Translating Documents
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
Check List Using The Regulations As A Template eg - Spouse Visa
Get Enough Sleep
Visa Application And Associated Costs
Preserving Records
Record Keeping And Management - How Long Do Documents Have To Be Kept?
Initial Requirements Regarding Accepting A Retainer
Failure Of Proper File Management Can Lead To Suspension As A Migration Agent
Interpreters
Confidentiality & Notifying The Client Of Complaint Procedure
Give Your Client A Copy Of Everything
Give Your Client The Bad News Immediately
Take Care While On Holidays
Clients & English
Check Special Requirements For Offshore Visas With The Embassy's Or Consulate's Website
Don't Accept Immigration's Assertion That Decisions Have Been Made Properly
Have No Fear Of Appeals
Never Advise Your Client To Make Life Changing Decisions Prior To The Grant Of A Visa & Trust Your Instincts
Before You Set The Fee With Your Client And Before You File A Visa Application
Oral Instructions
What Can Go Wrong If You Don't Record Your Mail Properly
Prepare Your Client For The Oath
Ideas For Chronologies For Client Files
Immigration Goes Into Hibernation On 30 June Each Year
Australia Closes Down Between Christmas & New Year
Have An Industrial Strength Office Set Up At The Office And At Home
What Is A Permanent Residence Visa?
Practice Together Or Practice In Groups
A Proper Email Account And Email Management
Undercharging And Undercutting On Fees
Positioning And Pathways And Fees (Putting All One's Eggs In One Basket)
Email & Fax Communication & Errors With Credit Cards Emerge As Troubling Issues
Preparing A Client For Merit Review Hearings Or Interviews With DIBP
Accountants And Migration Law
Passport
Berenguel - Sometimes Time Of Application Criteria Can Be Met At Time Of Decision
Bare Faced Liars & The Fraudsters
Everyone's Doing It
Bridging Visas
Visas Remain Current Until Midnight
Immigration Closes At 4pm
Looking After Secondary Visa Holders In A Visa Cancellation Process
Applying As A Secondary Visa Applicant Onshore When The Primary Visa Applicant Is Offshore
Being Illegal
Essential Prerequisites For A Ministerial Discretion Application
Last Lunge Applications
State And Territory Sponsorship
Addresses
Believing The Client
Follow Up
Make Peace With The Tax Office
No Obligation On Immigration To Chase Up Information Or Documents From Migration Agents Or Lawyers Representing A Client
Errors In Visa Applications
Spouse Visas - Unexplained Large Deposits of Money
Managing No. 8503 On Tourist Visas
Medical Consent
Statutory Declarations
Merit Review
Tax Deductibility of Migration Advice
LEGENDcom
Dates On Documents And Names On Documents
Breaking Up Is Hard To Do
Take A Statement
Case Management Software
Work Rights
Student
Check All Past Visa Applications
Revealing Convictions
Visa Holders Being On Their Best Behaviour
Email Communication With Immigration - Delete All Strings
No Without Prejudice Conversations With Immigration
Accounts Managements
What Is A Secondary Visa?
Identify Australian Citizens Who Support An Applicant
Communications
Schedule 1 Criteria
Second Thing To Do On Starting A File - Download The Relevant Part Of The Law
First Thing To Do When Starting Any File - Identify Any 'Rights Destroying' Deadlines
Lodging Paper Applications
Social Media & Smart Phones
References
Disputes About Parentage And Children
Helping People Pass The English Tests
Managing Emails
What Is The Pomodoro Technique?
Immigration Telephones Client
When Is A Visa Application Made In Australia
Apply For A Visa In Australia
No Visa Application Is An Island
The Hammock Principle
If a document is important, it must be translated into English. If an important document is not translated and the decision maker misses it as a result, that will not be the fault of the decision maker. The failure to take into account an untranslated important document presented by an applicant will not be a ground of review in those circumstances.
In SZNZN v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship [2010] FCA 1050 (24 September 2010), the two summons were before the Refugee Review Tribunal, but the summonses were in Mandarin and not translated. Here is what happened:
- The following facts appear to be common ground between the parties:
- Included in the material submitted to the Department, and provided in the Department’s file to the Tribunal, were two summonses issued in 2007 requiring attendance by the first appellant at the PSB “for penalties regarding involvement in unlawful religious activities”.
- These summonses were not translated into English, and appeared in the material before the Tribunal in their original form.
- The second of the summonses may have been translated into English and delivered to the Department in October 2008, prior to the decision of the Tribunal delivered 28 September 2009.
- It is clear from its Reasons for Decision that the Tribunal did not see the summonses on the file. In para 61 and para 62 the Tribunal said:
- In this case it was for the appellants to substantiate their case to the Tribunal, including production of evidence for consideration by the Tribunal.
- Second, the facts clearly demonstrate that the relevant summonses, while apparently included in the material before the Tribunal, were not translated into English. As a general proposition, while s 414 of the Act requires the Tribunal to review decisions of the Minister, it is not for the Tribunal to arrange to have material on the file translated where the relevance of the material is not explained: Cabal v Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs [2001] FCA 546 at [25]. In this case, in light of the obligation on the appellants to make their own case, it could not be expected that the Tribunal would take the appellants through the file on a document by document search in an endeavour to locate the summonses when they were not apparent, in English, on the face of the file. To the extent that the Tribunal was obliged to ask the appellants about the location of the summonses because the appellants’ case clearly relied in part on the existence of those documents, I consider that the Tribunal discharged that obligation when it put to the first appellant that it had not seen the summonses and outlined the documents on the file. That this is so is also clear from:
- The fact that, when the Tribunal specifically asked the appellants about the whereabouts of the summonses, the final answer given to the Tribunal was that the appellants would need to ask their migration agent. To that extent, there is no evidence (unlike, for example, in SZLSW v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship [2008] FCA 1321; (2008) 103 ALD 580) that the Tribunal was taken to the summonses and the relevance of those documents explained despite the lack of translation. In those circumstances it is not surprising that the Tribunal should have concluded that the summonses were not in the material before it.
So documents have to be translated for the decision maker to take them into account. There is no requirement in the Migration Regulations that the translation need be NAATI certified.