The foreigner’s identification card is issued by Migration (at checkpoints in each city of the country) and is the identification document for foreigners within the Colombian territory.

The registration must be made before Migración Colombia within fifteen (15) calendar days from the date of issuance.

Any document drafted by a lawyer or a public official, as well as a large number of financial and academic documents with legal implications, need to be translated by a professional legal translator if it is to be used in a foreign country that speaks a different language than the country where the document originated.

The following are some of these documents:

• Sales contracts
• Financial reports
• Power of attorney
• Property deeds
• Employment documents
• Wills
• Trusts
• Insurance policies
• Expert reports
• Documents related to Intellectual or Industrial Property
• Foreign regulations and legislation
• Judicial decisions
• Arbitration proceedings
• Deeds and articles of association of companies
• Academic reports

And, in general, any legal, financial, academic, religious text, etc., which entails the creation of rights or obligations for a given party.

Expatgroup.co has, among its functions, that of a legal translation agency specializing in the translation of legal documents, documents issued by public administrations, business documents, financial documents, etc. For this purpose, our team of collaborators includes professional personnel specialized in the legal translation of documents in each of the aforementioned areas, which allows us to guarantee their absolute validity in Colombia and abroad.

The professional legal translator must have a solid academic background in law. But, at the same time, he/she will face multiple translation challenges throughout the text, so a solid background in the field of translation is also necessary. In addition, specialization in certain areas, such as education, finance, business, etc., is essential to be able to guarantee quality work in such complex subjects.

No, in many cases, the translation is not only informative but also seeks to produce a document with legal effects in another country, from which it is necessary to carry out previous research in comparative law. It is not enough, therefore, to be bilingual to translate legal documents adequately. It is not even enough to have extensive experience as a translator or in Legal Sciences in isolation. In addition to the two languages, it is necessary to have a perfect command of the two legal systems involved (that of the original text and that of the country of the target language) in order to avoid making regrettable mistakes with serious legal consequences for the addressees of the translation.

Legal translation consists of interpreting the contents expressed in one language and translating them into another in a manner appropriate to the legal and socio-cultural contexts of the countries involved. Legal documents, whether public (documents issued by an administration or public body) or private (drafted to regulate a specific contractual relationship between individuals or companies legally).

Legalization consists of certifying the legitimacy of the signature of a public official in the exercise of their functions, which has not been previously registered in the database of the Colombian Ministry of Foreign Affairs or of the competent entity of the country where it was issued, in order for the document to be valid internationally. Legalization certifies the legitimacy of the public official’s signature stamped on the document but does not certify its content. It is appropriate to legalize a document when the country where it was issued or the country where it will take effect is not a party to the 1961 Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents.

Private documents may also need to be legalized. In Colombia, the signature of a private document must be recognized by a notary public, whose signature must, in turn, be registered in the Colombian Ministry of Foreign Affairs database.

The apostille is the legalization of a public official’s signature validating a document. It must be registered in the Colombian Ministry of Foreign Affairs database or the competent entity in the country where it was issued. The apostille certifies the legitimacy of the public official’s signature stamped on the document but does not certify its content. A document must be apostilled when the country in which it will take effect is a party to the 1961 Hague Convention on the Abolition of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents.

When there are no appointments available on the scheduling platform, or they deliberately cancel your appointment and you cannot reschedule. We recommend you to go directly and without an appointment to the nearest Migration Colombia office. In this blog we detailed all the steps to follow and recommendations in these extraordinary cases.

Typically, it may take up to 10 business days from the payment date for the process to be completed. However, the duration may be influenced by the city and other specific factors of Migración Colombia.