Sworn translation in Jerez de la Frontera

Few wine appellations anywhere in the world carry their name in three languages, and this is one of them: Jerez-Xérès-Sherry. That is no accident. From the eighteenth century onwards, Irish, Scottish and English merchants settled in the city to make their living from its wine, and their surnames are still written above the bodega gates: Garvey, Williams & Humbert, the Byass in González Byass. That bond with the English-speaking world never retired to the history books. Today Jerez airport keeps direct flights to London and to Germany, the Feria del Caballo fills the city with visitors from half of Europe every May, and many of the foreigners living on the nearby coast —El Puerto de Santa María, Rota with its naval base, Chipiona, Sanlúcar— come to Jerez for the serious errands: the police station where TIE fingerprints are taken, the courts, the University of Cádiz campus. And at almost every one of those counters they hit the same wall: a birth certificate, a criminal record check or a deed in English or French counts for nothing before the Spanish authorities until it comes with a sworn translation into Spanish.

Textualia handles that step entirely online. No appointments, no driving anywhere: you upload the document, see the final price on the spot and, once you pay, you receive the sworn translation as an electronically signed PDF, fully valid in Spain before notaries, registries, courts and the administration of the Junta de Andalucía. And if your procedure calls for a paper original, we send the physical copy on official stamped paper by courier to Jerez or anywhere in the province of Cádiz.

A sworn translation signed by a translator accredited by Spain's MAEC is fully valid throughout Spain, which covers the procedures that come up most often in Jerez:

• Residence and immigration: paperwork for the Immigration Office in Cádiz and the National Police station in Jerez, where NIE and TIE procedures are handled.
• Buying a home: foreign deeds, powers of attorney and certificates before a notary and the Land Registry, including for second homes on the nearby north-west Cádiz coast.
• Civil status and municipal registration: birth, marriage or death certificates for the Civil Registry and Jerez town hall.
• Education: degrees and transcripts for recognition or enrolment, for instance at the Jerez campus of the University of Cádiz, home to its Law and Social Sciences faculties.
• Pensions and work history: foreign pension and proof-of-life certificates before the Social Security.
• Inheritance and probate: foreign wills and grants of representation executed abroad.

One important note: the MAEC sworn translation certifies the document before the Spanish authorities; if you need it for a body in another country, always check the requirements of the destination country.

These are the documents we are most often asked to translate in Jerez:

• Apostilled criminal record checks for residence and visas: ACRO (UK), FBI (USA) or bulletin no. 3 (France), translated into Spanish.
• Foreign birth, marriage and death certificates for the Civil Registry and municipal registration.
• Deeds, powers of attorney and title certificates for buying a home.
• University degrees, diplomas and academic transcripts for recognition or enrolment.
• Pension and proof-of-life certificates to draw a foreign pension from Spain.
• Contracts and company paperwork for wineries and exporters dealing with British and French clients.

When the Irishman William Garvey arrived from County Waterford in the late eighteenth century to found his bodega, he was not blazing a trail: Jerez wine was already being drunk in England in Shakespeare's day, praised as sherris sack in Falstaff's speeches. Then came Alexander Williams and Arthur Humbert, and the London merchant Byass who went into partnership with Manuel María González of Tío Pepe fame. Those families put down roots so deep that their surnames now sound as thoroughly jerezano as flamenco or the horses of the Royal School. That history has a very present-day consequence: Jerez remains a city used to dealing with the English-speaking world. Its airport connects with the United Kingdom and Germany, its wineries export across the globe, and the surrounding district —from Sanlúcar to the naval base at Rota— is home to British, German and American residents who rely on Jerez for a good share of their official errands.

That is where we come in. We translate birth and marriage certificates, criminal record checks, deeds, powers of attorney, academic qualifications and pension paperwork from English and French into Spanish, signed by a translator accredited by the MAEC, with no need to travel anywhere. You upload the files, confirm the fixed price and receive the work as an electronically signed PDF, ready for the police station, the Civil Registry or the notary. And when the authority insists on paper, we send the physical copy on official stamped paper to your address in Jerez, El Puerto, Rota or Sanlúcar.