Do you work in the public sector, serving the public, and do you need to make use of spoken word interpreters?

We ask you to protect the public and yourself by ensuring you only ever engage the services of registered and regulated public service interpreting professionals.

 Watch out for ersatz and pseudo interpreters sent to you from agencies that recruit bilingual speakers who have no interpreting professional qualifications or experience. If an interpreter is not registered with the National Register of Public Service Interpreters (NRPSI), they are not regulated by the National Regulator. Should things go wrong, only registered and regulated interpreting professionals adhere to the NRPSI Code of Professional Conduct and are prepared to be held accountable for their work by NRPSI, the UK’s only independent, not-for-profit regulator of spoken word public service interpreting.

 Earlier this year, an agency announced it was recruiting bilingual speakers with no qualifications for government opportunities. These government opportunities were for; “a large number of active requirements calling out for bilingual speakers across the United Kingdom.”

 Surely no government officer, public servant, judge, barrister, solicitor, doctor, nurse or allied health professional would accept to work with an interpreter who does not possess the qualifications or experience needed for the task and who is not registered or regulated?

 Words matter.

 It is that simple.

 If the interpreting function fails, we lay ourselves open to miscarriages of justice; misdiagnoses leading to all sorts of problems for patients, medical professionals and the NHS; and desperate situations for those who need help from our social services.

 To protect the public, to defend the reputation of the public services and to ensure professionalism in public sector interpreting, always ensure you insist on an independently accredited interpreter who has had their qualifications checked, experience validated and their security clearances reviewed; check the annually updated ID card which is only issued each year after a strenuous renewal process for each Registrant.

 NRPSI (www.nrpsi.org.uk) was created 26 years ago to ensure professionalism in public service interpreting. The online National Register is free to use, easy to access and guarantees you the services of a registered and regulated interpreting professional.