My daughter is a lawyer and she won't speak Chinese with clients because Chinese is not an official language. She has to keep a record of all conversation and correspondance with her clients. ( Although her Japanese is better than Chinese)
A lawyer friend of mine was helping her associate to explain a mortgage agreement to her associate's Chinese client. They were a couple and the wife was from Canon (Toysan) and her husband was from Hong Kong. She explained the mortgage agreement in cantonese to the couple. One of the term stated that the couple are "jointly and severally"
are equally responsible for carrying out the full terms of the mortgage agreement. The couple divorced a few years later and the husband returned to HK. the bank went after the wife for the full amount.
The wife said based on her understanding from my friend's interpretation, she was only responsible for half of the whole amount and the bank should go after her husband for the other half. She also claimed that my friend was not speaking "Toysanese' and that was the reason why her understanding of the mortgage agreement was different.
The wife sued my friend and won a settlement. My friend can't speak "Toysanese" and her associate did pay her $100 fee to do the interpretation and she didn't document what she had said to the wife.
I told my daughter what happened and she will only speak or correspond with her client on business matters in english only.