a Reciprocity Schedule entry saying the record is generally unavailable. The applicant then submits secondary evidence, such as church or baptismal records, school records, medical records, or affidavits from people with personal knowledge of the event, commonly two. Every foreign-language piece of that evidence, including the statement from the issuing authority, needs its own certified translation.

What to bring to the DS-260 interview

Applicants upload scans to the CEAC portal and bring the originals or certified copies of the civil documents to the interview, together with the certified translations. The translations in the folder should be the same ones that were uploaded, with the same names and spellings, so the consular officer can match the paper to the scan.

Before ordering, check the Reciprocity Schedule entry for each document, collect every page including the backs, and list each name as it appears in the passport. Texliff prepares each certified birth certificate translation with its own signed statement of accuracy and competence, and the other civil documents in the file are handled the same way.