If you’ve heard of “over the phone translation services,” that’s great news. That means you’re already a step ahead. The ability to access speakers of a variety of languages by simply picking up a phone is a wonderful tool to have at your disposal. Even so, there are a few misconceptions out there about exactly what “over the phone translation” services really are.
Here are three of those misconceptions with clarification:
While interpreting and translation do have a lot in common, they are not the same thing. The correct term should actually be “over the phone interpreting services.” Interpreters deal with spoken language, changing the words and sentences from one tongue into another. Translators deal with written text and documents. When working over the phone, you’ll need to hire an interpreter, because you’ll be dealing with oral communication, not written.
While being bilingual is definitely a leg up for anyone who wants to work as an over the phone interpreter, it isn’t an automatic skill. Speed, accuracy, depth of knowledge in various fields (including vocabulary native speakers might not be all that familiar with), experience, and training all go into making a top-notch phone interpreter. Similar to how most people can draw a picture or write a sentence, but may not necessarily be Rembrandt or Hemingway, interpreting skills take training, training, training…
Once you’ve taken care of the purely technical side (languages and training) of what over the phone translation services (interpreting services) can do for you, you’ll probably want to work with a friendly interpreter who knows how to deal with a variety of different kinds of people and personality types. That’s the customer service side of phone interpreting. When balanced with the right technical skills, the customer service and technical aspects come together, creating great interpreters able to handle a diversity of jobs and handle them well.