Swedish translator in Tbilisi

Swedish translation is the most frequent of the Scandinavian languages in Georgia, and there are several particular reasons for that. Sweden is one of Georgia's largest donors, and the programmes of Sida, Swedish foundations and consultants have worked in Georgia since the 1990s; Swedish universities, KTH, Lund, Uppsala, Chalmers and Karolinska, take Georgian master's and doctoral students, often on a scholarship of the Swedish Institute; Swedish IT and engineering companies hire Georgian specialists; Georgian doctors apply for a licence in the Swedish healthcare system; and Georgian wine has in recent years established itself on the shelves of Sweden's state alcohol monopoly, Systembolaget. We translate from Swedish into Georgian and from Georgian into Swedish, certify the translation before a notary and attach the apostille at the House of Justice. On this page we explain what makes Sweden different even from Denmark and Norway: the institution of the state-authorised translator, administered by Kammarkollegiet, the personal number without which nothing can be done in Sweden, a state that issues no birth certificates, an apostille attached only by a notarius publicus, and an institution of cohabitation that Georgian law does not recognise.

The authorised translator (auktoriserad translator) and Kammarkollegiet

In Sweden an official translation is performed by a state-authorised translator, whom Kammarkollegiet, one of Sweden's oldest state authorities, enters on its list after an authorisation examination and who holds a stamp and an authorisation number of their own. The authorisation is issued for a language pair and a direction, and a translator authorised in the Georgian-Swedish pair practically does not exist in Sweden: the list contains English, Arabic, Persian, Russian, German, Finnish and dozens of other languages, but not Georgian. Swedish authorities, Migrationsverket, Skatteverket, UHR and Socialstyrelsen, ask for the translation of a foreign document from an authorised translator, but most of those same authorities accept an English document without any translation, and this is the key point for a Georgian client: an English translation of a Georgian document, with notarial certification and an apostille, is enough for almost every Swedish authority, while a Swedish translation is needed when a particular authority or court asks for it expressly, and in that case our Swedish translation goes with notarial certification and an apostille, with the force of a foreign public document. In the opposite direction, when a Swedish document is translated into Georgian, the Georgian system applies: a Georgian notary certifies our translator's signature, and a Georgian authority accepts that.

Sweden issues no birth certificates: personnummer and personbevis

The first thing we clarify for a Georgian client: Sweden does not issue birth, marriage or death certificates in the European sense. Every civil status act is recorded in the population register (folkbokföring) of the tax agency (Skatteverket), and the function of a birth certificate is performed by an extract from the register (personbevis, utdrag om folkbokföringsuppgifter), which Skatteverket issues with different contents according to its purpose: for birth, for marriage, for the address, for family status. A Georgian authority asks for a "birth certificate", and we translate the personbevis so that the title and the structure stay faithful to the original, while in a note we explain that this is the equivalent of a birth certificate in the Swedish system; a Georgian notary and the House of Justice accept that form, provided the extract carries a Swedish apostille and our translation certified before a notary. At the centre of the register is the personal number (personnummer), twelve digits, with the date of birth and four further digits, without which a bank account, BankID, healthcare, work and contracts are impossible in Sweden; a foreigner receives it when registering at Skatteverket if they stay in Sweden for more than one year, and for a shorter period a coordination number (samordningsnummer). For the registration Skatteverket asks for the Georgian birth certificate, marriage certificate and residence document, with an apostille and a translation, and this is often the first package we prepare towards Sweden. The Georgian personal number has eleven digits, and both stay unchanged in the translation, with a note saying which belongs to which system.

Who comes to us for Swedish translation

• Master's and doctoral students at KTH, at the universities of Lund, Uppsala, Stockholm and Gothenburg, at Chalmers and Karolinska, often on a scholarship of the Swedish Institute
• IT specialists, engineers and researchers at Swedish companies, in the technology clusters of Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmo
• Doctors, nurses and dentists applying to Socialstyrelsen for a licence
• Georgian-Swedish families and cohabiting partners: marriage, sambo, registration of a child in both countries, divorce, inheritance
• Georgians living in Sweden who need a Swedish extract, court decision or pension document in Georgia
• Exporters of Georgian wine, hazelnuts and mineral water working with Systembolaget's importers and with Swedish chains
• Swedish companies, Sida programmes, foundations and consultants working in Georgia
• Georgian and Swedish lawyers working on cases connected with the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce arbitration institute (SCC)

The apostille in Sweden: only the notarius publicus

Sweden has applied the Hague Apostille Convention since 1999, and since 2005 the apostille on a Swedish document is issued only by a notarius publicus, appointed by the county administrative board (länsstyrelsen) and present in every city, often in an advocate's office. For a Georgian in Sweden this is convenient: a personbevis, a diploma, a criminal record certificate or a court decision is apostilled at a local notary in a single visit, with no need to go to any ministry. One detail that comes up almost always in Sweden: most Swedish documents today are digital, a personbevis is downloaded as a PDF from the Skatteverket site, the criminal record certificate (utdrag ur belastningsregistret) comes from the police in a sealed envelope or digitally, a diploma is issued from the Ladok system with an electronic signature. A Georgian authority asks for a printed version with an apostille, and the notarius publicus certifies a printed copy of the digital document and attaches the apostille, or, in the case of a personbevis, a stamped version is sent by Skatteverket; we tell the client in advance in which format to request the document. In the opposite direction a Georgian document receives the apostille at the House of Justice, which we handle within the order. The apostille is attached to the original, not to the translation.

Migrationsverket: the work permit, the salary threshold and the family

Residence and work permits in Sweden are issued by the migration agency (Migrationsverket), and an application for a work permit is preceded by a vacancy advertised in Sweden by the employer and by an offer, while since November 2023 a minimum salary threshold applies, 80 per cent of Sweden's median salary, which changes every year and which has practically closed labour migration for low-paid occupations; this means that most of our Georgian clients come from IT, engineering, research and healthcare. Migrationsverket receives applications online, with documents as uploaded copies, and asks for a Swedish or English translation of a foreign-language document; English is the shortest route here too, and a Georgian diploma, employment contract, marriage and birth certificates are prepared in English, with notarial certification and an apostille. For family reunification (anhöriginvandring) Migrationsverket asks for documents proving the relationship and for certificates of the accommodation and income of the partner in Sweden, and here the Swedish institution of cohabitation appears, which we explain separately below. For a student residence proof of admission, of payment of the tuition fee and of financial means is needed, because students from outside the European Union have paid tuition fees in Sweden since 2011 unless they hold a scholarship.

Sambo: a cohabitation that Swedish law recognises and Georgian law does not

A large part of couples in Sweden live without marriage, and the cohabitation act (sambolagen) gives such partners (sambo) certain rights over the common home and property, while Migrationsverket recognises a sambo relationship as a ground for family reunification if the couple has lived together or plans to do so. Georgian law does not recognise this institution, and that appears in two directions. A Georgian going to a Swedish partner with sambo status submits to Migrationsverket documents proving the relationship, a joint tenancy agreement, photographs, correspondence, a certificate of family status from Georgia, and we prepare that package in English; in the opposite direction a Swedish document where a person is marked as "sambo", the family status field of a personbevis, a court decision on the division of property, an inheritance document, is translated for a Georgian notary and court with a functional explanation, so that "sambo" is read neither as "spouse" nor as "a stranger". The translation keeps the term of the original and explains in a note what rights Swedish law grants that status, because it is exactly this that matters in a Georgian inheritance or property case.

Educational documents: U/G/VG, A-F and UHR

The Swedish marking system is the most unusual of all for a Georgian recipient: a large part of the universities uses a three-step scale, U (fail), G (pass), VG (pass with distinction), some universities, technical ones especially, use the letters A-F or the figures 3-4-5, while schools have used the A-F system since 2011, where E is the pass minimum and F a fail. All three scales may occur in the transcript of one and the same student, according to the course, and a grade point average is often not calculated at all in the Swedish system. In the Georgian translation of a Swedish diploma (examensbevis) and transcript (studieintyg, a Ladok extract) every scale is explained separately, and in a note we write that the absence of an average is a feature of the Swedish system and not a defect of the document; this is often exactly the question that Georgia's National Center for Educational Quality Enhancement asks. In the opposite direction the assessment of a Georgian diploma in Sweden is carried out by the Swedish Council for Higher Education (UHR, Universitets- och högskolerådet), which is also Sweden's ENIC/NARIC centre, receives documents online in Swedish or English and, in the case of a Georgian diploma, asks for the transcript and the description of the study programme; admission to a master's programme runs through the common portal universityadmissions.se, where the Georgian school certificate and diploma are uploaded in English with an apostille and notarial certification, and the portal's requirements as to the format of documents are fairly strict, which we take into account when preparing the package.

Socialstyrelsen and Georgian doctors: kunskapsprov and Swedish C1

The Swedish healthcare system, especially in the northern counties, lacks doctors and nurses, and for Georgian specialists this is a real direction. The licensing (legitimation) of medical education obtained outside the European Union passes through several stages at the National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialstyrelsen): the assessment of documents, the knowledge examination (kunskapsprov) held by the university of Umea or Karolinska, proof of Swedish at level C1, a course in Swedish legislation and a practical service. Translation is needed at the very first stage: the diploma, the transcript, the description of the study programme with hours, the certificate of internship or residency, the specialty certificate and the Georgian licence, all with an apostille and a certified translation into English or Swedish, and Socialstyrelsen also asks the university to confirm the copy of the diploma directly. In medical terminology Swedish uses words of its own beside the Latin, and translating a Swedish discharge summary or an extract from a journal (journalutdrag) calls for experience in the field, especially when a Georgian doctor is reading the history of a treatment carried out in Sweden.

Marriage and family: hindersprövning and registering a child at Skatteverket

Before a marriage in Sweden a couple must pass the check of impediments (hindersprövning) at Skatteverket, and the foreign partner must submit a certificate that under the law of their country there is no impediment to the marriage; the Georgian certificate of family status, the birth certificate and, in the case of a previous marriage, the divorce document are prepared with an apostille and an English or Swedish translation, and Skatteverket accepts English directly. The marriage is conducted by a civil registrar or by an authorised officiant of the Church of Sweden or another denomination, and the marriage certificate (vigselbevis) is then reflected again in the Skatteverket register, from which a personbevis on the marriage is issued for Georgia, with the apostille of a notarius publicus and our Georgian translation. The birth of a child in Sweden means a double registration for a Georgian parent: the hospital notifies Skatteverket of the birth, the parents register the child's name online, and for Georgia a personbevis on the birth, stating both parents, goes with an apostille and our translation to the consulate or the House of Justice. The Swedish system grants a child Swedish citizenship by birth if at least one parent is a Swedish citizen, and dual citizenship has been permitted in Sweden since 2001, which a Georgian parent should take into account when preparing documents.

Swedish documents we translate most often

• Skatteverket extracts (personbevis) on birth, marriage, address and family status
• The criminal record certificate (utdrag ur belastningsregistret) from the police, in a sealed envelope or digitally
• The data of the residence card and decisions of Migrationsverket
• The diploma (examensbevis), the Ladok transcript, the school certificate (slutbetyg, gymnasieexamen), the description of the study programme
• Skatteverket tax certificates, the annual income statement (inkomstdeklaration, kontrolluppgift)
• Documents of the social insurance agency (Försäkringskassan) and the pensions agency (Pensionsmyndigheten) on parental leave, sickness, child allowance and pension
• Court decisions on maintenance, guardianship, divorce and inheritance cases, the estate inventory (bouppteckning) registered by Skatteverket
• The extract of the companies register (Bolagsverket) (registreringsbevis), the articles (bolagsordning), minutes of the board
• Documents for the import of wine and food for Systembolaget's importers: the product description, the label text, laboratory analyses

Business with Sweden: AB, Bolagsverket, Sida and Systembolaget

The Swedish limited company (AB, aktiebolag) is the main form of company in Sweden and functionally corresponds both to the Georgian Sh.P.S. and to a joint stock company, in a private (privat) and a public (publikt) variant; it is registered at the companies register (Bolagsverket), and the registration certificate (registreringsbevis) is the corporate document most often translated for the Georgian public register and for banks. A Swedish company has an organisation number (organisationsnummer), ten digits, in a format resembling that of the personal number, and a European VAT number (with the SE prefix), and both stay unchanged in the translation. One large part of the Georgian-Swedish relationship is development cooperation: Sida's programmes finance projects in democracy, gender equality, the environment and economic development in Georgia, and the contracts, reports, audit opinions and evaluation methodologies of these projects move in English, but the internal documents of Swedish foundations and organisations, the minutes of supervisory boards and Swedish budget terminology are translated directly from Swedish. Wine is a subject of its own: the retail sale of alcohol in Sweden is in the hands of the state monopoly, Systembolaget, which selects products by tender and buys through importers, and taking part in a tender with Georgian wine calls for the exact translation of the product description, the label, laboratory analyses and sustainability documents, where the terminology of qvevri, of the traditional grape varieties and of the method of production often establishes itself in Swedish precisely in these documents.

Transliteration: Swedish names in Georgian

Swedish names are carried into Georgian by pronunciation, not by letters, and the logic of English always goes wrong here: the Swedish sj, skj and stj sound, which has no exact counterpart in Georgian, ordinarily passes over as sh, k before soft vowels comes close to sh or ch, g before soft vowels sounds like a y, while å, ä and ö are vowels rendered approximately as o and e. Göran becomes Iorani in Georgian, Håkan becomes Hokani, Sjöberg becomes Sheberg, Kjellberg becomes Shelberg, Åsa becomes Osa, Göteborg becomes Geteborgi, Malmö becomes Malme, Linköping becomes Linshepingi, Växjö becomes Vekshe, Örebro becomes Erebru. Once chosen, a form stays unchanged in every document of that person or place, and if a name has a form established in Georgian (Stokholmi, Upsala), we keep it. In the Swedish system a person may have several given names, and in a personbevis one of them, the name in use (tilltalsnamn), is often marked with emphasis or a separate note; in the translation we keep every name in the order of the original and explain in a note which one is in use, because in other Swedish documents the person often appears under that name alone. In the opposite direction a Georgian name goes into Swedish in the Latin spelling of the passport, and we do not change that spelling.

Typical mistakes in Swedish translation

When we check other people's translations, the same mistakes recur: translating a personbevis as a "birth certificate" without a note, after which a Georgian official asks for "the real certificate", or, conversely, requesting from Skatteverket an extract for the wrong purpose; choosing the slow route of a Swedish translation where English would have been enough; looking for an authorised Swedish translator in the Georgian-Swedish pair, which does not exist; printing and translating a digital document without the apostille of a notarius publicus; "converting" the U/G/VG scale into Georgian points or inventing a grade point average; translating sambo as "spouse"; omitting the name in use or reading it as a different name; writing Göteborg and Göran by their letters instead of their sound; translating AB merely as "joint stock company" without a functional explanation; stating the old salary threshold in a Migrationsverket application; and carrying wine terminology over approximately in Systembolaget tender documents. Every one of these points is on our checklist, and the editor checks every Swedish translation against that list.

What sets our Swedish translation apart

• We know where English is enough and where a Swedish authority asks for Swedish, and we tell you before the order
• An explanation of the personbevis, the personnummer, sambo and the Swedish scales in a format comprehensible to a Georgian notary and authority
• Knowledge of the formats of Migrationsverket, UHR, Socialstyrelsen and universityadmissions.se and of the rule for apostilling digital documents
• Terminology of Sida projects, of corporate documents and of Systembolaget papers, including Swedish wine vocabulary
• Notarial certification by a translator registered in the Georgian-Swedish pair and the apostille at the House of Justice within one order
• A standard personal document in 1 working day, express in 1-2 hours, the process fully remote, from Stockholm and from Gothenburg as well

Frequently asked questions