Legal Translation of Foreign Language Disclosures

We’ve blogged about legal translation of foreign language disclosures and the need for professional language services to ensure accurate translation of contracts and agreements in order to protect consumers. A person in a trade or business who negotiates in a foreign language during the course of entering into a contract with a consumer must, in some jurisdictions, give the consumer a written foreign language translation of the proposed contract or agreement in the language of the negotiations. The foreign language translation must be an accurate translation of each and every term and condition.

Further:

The foreign language legal translation must be given to the consumer before he or she signs the contract.
The seller or creditor must give the consumer the foreign language legal translation regardless of whether or not the consumer requests it.
The legal foreign language translation must include the proposed contract terms, including purchase price, finance charges, payment amount, etc.

If one fails to provide a foreign language translation of the contract of agreement:

The consumer may rescind the contract in accordance with the laws of contracts.
The consumer may cancel the contract even after it has been assigned to a financial institution.
In a case where the consumer chooses to rescind, he or she need not pay the financial institution that has received an assignment of the contract – the institution is entitled to return the contract to the original business.

To read our court interpreting blog entry “Legal Translation, Multilingual Document Language Translation and Expanded Foreign Language Contract Laws”, click here.

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