Certified Translation
Certified translation of degrees, diplomas and transcripts for UK ENIC, university admissions, professional regulators and employers.
A certified degree certificate translation costs £35 to £60 per page with the signed certification statement included, and a single-page certificate is normally ready the next working day. Our translations are accepted by UK ENIC (Ecctis), UK universities and employers, and used for professional registration with UK regulators, delivered as a PDF with a stamped hard copy by tracked Royal Mail.
Prism Linguistics has translated academic paperwork in 300+ languages since 2013: a native speaker does the work and a second linguist checks it. This page deals with degrees, diplomas and transcripts specifically. The general rules on what certification means in the UK are on our certified translation page.
Four groups, mostly. UK ENIC, the national agency for recognising overseas qualifications, will not assess a document it cannot read, so anything not in English needs a certified translation alongside it. University admissions offices ask at application or enrolment, typically for postgraduate offers where the first degree was awarded abroad. Professional regulators ask when someone who trained overseas wants to register and practise here. Employers and their background-screening firms ask when a job offer depends on the qualification claimed.
The timing is what trips people up. An admissions office can sit on your file for weeks, then request the translation with days to spare before enrolment closes. Worth sorting early. If your degree is going into a visa application rather than a university one, the requirements sit with UKVI instead; our immigration document translation page covers that route.
A statement of comparability tells a UK institution what your award is worth against the UK framework. Ecctis asks for the certificate and, in some cases, the transcript, each with a certified translation carrying a signed statement of accuracy. Regulators usually want identity evidence in the same bundle, so if your ID needs translating as well, our passport translation service works the same way and arrives in the same envelope.
Transcripts are the fiddly part. A degree certificate is one page of names and dates; a transcript is tables of module codes, credit values, contact hours and grades, sometimes across six or eight pages. We format the translation to mirror the original, table for table and row for row, so a registrar can run a finger down both documents and compare them line by line. That sounds cosmetic. It isn't: a translation the reader cannot map back to the source gets queried, and queries cost you weeks.
Grading systems are noted, never converted. If the transcript says 9.2, the translation says 9.2, with a note that the scale runs to 10. We translate what the document says; deciding what that is worth against a UK 2:1 is UK ENIC's job, and a translator who offers to do the conversion for you is doing you no favours. The same principle covers diploma translation and diploma supplements, which are longer versions of the same exercise. A certified Romanian translation of a Bologna-format diploma supplement comes through the door most weeks.
A thesis chapter or research papers count as ordinary translation services work rather than certificate territory; we quote per word either way.
Not the original. A scan or a phone photo is fine, provided every word, stamp, seal and signature is legible and no corner is cropped. Photograph the back if anything is printed there, and send every page of a transcript, including the ones that look like boilerplate. Universities are surprisingly keen on the boilerplate.
Two things worth telling us up front. First, how your name is spelt on your passport, because transliteration varies and the receiving body will match the translation against your ID. Second, if your name has changed since you graduated, send the document that bridges the gap; a certified marriage certificate translation alongside the degree usually settles the question before anyone thinks to raise it.
No account, no minimum spend. Most orders start and finish by email.
Upload your degree certificate, and transcript pages if you need them, through the online quote form or by email. Tell us the language and who will receive the translation: UK ENIC, a university, a regulator or an employer.
We reply within one working hour during office hours. Certificates are priced per page, transcripts per word, and the quote is the price you pay.
A native-speaker translator does the work and a second linguist reviews it. You receive a PDF with the signed statement of accuracy, plus a stamped hard copy by tracked Royal Mail if you need one.
Academic paperwork has its own vocabulary: module codes, credit systems, honours classifications that don't map neatly between countries. Your documents go to a professionally qualified native speaker who has translated them before, and a second linguist checks grades, names and dates against the original. What we never do is convert a grade; we translate what the certificate says and leave equivalency to UK ENIC, which is what they prefer.
A standard single-page degree certificate is priced per page, £35 to £60, with the signed certification statement included. No separate certification fee, no charge for the PDF. Transcripts and diploma supplements are priced per word: standard work in common European languages runs £0.09 to £0.14 per word, and where the transcript needs certifying, which it usually does, £0.12 to £0.18 is the realistic band. Rare languages sit higher because qualified translators are scarce.
Turnaround for a single-page certificate is normally the next working day. If enrolment closes on Friday and it is already Wednesday afternoon, say so: urgent and same day translation options exist for short documents, subject to capacity, and we would rather give you a straight no than a comfortable maybe. Wider context on rates is on our pricing page. For your own document, the quote form gets you a fixed price within one working hour during office hours.
The traffic runs both ways. If a degree is heading to an employer or university in another country, the receiving body may ask for a notarised or apostilled translation rather than a certified one. We don't arrange notarisation or apostille ourselves; what we do is prepare the certified translation in exactly the form your notary public needs to complete the job. The detail, including when a notary is genuinely required (less often than people fear), is on our notarised translation page.
Send a scan, tell us who will receive it, and a fixed price comes back within one working hour during office hours.