I think I've already posted this on some forum here. I have it as a TXT file on my desktop. Whenever I see the need for it, I copy & paste it on the bid, adapting properly.
Today I received a USD 0.025/word job offer, so I sent it.
Dear XXX,
VERY honestly - I am not joking - for USD 5 cents/word or less, I strongly advise you to use free machine translation. The flaws will be different, but the overall quality you'll get will be about the same.
I know that, because now and then I get hired by translation agencies that went overboard on the cheap side... to redo translations obtained for USD 5¢/word or less. I've seen them, I've been asked if there is any way to recover or fix them for less than the full translation rate. If the end-client has anyone who can read the target language, they'll bluntly reject the whole job at once. And no proofreader worth their salt will fix that 'junk' at proofreading rates.
I know that some translations are required only for compliance to certain requirements; they'll be received, acknowledged and immediately filed forever. Nobody will ever read them. So machine translation engines will allow you to make a bundle without wasting money on amateur translators.
If any client accidentally reads the free machine translations you sell and rejects them, you'll have more money left to afford having them redone by a professional.
Rates in the EN-PT pair are gradually settling worldwide in the following ranges, all in US cents per word:
5¢ and under - unacceptable work, better use MT
7¢-8¢ - low quality work - though a spell/grammar checker won't find errors there, a bilingual reader will intuitively back-translate every phrase to get its meaning. Monoglots will be puzzled.
9¢-11¢ - standard good quality translation
12¢ and above - translation in specialized subjects (legal, finance, medical, technical etc.)
The 6¢ slot for EN>PT is developing into a chasm. Outsourcers don't want to pay that much if they can get the same quality for less. Translators won't accept such rate if their professional level justifies charging more.
I hope this gives you some guidance to avoid wasting money on what you can do yourself for free.
Good luck!
Jose
Worst of it is that as the USD has dropped some 30% respective to the BRL (the currency I pay my bills in) since last January, these figures are getting obsolete.
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Maria Karra United States Local time: 13:02 Member (2000) Greek to English + ...
reply all
Nov 5, 2009
Jeff, your title "Was I wrong to do this?" gives me the impression that hitting "reply all" was intentional; I mean, generally we don't ask whether an accident was the right or wrong thing to do, do we? But then you write "I accidentally hit the REPLY ALL button" so if that's the case, if I were you I would write to the agency and apologize, but only for replying to everyone, NOT for what you said to them about the deadline and the rate. In any case it's partly the agency's fault for putting all those names in CC and not BCC.
Jeff Whittaker wrote:
Therefore, I sent them a reply asking if they had a non-free e-mail account and stating that I could not accept their project because of the crazy deadline and I stated my rate for non-rush work which was more than double the rate they were offering.
accidentally hit the REPLY ALL button, thus informing all of this agency's translators that the rate is too low. Oops. [/quote]
Well, you didn't really say their rate was too low. You said that your rate was much higher. I don't know exactly what you told them but it doesn't sound like you offended them.
As to the replies you've received.... Sad. Very sad.
Maria
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Eleftherios Kritikakis United States Local time: 12:02 Member (2003) Greek to English + ...
The Big Deal
Nov 5, 2009
"Don't know about other jurisdictions, but in the EU the any company/organisation collecting personal data has to be registered with the relevant regulator."
a) No personal data in this case. These email addresses are available and publicly advertised by their owners at proz.com and other sites, INVITING job proposals.
Therefore, the oursourcer did not commit any wrongdoing.
b) Jeff, for the same reason you didn't do anything wrong. There was no instruction to prohibit you from doing anything like that. You hit the "reply all" button. Big deal... also, everyone knows this price was low, you didn't reveal any government secrets, and even if they didn't, you just expressed an opinion. Big Deal.
c) Jose, you write too much stuff. Good stuff, but nobody's going to read it. Even if they did, they wouldn't care or wouldn't understand.
d) Finally, it's got nothing to do with "professionalism" etc. You guys have to losen up a little bit. We' re talking about a completely unregulated industry where nobody asks you "how much would you need to do this", instead, they are trying to "force a price" without considering difficulties that may arise during the project.
To general emails coming from all over the place about anything, in which everyone writes whatever the heck they want, I have the right to respond in any manner I want as well. I keep it simple, indifferent "Hello, unfortunately I have no time" and that's it.
e) Jeff, you did nothing wrong, and if you hurt anybody's feelings, let me know and I'll send them $50.
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Ángel Domínguez Spain Local time: 19:02 Member (2008) English to Spanish + ...
Not at all
Nov 5, 2009
My opinion:
a) The agency was very rude when they sent the same e-mail to more than 100 translators. They might as well have gone out on the streets and yelled “I got a translation job here, who wants to do it?”. This would be the opposite of a personal contact; If I saw 100+ recipients in an e-mail I would be very wary of it.
b) The agency SHOULD NOT have left the whole list of recipients for you (or anyone else) to see. Just consider that every other recipient now has seen your e-mail address. That’s a sign of sloppy behaviour and, most of all, disregard for the privacy of the recipients. In the European Union, that would probably imply a penalty for disseminating private information.
Ángel.
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Eleftherios Kritikakis United States Local time: 12:02 Member (2003) Greek to English + ...
No, it's not.
Nov 5, 2009
In the European Union, that would probably imply a penalty for disseminating private information.
No, it would not. If that was the case, then proz.com is also violating privacy laws since it "disseminates" all information of its members (by making them publicly available and by associating them with kudoz points, blue board scores, etc.).
When one party (the translators) have their email addresses available for anyone who wants to send them business proposals (through proz, etc), then there's no problem. The translators have already agreed to the use of their email addresses and phone numbers etc. for business purposes, and that was a genuine business purpose.
The same with proz happens with junk mail. When my address is available in the phone book, then businesses can send me their junk proposals. Sometimes they actually send "by mistake" their junk mail in the name of the previous tenant (so that I would be curious and open it). You can't prove that there's foul play, since the previous tenant was available for "business transactions".
An email address which is published at proz and other sites for anyone to see and under the assumption that it is available for business proposals, is not "private information".
===============================================
But anyway, Jeff did nothing wrong, although I have a feeling that he was working many days without company, all by himself, and then he wanted to communicate with someone, so he posted the first thing that was interesting in his day.
Hang on there Jeff, we' re all on the same boat... the first ten years are the tough ones
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RichardDeegan Peru Local time: 13:02 Spanish to English
Stay away from lawyers who have trouble keeping dates straight.
Nov 5, 2009
Jeff sent out his reply based on work to be done by "tomorrow", and received this response:
"Hi Jeff:
I'll be free starting next Monday.
Kind regards"
XXXXXX
Attorney At Law, DAAD Certificate in German Law"
Stay away from lawyers who are clueless about statutes of limitations, motion and court dates, etc
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I have my own template for these kind of offers.
I received the 0.025 USD offer this morning as well, even though I have changed my settings not to receive job offers under a certain rate...
[Modifié le 2009-11-05 03:03 GMT]
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ViktoriaG Canada Local time: 13:02 Member (2005) English to French + ...
An emerging "translator" breed
Nov 5, 2009
Jeff Whittaker wrote:
I am available and please send me the deadline and one file as example ... my daily output is 6.000-7.000 words for Ge-En.
For any other question pls contact me."
Sounds like a googler. What gave it away? When one is too lazy to type the word "please" when first contacting a translation outsourcer (come to think of it!), I very strongly doubt they use their own brain to produce the translation. Thanks, Google!
Sorry about your misfortunes, Jeff. However, I do believe you did right, even though it was unintentional.
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ViktoriaG Canada Local time: 13:02 Member (2005) English to French + ...
A real translation test
Nov 5, 2009
Lany Chabot-Laroche wrote:
Funny that people are now replying to you... Although probably not so funny for you. Still, can't people see you were replying? Especially since you told you didn't want to be part of this.
I think the first translation test to use with candidates for a job should be something like what Jeff did. If they pass that test, then you can give them the real test, i.e., the one that tests their abilitiy to translate and not merely their ability to find the any key. I mean, it now seems that it is of the utmost importance to ensure your translators know how to use e-mail. If they don't know how e-mail works, how on Earth do you expect them to know how a word processing program works?
I'm telling you, the googlers are coming, and there ain't no stopping them!
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And thanks to PROZ, we are becoming rare birds who still ask normal rate and normal delay.
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ViktoriaG Canada Local time: 13:02 Member (2005) English to French + ...
Erm... no
Nov 5, 2009
Eleftherios Kritikakis wrote:
In the European Union, that would probably imply a penalty for disseminating private information.
No, it would not. If that was the case, then proz.com is also violating privacy laws since it "disseminates" all information of its members (by making them publicly available and by associating them with kudoz points, blue board scores, etc.).
The only information ProZ publicly disseminates is information the dissemination of which the users have explicitly agreed to. On the other hand, apparently, Jeff did not agree to having his e-mail address published. If I were Jeff, I would not be happy. Bottom line: on ProZ, I decide how much or how little info is published about me, but in Jeff's case, he simply had no say. That's where the term unauthorized becomes relevant.
I don't know about you, but I have absolutely no published e-mail address. Still, that ridiculous two-cent offer ProZMail is still magically reaching me. And none of the people who write to me through ProZ actually know my e-mail address (unless I reply). This is actually the reason why I don't even bother replying to ridiculous job offers: I don't want brokers to ever know my e-mail address.
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Samuel Murray Netherlands Local time: 19:02 Member (2006) English to Afrikaans + ...
Apologise immediately (to the translators)
Nov 5, 2009
Jeff Whittaker wrote:
What happened was that the PM sent this e-mail to 100s of other translators with all of their e-mail addresses visible in the "send to" line and I accidentally hit the REPLY ALL button, thus informing all of this agency's translators that the rate is too low.
You did not inform the translators of anything -- you simply stated your opinion. Anyone is free to disagree with you. Did you remember to quote sections of the original sender's e-mail in your reply, or leave the "Re:" (or similar) tag in the subject line, to make it clear that your reply is indeed a reply?
My take would be to send another e-mail to everyone to explain that you had accidentally pressed "Reply All" and that you kindly ask them to ignore your e-mail. In that e-mail, use top-posting, so that the recipients can see the e-mail you're apologising for.
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Samuel Murray Netherlands Local time: 19:02 Member (2006) English to Afrikaans + ...
How to press Reply All by mistake
Nov 5, 2009
Laurent KRAULAND wrote:
I don't know about the configuration of your e-mail account, Jeff, but in mine I have to select either Reply or Reply to allbefore starting to compose the e-mail.
I can't answer for Jeff but I can say that different e-mail programs work and look differently. In some of the older mail clients I have used, it was possible to have only one "Reply" button, and to have that button's default action be "Reply All" (if you want to reply to one, there is a little dropdown list for that). Also, how many of the CC addresses one can see depends on the size of the e-mail composer window.
In Thunderbird 2, for example, the recipient e-mails are displayed in a list (not next to each other) and the list is scrollable, which means only the top three CC names can be seen if you happen to glance at it and not notice the scroll bar. Also, in TB 2, I can't see the recipients' names when I look at the mail in the preview pane (because I'm using a space-saving small title bar). I can make a similar mistake in Gmail, because Gmail's compose section is not a separate window and it is not easy to see that there are multiple recipients unless you happen to glance specifically at the correct box on the web page.
I tend to err on the opposite side -- I tend to hit Reply only, even when later it occurs to me that I was a CC'ed person and that the original sender may have wanted me to use Reply All.
It also depends on one's habit. I have several clients who ask me to use Reply All when responding, because they CC all their e-mails to a supervisor or colleagues or their home address or whatever. Also, some mailing lists require that you press Reply All to make your response to go the list and not to the original sender (the Sourceforge mailing lists are notorious for this glitch). So pressing Reply All can simply be habit. After all, if there are CC recipients, it is not unlikely that the original sender wants further discussion to remain open to all recipients.
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Laurent KRAULAND France Local time: 19:02 Member (2007) French to German + ...
OT: many KudoZ to one of my clients
Nov 5, 2009
Contrary to the current trend, which sees any price in euros as being too high, and rates for translations in USD over 0.04 to be "cosmic" (whatever that means), I have just received an e-mail from one of my clients. I will of course not name their name in this forum, but their comment to my last invoice was: "Sorry, Laurent, but your prices are definitively too low for the good job you are doing... Please raise your rates by a minimum of 10% *immediately*."
It may of course be an exception, but hey, it gives proof that there are still other clients than the joes-go-cheapy out there.
Many KudoZ to this client!
[Edited at 2009-11-05 09:26 GMT]
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