Is there really any viable free translation service out there?

So why the interest in free translation? Actually, it is understandable. With businesses these days being multinational, and with both clients and source skills being based around the world, it is inevitable that translation services should be in demand. If you have such a business, you have probably come upon this need yourself.Now, you have two choices: either you go in for free translation or you can hire a professional translation service for your needs. But is free translation even possible? Of course it is. There are all sorts of software offered online that are free to use and which can allow you to translate reasonably efficiently between two languages. If a document just needs to be translated into your language so that you can understand it, then this is a reasonable way to go. However, translation technology has not arrived at that level of perfection that it can reliably be used for business purposes.For that matter, even for your own personal use you will find that if you translate from some other language into your own using online software, there will be certain words that the software will not be able to comprehend. So, there are definite issues with using online software for translations.The problem  with trying to get things for free is that quality cannot be assured. If you don’t go to a professional, and instead rely upon online software for your translation needs, then when online software cannot handle a passage that you need translated, you’ll find that you’re stuck and you have no one to turn to. This is the real problem with free translation, and when you contrast that with the reliability and adaptability of professional translators, you understand that there is a great difference.The important part about professional translation services is that they use human translators, and a human translator has certain natural advantages over the machine translation provided by online sites. Just consider all the subtle nuances that a language consists of. Take the English language itself and how it’s spoken differently in different parts of the world, for example in Great Britain, or in America, or even in Australia. There is also slang used in language sometimes, or idioms, which can be very difficult to translate.Now, a human translator can handle these different aspects of the language and still turn out a translation that is both polished and understandable, and most importantly, a translation that is actually accurate. After all, when you’re reading a document that you’ve translated from another language, you want to be sure that what you’re reading is what was actually intended by the person who wrote the document. In other words, if the translation is wrong, then your decision based upon reading that translation might also be wrong. And that is dangerous for any business and should be avoided if at all possible.The simple fact is that you cannot get anything of reasonably good quality for free, and this applies to free translation as well. If you want quality and accuracy, then it’s best that you pay for it, and that’s what professional translation agencies are all about. Better still, a professional translation agency can probably source translators from the very country that a document originates from, leading to a far great level of accuracy in the translation. Besides that, a professional translation agency will also have a document proofread by someone who is a native of the destination country for that document, and this results in a translation that a native speaker will not be able to detect as being a translation.  Isn’t this the level of quality that your business requires and indeed deserves? Employing a professional translation agency rather than using online software for free translation ensures that your business is run on a firm footing and that understanding between people who speak and understand different languages is maximized.