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Was I wrong to do this?
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Thread poster: Jeff Whittaker

Was I wrong to do this?

Tomás Cano Binder, CT

Spain
Local time: 19:53

Member (2005)
English to Spanish
+ ...

The question is...

Nov 5, 2009

The question is whether you already had a working relationship with this company. If you did not, then you did nothing wrong and you cannot be sued for anything because:

A) No NDA, no agreement, and not even good professional practices bind you to any confidentiality or privacy obligation with someone who is not your customer.

B) Any information about the company, the end client, the project, and the proposed compensation was already made available by the original sender (the agency) to the 100 translators. You are not disclosing any such information as it was already known to all before your email.

C) The contents of your email to this company that reached the 100 translators was YOUR opinion about the project and the rate, and you are entitled to sharing such opinion with whoever you like.

The only complaint I would have as one of the 100 translators is that I had received an unwanted email, but... we receive dozens of those every day and don't have the time to go around suing all people who spam us.

Corinne Rubio

France
Local time: 19:53

Member (2007)
English to French

The courage to say no.....!!

Nov 5, 2009

Thank you José for your advice, I think I will use your text today even, as I received an offer for USD 0.025/word too, and I will save the text for future use: it is dead right in every detail!! A translator worth its salt will never be able to lower quality to gain time at the same level as offered translation rates!! The lowest I ever got offered was 0.10 usd..... uncomfortable when the dollar is falling every day and the euro strong.. and payment within 30 days, meaning that the dollar has plenty of time to reach rock bottom level in the meantime!!!!
I'd be curious to know how much agencies are making on top of that!!
Best, Corinne

José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:

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.

José Henrique Lamensdorf

Brazil
Local time: 16:53

Member (2007)
English to Portuguese
+ ...

The real issue

Nov 5, 2009

Corinne Rubio wrote:
I'd be curious to know how much agencies are making on top of that!!

I'd expect a good agency to add at least 100% on top of my (plus any other involved parties' - e.g. proofreader, DTP) rates to what they charge the end-client, to cover services such as:

recruitment and selection (based on more criteria than just language pair and rates)
planning and negotiation of deadlines, covering all intermediate milestones
credit checking of end-client, advance or midway payments otherwise (as any business is expected to do)
constant monitoring of work progress
interface for translator's questions to end-client
guidance to end-client (whose core business is not translation) on best ways to achieve desired results
seamless integration of all vendors/phases to deliver a complete job
detailed checking of the packaged deliverable
collection and timely payment to all involved

... and many other things.

After all, if the end-client just wanted "a translation", they could find a translator via any search engine, and deal with them directly. IMHO a translation agency must add a lot of value to the process. So the concept of a good translation agency is an organization that makes money from adding value throughout the translation process.

Conceptually bad translation agencies abound everywhere. These, in fact, make money from buying translations cheap and selling them for a profit. Technically, they are not agencies, but mere resellers. They push files back and forth.

I had e-mail contact with a very nice gentleman in India who runs a translation "agency". Unfortunately, his English was so ghastly bad that our communication was impaired. He was quite happy from making a half-cent (US) profit on the word by merely pushing files. Of course, there was no use in him opening any of these files other than for word-counting. The end-client should feel like buying hi-tech surgical supplies from a lemonade stand, but too many fail to feel any uneasiness from doing so. This is the real issue.

konungursvia

Canada
Local time: 13:53

Member (2010)
French to English
+ ...

You're okay

Nov 5, 2009

I think you did the right thing.

sivara

United Kingdom
Local time: 18:53
English to German
+ ...

Absolutely not!

Nov 5, 2009

I am really angry about such rates we are being paid.
As a specialized translator on legal translations they try to change my rates all the time.
For a good job you have to pay.
Research takes time and all my direct clients are happy with my rates and pay without any discussion. Only the agencies are trouble-makers and I am not prepared to work for a rate which is totally ridiculous. And I think that we as translators should be very careful not to be treated as slaves.

Such agencies should be nailed onto a large board! Unfortunately, there will always be someone prepared and willing to work for cheaper rates, I am afraid.
To make it short: the agencies play with us and make a fortune!

gad
United States
Local time: 13:53

Member
French to English

You were not wrong, IMO

Nov 5, 2009

Jeff, you were not wrong, whether the "Reply All" was accidental or intentional. If the agency did not want you to correspond with "All" then they should have used BCC. This whole situation is mildly amusing though it's also not good to hear about those who replied to offer their translation services, especially because they didn't even know enough to reply to the original sender and instead replied TO YOU.

I also think it's good that there are others who will now read what you replied because then it may educate them a bit on what rates and time turnaround are normal and reasonable.

It is really of concern that this agency has a high Blue Board rating.

I know the above basically echoes what others have already replied on this thread so I guess I'm just chiming in with my agreement.:)

Jeff Whittaker

United States
Local time: 13:53

Member (2002)
Spanish to English
+ ...

TOPIC STARTER

I guess no one accepted the job because...

Nov 5, 2009

...the outsourcer has posted the project on the job board and decided to generously raise the rate: by one whole euro cent.

[update: job closed - only 6 people responded]

[Edited at 2009-11-05 14:03 GMT]

Milos Prudek

Czech Republic
Local time: 19:53

Partial member (2004)
English to Czech
+ ...

Take that tongue out of your cheek

Nov 7, 2009

and I accidentally hit the REPLY ALL button, thus informing all of this agency's translators that the rate is too low. Oops. [Edited at 2009-11-04 20:06 GMT]

Take that tongue out of your cheek now, Jeff, and put quotes around the word "accidentaly" in your post.

In other words, well done, sir.

David Russi

United States
Local time: 11:53
English to Spanish
+ ...

Love it!

Nov 7, 2009

I think this should be standard practice...

Cathy Flick

United States
Local time: 13:53

Member (2003)
Russian to English
+ ...

don't worry, happens sometimes...

Nov 8, 2009

[if anybody knows why "preview" is showing a backward slash before every apostrophe and quotation mark, please let me know... It just started a few days ago, happens on two different computers, and is driving me nuts.]

Once an agency decided to send out a huge "new contract" for all its "vendors", but the person mailing it mistakenly did something similar - the "reply-to" address was the entire list of recipients, even if the person replying didn't choose "reply all".

So on a Saturday afternoon, we all found out 1) how many people were checking their e-mail on a weekend and 2) how irate everybody was about the draconian contract (honestly, I would have charged hourly to even read through it....). It sparked a revolution, threats to never work for the agency again (it really was a good agency, too), etc. The CEO (who was a translator himself) quickly found out about it and tried to do some damage control, apologizing and saying it wasn't really ready to go out, it was intended to address problems with people doing every kind of work imaginable for them, etc. etc. etc. and we never heard about the "new contract" again....

Anyway - if you're bothered by all the replies, just send out a very neutral note to everybody (including the agency) saying you accidentally hit reply-all and that you really are not offering the job but were replying to the job offer yourself. This way the agency knows that you weren't being malicious.

I just received a US$0.04 offer myself for a highly technical document - the agency is in a country with a much different cost of living than the US, so I don't assume that they were trying to cheat anyone. On the contrary, they have a good reputation and if their budget were higher, I would happily work for them. I did feel obliged to point out the risk of accepting translators with such low rates in a country (the USA) with higher costs of living and working, though. Sometimes they could get good quality at that rate if the translator is just doing translation as an "extra" and doesn't need the translation income for the tools of the trade (already provided by another employer or a well-compensated spouse or by the school for academics just doing it for fun, to keep up their knowledge of a language) or for living expenses. Sometimes translators just starting out freelance will take such rates, thinking they are reasonable, but later find they can't maintain both quality and regular meals on it ... But it's more likely they will get translators who seriously cut corners and do not even know the subject matter, because they can't afford to spend an appropriate amount of time on such jobs at that rate.

Back in the very early 1980s, I worked for US$0.04 also. I even worked for less for a cheapskate publisher of scientific journals in my fields, but time records showed that I was making the same $/hr at both rates for a variety of reasons. ($/hr is the important figure, folks, not cents per word). But my only work expenses were (other than a few dictionaries) a manual typewriter (cost: $35 used), an occasional typewriter ribbon, and boxes of paper and carbon paper, plus index cards for notes. Oh, and a lot of red pens for correcting my draft before retyping, mainly because the cats kept running off with my pens (they stockpiled the pens under the couch). The only troubleshooting time required was figuring out how to replace the *#$&*# typing ribbon periodically. Deadlines for even short jobs were several weeks, giving plenty of time to research terminology in the library (which still had hardcopy journals, they hadn't started running out of room yet). Also all my bills (rent, food, medical insurance, phone, electric, water, clothing, kitty litter, etc. - even postage) were a small fraction of the cost today.

I can't work for US$0.04 any more. I have enough trouble paying all the bills on US$0.15 for my kind of work (highly technical)! Just the cost of working must be at least several hundred times what it was in the early 1980s, pre-computer. Not to mention the stress of today's deadlines (no more leisurely trips to the library, I need to pay thousands of dollars per year to maintain access to electronic databases and online journals). Also we need to spend a lot of time on computer-related tasks that didn't even exist in the early 1980s, so we can't spend all the work day on actual translating without going into serious overtime. The daily output of scientific translators hasn't actually changed since pre-computer times because we've just exchanged some tasks for others, but we have to charge more because all our expenses (personal and business-related) are much higher.

Peace, Cathy Flick

Ph.D. Chemical Physics/M.A. Physics/B.S. Chemistry
Scientific Translator since 1978
Russian/French/German/Spanish/Italian into US English

Cathy Flick

United States
Local time: 13:53

Member (2003)
Russian to English
+ ...

some of us do like to read...

Nov 8, 2009

Eleftherios Kritikakis wrote:

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.

I read it, and thought it was very interesting. Please don't discourage him!!!

Peace, Cathy Flick

José Henrique Lamensdorf

Brazil
Local time: 16:53

Member (2007)
English to Portuguese
+ ...

How professional is that?

Nov 8, 2009

Cathy Flick wrote:
Sometimes they could get good quality at that rate if the translator is just doing translation as an "extra" and doesn't need the translation income for the tools of the trade (already provided by another employer or a well-compensated spouse or by the school for academics just doing it for fun, to keep up their knowledge of a language) or for living expenses. Sometimes translators just starting out freelance will take such rates, thinking they are reasonable, but later find they can't maintain both quality and regular meals on it ... But it's more likely they will get translators who seriously cut corners and do not even know the subject matter, because they can't afford to spend an appropriate amount of time on such jobs at that rate.

If it's an end-client "developing talents", it's all right.

I began translating as an intern engineering student, and had the whole engineering department to check what I had done then. My first fling at translating video for lip-sinc dubbing was on an invitation from a client, for whom I used to translate manuals. Hadn't he given me this chance, I might have never discovered a rare natural talent in my self. Translated some 400 videos for them alone.

However an end-client hires an agency precisely to get professional service without the hassle of separating the wheat from the chaff. So an agency is not expected to hire beginners, part-time amateurs, etc.

Imagine there is a birthday in your family. Though you could bake a cake yourself, you order one from a confiteur. What would you say if you discovered that they had outsourced it to the local Girl Scouts?

Pablo Bouvier

Spain
Local time: 19:53

Member
German to Spanish
+ ...

Was I wrong to do this? No, but with OE it is asy to avoid...

Nov 9, 2009

Jeff Whittaker wrote:

Today, a translation agency (with a high blueboard rating) contacted me and wanted me to translate a section of a 17,000-word project by tomorrow for the rate of .04 euros per word. Sad, but nothing new here. The sender was also using a g-mail account, so I have no idea if they were the real agency or just impersonating them. At any rate, based on the rate and deadline, it was obvious that I would never be working for this company. 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.

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. Oops.

[Edited at 2009-11-04 20:06 GMT]

I said already I do not think it was incorrect. Nevertheless, I imagine that many of us use the standard mail Outlook Express of Microsoft with which it is very easy to avoid this type of things.

For it, you should use the OE menu path: Tools > Options> and unselect the case Send immediately that is assigned by default. Then OE will warn you that they are pending messages on your output box and will allow you to verify them before sending. Hope it helps in the future. Have a nice day.

[Editado a las 2009-11-09 09:18 GMT]

Krzysztof Kajetanowicz

Poland
Local time: 19:53

Member (2011)
English to Polish
+ ...

rates.... multiplied

Nov 20, 2009

If you do translation as an "extra", I imagine you would expect higher rates, not lower. After all, the busier you are, the more you value your free time. I'd charge more for the 10th hour of my work on a given day than for the first (even if the first hour is more productive).

Sometimes translators just starting out freelance will take such rates, thinking they are reasonable, but later find they can't maintain both quality and regular meals on it ...

Either that, or they will go for the volume. It all depends on the difficulty, repetitions, etc. With a good TM it's not that difficult to do 4 thousand words a day. Even at 0,05$ a word it's $200 a day, or $48,000 a year (20 days a month). According to this survey, the average pay for a US-based translator is $49,700 (and bear in mind that we're in the middle of the worst crisis in 70 years and the pay statistics are essentially pre-crisis).

Why is 0,05$ regarded as an insult for something that doesn't have to do with microbiology or the proverbial rocket science?

[Edited at 2009-11-20 21:47 GMT]

[Edited at 2009-11-20 21:48 GMT]

Jeff Whittaker

United States
Local time: 13:53

Member (2002)
Spanish to English
+ ...

TOPIC STARTER

Crisis?

Nov 20, 2009

I love it when clients suggest a lower rate because of the "crisis". We may be in a crisis, but this will be my best year ever in 16 years (at least before taxes

Krzysztof Kajetanowicz wrote:
(and bear in mind that we're in the middle of the worst crisis in 70 years and the pay statistics are essentially pre-crisis).