| Pages in topic: < [1 2] | Dystopian translation world Thread poster: Joop Debrabandere
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Enrique Bjarne Strand Ferrer wrote:
Joop
"As you have introduced a discount matrix for reviewing, I am forced to adapt my pricing. My new price fpr reviewing is x.xx per word. I would allways be happy to discuss a return to our previous arrangement." [/quote]
Hello Enrique,
That's what I did. I increased my review rate by 33%.
In general the customer doesn't really send me review jobs with repetitions often, so it doesn't really affects me. I just wanted to hear whether anyone ever had been "offered" a price grid for review.
| | | | | Don't work for free | Sep 4, 2023 |
Joop Debrabandere wrote:
Hello colleagues,
Last week, I received the most crazy mail from an agency, in which they introduced a price grid for bilingual review. Well, you might think this is a joke, but it isn't.
It looks as follows
Perfect Match 10%
Context Match 10%
Repetition 30%
100% Match 30%
Fuzzy Match 95-99% 40%
Fuzzy Match 85-94% 60%
Fuzzy Match 50-84% 80%
No Match 100%
What are your thoughts on this?
What a dystopian translation world we are now living in.
Currently I have a review job from them with about 4000 unpaid words (due to the high number of repetitions). So I decided I won't be reading the last 4000 words as they are simply not paid. I see no other solution. Or should I really review 4000 words for free??
Joop
If some parts of the job are unpaid you need to make it clear that you won't be reading those parts. In fact, tell them to just send the bits they are paying for.
I don't understand the concept of a grid for reviewing jobs though. It makes no sense.
| | | | Samuel Murray 
Netherlands
Local time: 14:17
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
Joop Debrabandere wrote:
Perfect Match 10%
Context Match 10%
Repetition 30%
100% Match 30%
If by "repetition" etc. they mean that the CAT tool automatically inserts your previous edit into the current segment (and alerts you to this), then yes, I'd be okay with this. But if they simply mean that the current segment is identical to another segment somewhere in the file, then obviously it still has to be paid at the full price. Well, come to think of it, I suppose it would be okay, but only for segments that the translator didn't edit (i.e. the CAT tool has to tell you whether a repetition was edited). And if the CAT tool doesn't show you what the translator's edit was, then again... the edit costs full price.
Fuzzy Match 95-99% 40%
Fuzzy Match 85-94% 60%
Fuzzy Match 50-84% 80%
I'll give discounts for fuzzy matches when reviewing only under these conditions: the CAT tool must show me the same fuzzy match that was shown to the translator (so that I can see what the translator saw when he edited the fuzzy match) and how the current text differs from the original fuzzy match (i.e. I need to see what edits the translator made to the match). And of course the client should know that I will only check the translator's edit, and not check the full text of the whole segment. But I've never seen a CAT tool capable of doing this.
In addition, the CAT tool must distinguish between fuzzy matches from the client's original TM and fuzzy matches from segments that the translator edited. This is perhaps my biggest gripe with bilingual review -- I can't trust the fuzzy match percentage. If there is a 80% match of a client TM segment, then I know that the segment is largely trustworthy and I only need to check for changes, but if the 80% match is an 80% match of a PEMT segment that the translator had translated, then the segment is entirely untrustworthy... and the CAT tools that I work in do not distinguish between these two types of matches. Clearly the CAT tool was designed for translators and project managers, and not for reviewers.
Currently I have a review job from them with about 4000 unpaid words (due to the high number of repetitions).
So, if you regularly get jobs from this client, you'd have to adjust the way you work. Does the client supply you with an analysis before you start or accept the job? Can you tell the client that you no longer accept jobs with more than 10% fuzzy matches? (because it's at those fuzzy matches where you're going to be losing money) Does the CAT tool allow for automatic propagation of edited repetitions?
| | | | Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 13:17
Member (2008)
Italian to English
| Wouldn't it be great if.... | Sep 5, 2023 |
....instead of bean-counting fuzzy matches and repetitions, agencies would express some interest in the text to be translated? The best ones do this, with useful notes about what the end client is looking for, how flexible the deadline is, formatting requirements, etc. They do NOT immediately start specifying the ways in which they intend to use a CAT tool to pay the translator as little as possible. What they are looking for is a *good translation*.
[Edited at 2023-09-05 07:44 GMT]
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Tom in London wrote:
....instead of bean-counting fuzzy matches and repetitions, agencies would express some interest in the text to be translated? The best ones do this, with useful notes about what the end client is looking for, how flexible the deadline is, formatting requirements, etc. They do NOT immediately start specifying the ways in which they intend to use a CAT tool to pay the translator as little as possible. What they are looking for is a *good translation*.
[Edited at 2023-09-05 07:44 GMT]
Hi Tom,
I totally agree. Unfortunately, the past few years I noticed a rapidly declining interest in quality translations by end customers. It is very sad to see that evolution, but very often, they really don't seem to care anymore. They need a translation at the lowest possible cost. This is often the case with multinationals, especially in the automotive industry. When agencies can't give them the ridiculous prices they want, they just leave and go to Poland, Letland, Portugal, China, etc.
| | | | Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 13:17
Member (2008)
Italian to English
| Do they even look? | Sep 7, 2023 |
Joop Debrabandere wrote:
Hi Tom,
I totally agree. Unfortunately, the past few years I noticed a rapidly declining interest in quality translations by end customers. It is very sad to see that evolution, but very often, they really don't seem to care anymore. They need a translation at the lowest possible cost. This is often the case with multinationals, especially in the automotive industry. When agencies can't give them the ridiculous prices they want, they just leave and go to Poland, Letland, Portugal, China, etc.
I suspect they don't even look at the translation. They just run the document through a CAT tool so that they can get the statistics for matches, repetitions, etc. and then send them to a translator for a price without considering the text itself.
[Edited at 2023-09-07 12:21 GMT]
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Tom in London wrote:
I suspect they don't even look at the translation. They just run the document through a CAT tool so that they can get the statistics for matches, repetitions, etc. and then send them to a translator for a price without considering the text itself.
[Edited at 2023-09-07 12:21 GMT]
I even have end customers who now run their texts themselves through deepL and they don't need (want) me (us translators) anymore.... as I said, they don't care anymore + they really have no idea what they (and/or DeepL) are doing. Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise....
| | | | | prices for automotive translation work | Sep 8, 2023 |
Joop Debrabandere wrote:
They need a translation at the lowest possible cost. This is often the case with multinationals, especially in the automotive industry. When agencies can't give them the ridiculous prices they want, they just leave and go to Poland, Letland, Portugal, China, etc.
Wow, sounds a bit too sweeping. How do you get and follow that hard data from 'automotive multinationals'? This market is a Ding-an-sich to me.
[Edited at 2023-09-08 14:20 GMT]
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