| Pages in topic: < [1 2] | My "client" doesn't want to pay half of the work-translation and reviewing/editing differences? Thread poster: Lyhm
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Lyhm
Italy
Local time: 03:59
English to Italian
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TOPIC STARTER | I'm obviously talking about my experience | Jan 31, 2017 |
Sheila Wilson wrote: Lyhm wrote:
People doing it as a hobby don't care about the conditions and I have to compete on that level to gain experience if I don't want to work for free. No one wants new translators who are trying to gain experience and education alone doesn't mean anything. It's you saying that, not those of us who know a bit about the profession. I know that it isn't easy for inexperienced translators to land good jobs, but it isn't impossible, unless they approach it as though it's going to be. Of course, you shouldn't expect to land your first good job on day one - it could be weeks or even months before the jobs start trickling in. That time can be filled with all sorts of useful activities, such as learning about risk management.
You seem to think I just started looking for small jobs...I've been trying for over a year now and having previous experience seems to be a key factor for everything-even just translating amazon products listings.
Sheila Wilson wrote:
Get a job flipping burgers or something now to earn some money. Spend your free time researching how to run a business. Read extensively about whatever you're interested in - in both languages. Do NOT drop your use of Italian. If anything, maybe you ought to be studying Italian written expression. I'm sure not all native Italians have a good writing style in their native language, any more than English speakers.
I don't know how flipping burgers would bring me any translating experience and from what I've said about this specific client and her complaints, I don't know why you're assuming I'm lacking a good writing style. It basically turned out she's illiterate.
I'm not overestimating my abilities, I'm trying to get some small generic translation jobs in order to get some experience while I'm still studying. The one thing my University might introduce me to after my degree will be an unpaid internship. Shouldn't I be trying to get some experience as soon as I can?
I'm currently competing with hobbyists, not professionals.
No healthy client would expect a professional to work at such a low rate, and I make sure to list my current "student" status, describe what sort of texts I'm familiar with, provide samples of my work, etc. I haven't talked about all this in the main post so I understand why you might think I'm just another one of those who wake up one day and jump into something they can't do expecting good results-I just thought, considering my fluency in English and my general knowledge and writing skills, I might try to start getting some experience doing some smaller jobs so one day I won't just be a newbie with a degree.
Aleksandra Muraviova wrote:
In the meanwhile, do not give up and let this bitter experience take over you. Now you know a great deal more about risk management, compared to what you knew before. Make the knowledge work for you. See it as your profit - you wanted experience and you gained it, though not the one you were aiming for. There is plenty of honest employers.
And remember: there is no such thing as "need experience, will work for food." Your time is worth something more than 5$, even if you're new.
Thank you for all the nice suggestions!
I'll keep looking for jobs within my capabilities, ideally for a half-decent looking rate, and I'll make sure the clients know exactly what they want and what they should expect before accepting anything in the future
| | | | | 2/3 hours or 2-3 hours | Jan 31, 2017 |
Lyhm wrote:
I was aware the budget was absurd but, as I've already said, it feels like to get some "experience" you have to compromise to work for basically nothing nowdays.
I'm confused on why it seems so unbelievable to many of you that a newbie could translate and refine 1000/1500 words in a couple hours.
I think where you (OP) wrote that you had translated the files in 2/3 hours this was taken to mean 2/3 of an hour, ie 40 minutes. Do you actually mean 2-3 hours? (Which was how I read it, and would likely seem more reasonable to many people here...)
| | | | Lyhm
Italy
Local time: 03:59
English to Italian
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TOPIC STARTER
mairaw wrote: Lyhm wrote:
I was aware the budget was absurd but, as I've already said, it feels like to get some "experience" you have to compromise to work for basically nothing nowdays.
I'm confused on why it seems so unbelievable to many of you that a newbie could translate and refine 1000/1500 words in a couple hours.
I think where you (OP) wrote that you had translated the files in 2/3 hours this was taken to mean 2/3 of an hour, ie 40 minutes. Do you actually mean 2-3 hours? (Which was how I read it, and would likely seem more reasonable to many people here...)
Yes, I meant 2-3 hours which I don't think is too fast to translate a generic text...right?
[Edited at 2017-01-31 23:00 GMT]
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Lyhm wrote: mairaw wrote:
I think where you (OP) wrote that you had translated the files in 2/3 hours this was taken to mean 2/3 of an hour, ie 40 minutes. Do you actually mean 2-3 hours? (Which was how I read it, and would likely seem more reasonable to many people here...) Yes, I meant 2-3 hours which I don't think is too fast to translate a generic text...right? [Edited at 2017-01-31 23:00 GMT]
That still depends on the text. Even a generic website text has its pecularities, because it's basically marketing, and marketing involves a lot of creativity, sometimes changing whole chunks of text in process. If you can produce decent text at the speed of 1000 wph (words per hour), that is really cool.
For reference: My speed is 6000 wpd (words per day), but only if Japanese is involved (because a word is a symbol there, and sometimes 5 symbols make up a single semantic unit, while still being counted as 5 words). That is already considered fast, and my En-Ru speed is around 4-5 thousand in a working day, which is still above average. Divided by 8 hours, we get around 500-600 wph for en-ru and 750 wph for ja-en and ja-ru. Please, remember, that translation speed isn't only about typing, but also about making sure you've done everything right, researched terms, did no typos etc.
And now come to think of it, how much time did you spend with that "client" doing the "proofreading" thing? In fact, you have the right to charge her for that too (though I doubt she would pay at all). I mean, you provided her with synonyms and stuff, right?
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Lyhm
Italy
Local time: 03:59
English to Italian
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TOPIC STARTER | it's not just 1 hour | Feb 1, 2017 |
Aleksandra Muraviova wrote: Lyhm wrote: mairaw wrote:
I think where you (OP) wrote that you had translated the files in 2/3 hours this was taken to mean 2/3 of an hour, ie 40 minutes. Do you actually mean 2-3 hours? (Which was how I read it, and would likely seem more reasonable to many people here...) Yes, I meant 2-3 hours which I don't think is too fast to translate a generic text...right? [Edited at 2017-01-31 23:00 GMT] That still depends on the text. Even a generic website text has its pecularities, because it's basically marketing, and marketing involves a lot of creativity, sometimes changing whole chunks of text in process. If you can produce decent text at the speed of 1000 wph (words per hour), that is really cool. For reference: My speed is 6000 wpd (words per day), but only if Japanese is involved (because a word is a symbol there, and sometimes 5 symbols make up a single semantic unit, while still being counted as 5 words). That is already considered fast, and my En-Ru speed is around 4-5 thousand in a working day, which is still above average. Divided by 8 hours, we get around 500-600 wph for en-ru and 750 wph for ja-en and ja-ru. Please, remember, that translation speed isn't only about typing, but also about making sure you've done everything right, researched terms, did no typos etc. And now come to think of it, how much time did you spend with that "client" doing the "proofreading" thing? In fact, you have the right to charge her for that too (though I doubt she would pay at all). I mean, you provided her with synonyms and stuff, right?
Each "file" was about 1200-1500 words and I spent around 2 hours on each of those, again, the text was generic and easily understandable for me, no specific terminology I had to research extensively etc. and it was pretty basic overall so the *translation* itself, the typing part, didn't take me long at all. I put time in using the most appropriate terms and making the text read nicely too. There were no typos or mistranslations and she just wanted me to sit there for hours (3-4 hours reviewing each file) to give her synonyms and hear her insults when she would fail to understand. Let me clarify this, I didn't translate using "difficult" words out of context. I used a couple words that aren't part of the everyday-basic Italian, as the context required, and she would complain saying the translation didn't make any sense (she didn't know the different meanings, let's say a verb, can have). I obviously couldn't just go "you're wrong, I'm right" so for the first 2 files I just found a different way to translate that she would understand but some things in the third one were not difficult to understand at all and there wasn't another way to go around it.
So on top of laughing at me and making me miserable because she's ignorant, she ended up not paying me anything at all. Keep in mind she considered all that "review" bit as part of the translation, which I doubt it was.
Altough I seem to always have the worst luck in life, I hope this was a rare case of stupidly difficult client.
| | | | | I misread it as 2/3 of an hour. | Feb 1, 2017 |
My surprise was based on my misreading of what you wrote. For some reason I misinterpreted "2/3 hours" as "2/3 of an hour". Everyone has their own ideas about appropriate translation speeds, but two or three hours for 1000 to 1500 words of text would not be unusual at all.
If the client wants to (effectively) change the original text or substitute genuinely interchangeable synonyms or phrasings, then that should be charged extra.
On the other hand, working for somewher... See more My surprise was based on my misreading of what you wrote. For some reason I misinterpreted "2/3 hours" as "2/3 of an hour". Everyone has their own ideas about appropriate translation speeds, but two or three hours for 1000 to 1500 words of text would not be unusual at all.
If the client wants to (effectively) change the original text or substitute genuinely interchangeable synonyms or phrasings, then that should be charged extra.
On the other hand, working for somewhere between €1.50 and €2.50 per hour is working for free. If you were amazingly lucky and worked yourself to death and somehow got an average of 200 hours of paid work every month, you would end up with a total of something like €400 before taxes. It would be better to practice on your own and maybe work in small groups with other students to correct and discuss each others' work (and establish some solid professional connections for when you all leave the university).
I would also second Aleksandra's suggestion of finding some kind of work or paid internship to start building up a specialization (knowledge, experience for resume, connections). ▲ Collapse
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i think you need to think about what you are aiming for, when you are working like this to "build up experience."
regarding working for peanuts on upwork, it is a recognized and not unreasonable way for new upworkers to obtain good feedback - doing a fixed, small number of jobs cheaply (making it clear that this is an introductory offer and they should not expect a long-term relationship at that price) and then requesting positive feedback (assuming your work is good); this can be l... See more i think you need to think about what you are aiming for, when you are working like this to "build up experience."
regarding working for peanuts on upwork, it is a recognized and not unreasonable way for new upworkers to obtain good feedback - doing a fixed, small number of jobs cheaply (making it clear that this is an introductory offer and they should not expect a long-term relationship at that price) and then requesting positive feedback (assuming your work is good); this can be leveraged in order to then get decent jobs ... on upwork. Is this experience useful for getting jobs off upwork? I think that many serious clients will be aware that Upwork is something of a sweatshop, and not consider your experience there an indication that you are truly competent. Perhaps, by slowly building up reputation on upwork, after, say, a year you will have found a couple of specific good, reputable clients that you can refer to in your CV - for example a friend of mine has regular work from a well-known book publisher, through upwork.
this particular client sounds like a dead end, but in any case, by taking her off upwork, you lost this way of leveraging your work. Apart from a few quid, what use would this experience have been to you/your CV, if it had worked out? The chances are that in a year's time when you want to say "one year's experience", you wouldn't have any contact with her. What is the difference between this and simply picking a website at random and translating it in your own time, without offering the translation to anyone?
In answer to your original question re. reviewing/editing differences, I don't think there is a fixed line; in general, I would expect a translation to be submitted fit for purpose and ready to go. Occasionally, there may be a mismatch between the translator and the client about what this means (formatting is another issue that can crop up here). I think you were unlucky with this, your first client, but consider it a learning experience. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | translate Wikipedia to gain experience | Feb 2, 2017 |
Hello,
If you want to gain experience, become a Wikipedia "contributeur" (I only know the french word for it) and translate some pages of Wikipedia.
And you can use them as examples of your translations for your future clients.
Regards,
Claire
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jyuan_us 
United States
Local time: 21:59
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
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| Is this true? | Feb 2, 2017 |
Aleksandra Muraviova wrote:
Even a generic website text has its pecularities, because it's basically marketing, and marketing involves a lot of creativity, sometimes changing whole chunks of text in process.
Is this true? I thought a generic website text is basically about statements of facts, and translating such website texts won't require a lot of creativity.
I have been translating tons of websites and to me websites are much easier to translate than other marketing materials, such as flyers or brochures.
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jyuan_us wrote: Aleksandra Muraviova wrote:
Even a generic website text has its pecularities, because it's basically marketing, and marketing involves a lot of creativity, sometimes changing whole chunks of text in process. Is this true? I thought a generic website text is basically about statements of facts, and translating such website texts won't require a lot of creativity. I have been translating tons of websites and to me websites are much easier to translate than other marketing materials, such as flyers or brochures.
Well, a website text is supposed to keep the visitor on the site, however simple the text may be. That's why it's not just a translation, it's localization, meaning that you might be doing extra transformations, which would make the text more appealing to the audience. This doesn't require it in the amounts a proper marketing/advertizing text needs it (and that's what I love about doing sites), but it's still required to be non-boring.
Nevertheless, it is an opinion, a sort of. For example, I am adamant about making the translated text as appealing to the reader, as the original was, but I've encountered an opinion that conveying the feelings that can be experienced by reading the text is unnessessary. I strongly disagree with it, but there are people who are actually thinking this way.
Edit: rephrased a sentence
[Edited at 2017-02-02 07:13 GMT]
| | | | jyuan_us
United States
Local time: 21:59
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
+ ...
Aleksandra Muraviova wrote:
That's why it's not just a translation, it's localization, meaning that you might be doing extra transformations, which would make the text more appealing to the audience. This doesn't require it in the amounts a proper marketing/advertizing text needs it (and that's what I love about doing sites), but it's still required to be non-boring.
[Edited at 2017-02-02 07:13 GMT]
I think for a professional translator, to make a text "appealing to the audience" and "non-boring" won't require a lot of extra effort. It all naturally happens in the translation process to make the style of the target language match that of the source text.
| | | | Jo Macdonald
Spain
Local time: 03:59
Italian to English
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| Clients who know a bit of English | Feb 2, 2017 |
Hi Lyhm,
I recently had a similar experience with quite a cool client who was sending me interesting jobs.
The problem was, this client knew a bit of English and wanted to make a lot of changes to my work (including changes to the original) many of which were unnecessary or even detrimental to the quality of the translation, and all of which obviously took a lot of extra time that was not included in the price of the translation.
I tried hard to explain that what the client wa... See more Hi Lyhm,
I recently had a similar experience with quite a cool client who was sending me interesting jobs.
The problem was, this client knew a bit of English and wanted to make a lot of changes to my work (including changes to the original) many of which were unnecessary or even detrimental to the quality of the translation, and all of which obviously took a lot of extra time that was not included in the price of the translation.
I tried hard to explain that what the client was doing was as if I, who know a bit about their products, try to make changes to them after they've been produced to my order, when they the manufacturer obviously know a lot ore about their products and what's best for me on the basis of my order, but all to no avail and in the end we agreed not to work together again because I really can't give them what they want.
The client was a good client who paid but what they wanted, for an Italian non-linguist to "correct" what a professional English translator had written just didn't make sense.
Unfortunately you have a bit less experience than I do and it looks like your client is just making up excuses not to pay.
You could definitely tell the bad payer you're going to make a low Blue Board entry unless payment is made within one week and see if they agree to pay. They might also pay after the entry is made, many do. If that doesn't work you can also tell them you'll be taking legal action, but for less than 100 euros it's not really worth it imo. ▲ Collapse
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jyuan_us wrote: Aleksandra Muraviova wrote:
That's why it's not just a translation, it's localization, meaning that you might be doing extra transformations, which would make the text more appealing to the audience. This doesn't require it in the amounts a proper marketing/advertizing text needs it (and that's what I love about doing sites), but it's still required to be non-boring.
[Edited at 2017-02-02 07:13 GMT] I think for a professional translator, to make a text "appealing to the audience" and "non-boring" won't require a lot of extra effort. It all naturally happens in the translation process to make the style of the target language match that of the source text.
I totally agree with you. But we are giving advices to a newcomer here. For me, it is already natural. But I remember that I had to pay attention to this at first, so I thought it would be good to give this advice to Lyhm.
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Aleksandra Muraviova wrote: jyuan_us wrote: Aleksandra Muraviova wrote:
That's why it's not just a translation, it's localization, meaning that you might be doing extra transformations, which would make the text more appealing to the audience. This doesn't require it in the amounts a proper marketing/advertizing text needs it (and that's what I love about doing sites), but it's still required to be non-boring.
[Edited at 2017-02-02 07:13 GMT] I think for a professional translator, to make a text "appealing to the audience" and "non-boring" won't require a lot of extra effort. It all naturally happens in the translation process to make the style of the target language match that of the source text. I totally agree with you. But we are giving advices to a newcomer here. For me, it is already natural. But I remember that I had to pay attention to this at first, so I thought it would be good to give this advice to Lyhm.
Localization is not just about the text, it includes everything on the webpage/website, e.g. visuals, links and whatever else... it's much more than just translated text... but it all needs to fit together.
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