#10 – Paying promptly for the services of a plumber/lawyer/doctor is a must.  However, the translator doesn’t mind waiting indefinitely for payment.

#09 – Anybody with two years of high school language (or a foreign tongued grandmother) can translate.

#08 – A good translator doesn’t need a dictionary.

#07 – There’s no difference between translation and interpretation.

#06 – Translators don’t mind working nights and weekends at no extra charge.

#05 – Translators don’t need to understand what they’re translating.

#04 – A good translator doesn’t need proofing or editing.

#03 – Translation is just typing in a foreign language.

#02 – A translator costs $49.95 at Radio Shack and runs on two AA batteries.

And the Top #01 misconception about translation and translators is:
The document that took a team of 20 people two months to put together can be translated overnight by one person and still retain the same impact as the original.

Do you have your own list of misconceptions? Do you want to add something more to this, please post in a comment and share your ideas and thoughts.

This blog post has been contributed by Lisa G. Siegel-Cruz, a Spanish-English translator from Florida, Orlando. Lisa is a member of ATA (American Translators Association) and you can reach her on http://bit.ly/7GQj3M. At TranslationArtwork.com your translations are in safe hands, believe me.