Category: Legal Spanish Vocabulary

Feminine noun. In retail, is the process of a customer taking previously purchased merchandise back to the retailer, and in turn receiving a refund in the original form of payment, exchange for another item (identical or different), or a store credit. E.g.: La devolución de compras de paquetes multiples en empaques sin abrir serán reembolsadas al precio prorrateado de compra por caja al momento de la venta: Returns of unopened boxes from multi-pack purchases will be refunded at the pro-rata purchase price per box at the time of original sale.
The verb is devolver. dc

Feminine plural noun. Goods intended for sale, stored in a warehouse or store. E.g.: Desafortunadamente, no tenemos existencias de uno o más de los productos que has pedido: Unfortunately, one or more of your items is currently out of stock. dc

Feminine noun. Account in which items sold or services performed are detailed with their price and delivered to the customer to demand payment. E.g.: La factura en este caso se basará en los precios ofrecidos por el proveedor : The Invoice will therefore be based on prices offered by our supplier.
The verb is facturar.
By the way, in Argentina, una factura is also a specific kind of pastry very good for breakfast with mate, and facturar is the whole process of making hams, sausages and other cold cuts out of a pork. I also remember vividly that my mother used to call facura a bad spell, but I haven’t found that meaning in the RAE. dc

Verb. To give something to someone, or make him happen to have it. E.g.: Podría entregar a todos sus proveedores breves descripciones de su uso y de sus condiciones de uso: You may wish to provide brief descriptions of your use and conditions of use to all of your suppliers.
The noun is la entrega. E.g.: No hay que dar por hecho que el método de entrega aporta legitimidad al contenido del paquete: Do not assume that the method of delivery lends any legitimacy to the contents of the package. dc

Masculine noun. A remito is a document that is used in different business operations. It is issued by a seller in order to prove the shipment of certain goods: when they arrive at their destination, the receiver must sign the original shipment and return it to the seller.
The verb is remitir: to send. E.g.: Si la entrega es con remito, el Proveedor deberá remitir las facturas, que no podrán ser cedidas, dentro de los 5 días siguientes: If the delivery is made upon a dispatch note, the Supplier shall submit the invoice, which is not transferable, within 5 days.
Another term with the same root is the noun remitente: sender, shipper. dc

Adjective. This word is very common in Legal Spanish and it does not have a direct translation into English. It can be translated into ‘reliable, authentic’, but it means much more than that. The RAE defines it as que hace fe, fidedigno. I think this needs a deeper explanation. As you can see, there are two words here: fe (faith), haciente (making): faith-making. My partner David is here telling me that in English ‘faith-making’ means nothing and I trust him because he is English and a journalist. But, in Spanish it means a lot: Que hace fe means something like ‘that it proofs that what it declares is trustworthy’. For example: un documento fehaciente. But the problem does not finish here; this adjective is often used in the expression de forma fehaciente, or more often we use the adverb fehacientemente. That means that what is done it is done in a way that it can be proven. The perfect example is the expression notificación fehaciente, or notificado fehacientemente; this means that the notification is made in a way that who makes it can pove they made it. Does this make any sense? I will give you a real text here: El ejercicio de este derecho deberá hacerse mediante notificación fehaciente que habrá de recibirse en el domicilio social: In order to exercise this right, the shareholder or shareholders shall provide due verifiable notification sent to the registered offices of the Company.
In another note and speaking about faith, dar fe means ‘to attest’. I think it all makes sense now. A student has told me that the best translation of fehaciente could be ‘verifiable’, and I kind of agree. dc