Do I really need a native bilingual professional translator?

Many times, a potential client approaches me for a job and asks for a quote to translate a document from Hebrew to English (or vice versa). When I give the price, some clients agree and some say, "But I can get it for less with ---, they gave me a quote half the price".

Just like the old lady in the picture, there are many translators in the market today -- and even more who present themselves as "agencies". These people have a nice website that presents multiple languages and, in fact, work alone. You can never know who is behind that website.

These people take work in all languages and then either outsource it on websites like Fiverr for the lowest bid, in the best case, or, in the worst case, use Google Translate for the translation. With today's technology and the many websites that offer keyboards for every language in the world, it's super easy to type the source into one and then use Google Translate. I even did it once when I tried to figure out the language of a document a client claimed was Russian, but turned out to be Uzbek, since they are easily confused, since both use the Cyrillic writing system. I referred the client to the appropriate translator and saved him a few $$ on the way.

But that's not the point.

The point is that this case explains why you should go not only straight to the translator itself and save the middleman fee of those big "agencies" that collect from you, but also know that this person knows both (or more) languages at an advanced level, if not as a native/mother tongue. It will still cost you, but not as much as the agencies -- that pay hunger wages to the people who actually work for them with a stressful deadline they determine, and they don't really care about the quality and visibility of the translation - "as long as it's passable," the project manager in such a company once told me.

A great native or bilingual translator not only knows their limitations, but also knows the language at the deepest level and can identify mistakes and conventions that are not easily recognizable.

Want an example? Take a look at this picture here:

​ This is only part of a marriage certificate that I translated recently.

For those who don't read Hebrew, on the right is the criteria field "current occupation," and the other two columns describe the groom's (in the middle) and the bride's (on the left) occupations.

A non-native or non-bilingual translator who receives this project will input the groom's occupation into Google Translate or another Hebrew-English dictionary and will receive the following results:

In both cases, the translation of the groom's occupation "צבע קבע" (reads: T'zev'aa K'ev'a) yields the same result - Permanent Color. A non-native or non-bilingual translator will not ask whether it's correct or makes sense, but will give it back to you as is. Since you probably paid in advance, you will have a problem reaching them to correct it. If it's an honest person, they will respond. If it's an agency, they might be easily reached, but still have an issue correcting it.

However, a native or bilingual translator knows two things - first, that in Hebrew there is an additional orthographic system of lines and dots (Niqqud) which gives the letters their sounds, and as such changes completely the meaning of words that are written the same (homophones); and second, that there is a spelling mistake.

In fact, the word "צבע" (with the letter Ayin) should spell "צבא" (with the letter Alef) (T'za'v'a), which means Army, and with the conjunction to the word "קבע" (that should be read: Ke'va), actually means Standing Army.

We have encountered too numerous to count such mistakes, and since our in house Hebrew <> English linguist has taught Modern Hebrew in the USA school for 3 years, and has a level 9 B2.2 proficiency (see explanation on Berlitz website), and working as an OPI's grader for Berlitz as a contractor, she is qualified to translate from Hebrew to English, and English to Hebrew.

So, if you ever need a good, reliable, and quality translation, you know where to turn!

Just give us a call!