Abstract
This paper shows a qualitative phenomenological research study aimed at analyzing if translation clients consider the profile of the translator, when they require their services. Thus, we focused this study on the analysis of two essential factors: formal education and certification and how they impact on the demand for translation services. We applied a survey to 88 translation clients in Colombia, who were randomly selected. We found that there is a high percentage of official documents to be translated, but we also found that the main criteria for clients to select a translator is his/her certification as official, even if this certificate is not necessary. We found that clients in general do not understand the difference between professional and certified translator. Finally, we suggest the creation of other kind of certifications for translators depending on the specific area they translate, in order to certify professional translators in different areas additional to “official”. We also suggest including formal education as a previous requirement for the certification of official translators, so all official translators would be professional translators.
Keywords
Professional translator; official translation; formal education; certification; profile of the translator