| Pages in topic: [1 2 3] > | How is this company still in business? Thread poster: Baran Keki
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Baran Keki 
Türkiye
Local time: 16:01
Member
English to Turkish
There is a well-known translation agency that specializes in life sciences. It is the 'Perfect' example of a large translation company that 'gobbles up' little, 'boutique' agencies that people often mention on these forums.
I got into their books some 5 years ago and set my rate as 0.10 USD per word, and I actually got paid that rate on a few jobs where they asked me to install their anti-virus and encryption software on my old, dying desktop computer and keep them on at all times (they w... See more There is a well-known translation agency that specializes in life sciences. It is the 'Perfect' example of a large translation company that 'gobbles up' little, 'boutique' agencies that people often mention on these forums.
I got into their books some 5 years ago and set my rate as 0.10 USD per word, and I actually got paid that rate on a few jobs where they asked me to install their anti-virus and encryption software on my old, dying desktop computer and keep them on at all times (they would send emails to warn me if they were disabled). You couldn't see the contents of the extremely bad quality PDF files without their encryption program. Anyways, I had enough of their gizmo that slowed down my computer (and god knows did what else), and their jobs that were a real pain in the backside, despite the cool 10 cents per word. They were more trouble than they were worth.
I haven't heard from them for quite some time, but lately (in the last 2 years) I've been getting emails from them almost every week. They are always the last minute jobs, like 5000 words to be 'proofed' in 1 hour, 3500 words of translation (sent at 10 PM) to be delivered by 9 AM the next morning etc. And the PMs are always plaintive, sending multiple emails, almost begging you to take the job. The rates are about 1.5 cents for 'proofing', 2 or 3 cents for translation (so much for 10 cents per word). When I ask them about their poor rates they tell me (and encourage me) to 'negotiate' the rates on their portal, which they call 'PD'. I've never seen a link to that portal, and don't know how it works. They sometimes send me client queries for the jobs I haven't done (I've never done a single job for them since I erased their programs) saying that 'the translator is unresponsive' and could I take a look at those queries for them (for free, no doubt).
The jobs they send are extremely hardcore/heavy-duty medical stuff (not easy-peasy, MT friendly Clinical Trials), about cancer, cardiology that require a good deal of medical expertise, and they are always from Turkish to English. This is important - they ask you to translate into your 'source language' (or they're under the illusion that you're a native English speaker). Now, since no sane British or American medical professional would ever dream of quitting their medical practice to learn Turkish with a view to becoming a Turkish to English medical translator, these translations are done by Turkish freelance translators who have no actual on the job medical experience (like their Am or Br counterparts, no Turkish doctor in their right mind would quit their job to take up translation).
Anyways, the point I'm trying to make is this: these Turkish medical reports are extremely difficult to understand, written in an esoteric medical lingo understandable only to those who penned them (they're sometimes hand-written), and (having checked out a few of those 'proof' jobs without accepting them to see what's what) they're, as can be expected, very badly translated. Complete gibberish, makes little to no sense to their intended audience.
So, you have a 'Perfect' translation agency that have incompetent (or clueless would be the right word) non-native English speakers (probably sporting that fake 'N' sign on their Proz profiles), graduated from medical school, but have no actual medical work experience, translate such difficult Turkish medical reports/texts, written in a convoluted, abbreviated language, into English, which are usually delivered late (since they provide you with extremely tight deadlines), and the translators go into radio silence after delivering the job.
When you Google this translation company, you see that their revenue in 2021 is 1.1 billion USD. They keep sending you emails even when they know you're ignoring them, and begging you take the job (in the words of Don Logan: "Do the job!").
I can't wrap my head around this. Can somebody explain how a company like this continues to thrive and makes 1 billion dollars a year? Would you buy the products/services of a company that delivers you shit quality and delivering it late and not responding to your queries, questions even if they deliver those services a lot cheaper than others? ▲ Collapse
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 14:01
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| Re: the mysterious PD | Jan 5, 2023 |
Baran Keki wrote:
You couldn't see the contents of the extremely bad quality PDF files without their encryption program. Anyways, I had enough of their gizmo that slowed down my computer...
I also work for them, though thankfully I don't have this particular tool installed on my computer, as it is not needed for the types of jobs that I do for them. I suppose you could uninstall it and still work for them, as long as you remember to not accept any jobs that require this tool.
When I ask them about their poor rates they tell me (and encourage me) to 'negotiate' the rates on their portal, which they call 'PD'. I've never seen a link to that portal, and don't know how it works.
Just ask them for the URL. Or, create it yourself: simply replace "www" with "dashboard".
After logging in, look for links called "Project Director" (which is what "PD" stands for)... there may be more than one, that may correspond to different offices. The Available tab shows offered jobs, the Inbox tab shows jobs that you have accepted and not yet delivered. Often, files are downloaded from PD and then uploaded back to PD again, although some PMs send the files (or some of the files) via e-mail.
But they may need to tell you your username. So whenever a PM contacts you with a job and tell you to negotiate on PD, and you can't see the job on PD (or you can't access PD with just your e-mail address), just write back and ask for them to tell you your username (so that you can reset the password).
I "negotiate" most of the rates that they offer, and they accept my negotiations if the rate increase is within their budget (which it often is). I believe their system automatically puts a certain low rate into the quote, but the PMs are actually authorized to accept higher rates, up to a point. When they stop rejecting your negotiations is when you know that you have discovered the sweet spot.
The PMs from different offices around the world have different maximums that they tolerate. For example, for an identical job, the UK office would accept only 60% of my "negotiation" what the New York branch would accept.
They sometimes send me client queries for the jobs I haven't done ... saying that 'the translator is unresponsive' and could I take a look at those queries for them (for free, no doubt).
Yes. I suspect if you do these sorts of free tasks often enough, you become a favoured translator who is approached about jobs before other translators. I do this for most of my clients, no problem.
[Edited at 2023-01-05 14:55 GMT]
| | | | | Here's how... | Jan 5, 2023 |
I haven't worked for a perfect company but I know one that roars and I think they basically get away with murder a lot of the time because nobody properly reads the translations. It's all just a box-ticking exercise. Regulatory affairs.
Ethics committee approvals. At best, they read the word "approved".
Or when the notes on a surgical procedure are translated, it could even be AI rather than a human that picks out certain keywords so the drug company or the insurance co... See more I haven't worked for a perfect company but I know one that roars and I think they basically get away with murder a lot of the time because nobody properly reads the translations. It's all just a box-ticking exercise. Regulatory affairs.
Ethics committee approvals. At best, they read the word "approved".
Or when the notes on a surgical procedure are translated, it could even be AI rather than a human that picks out certain keywords so the drug company or the insurance company can build its statistics.
The big boys spend a lot on marketing and hoodwinking customers into thinking they're getting the best service because of their QA systems. They also have more capacity to service really big companies.
But I agree it's amazing they get away with what they do. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 16:01
Member
English to Turkish
TOPIC STARTER | What would be the point? | Jan 5, 2023 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
I "negotiate" most of the rates that they offer, and they accept my negotiations if the rate increase is within their budget (which it often is). I believe their system automatically puts a certain low rate into the quote, but the PMs are actually authorized to accept higher rates, up to a point. When they stop rejecting your negotiations is when you know that you have discovered the sweet spot.
Thanks for explaining their system. But how far would you hope to go from 3 cents per word? And why am I being put in a position to haggle when my rate was set as 10 cents per word when I first registered with them? Considering their deadlines and the difficulty involved, I'd have cold feet about accepting their jobs even if they agreed to 10 cents per word.
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Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 14:01
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
Baran Keki wrote:
But how far would you hope to go from 3 cents per word?
Not far. But that's what client education is all about. The longer you negotiate with 10c per word (and write a comment in the comment box that 10c per word is normal for your language combination etc. etc. etc.), the more likely it becomes that your profile will be seen by PMs whose jobs do actually pay 10c per word (or it will educate existing PMs about the true value of the translation). PMs are not industry experts -- they rely on translators to tell them what is fair.
And why am I being put in a position to haggle...
Because that is what doing business internationally involves.
Considering their deadlines and...
You can also negotiate the deadlines, by the way (I often do that when I'm quite busy or when their proposed deadline is unrealistic). And it goes without saying that you should not write "the deadline is way too short"; instead, write "unfortunately I'm fully booked for tomorrow, but I can do the job by the day after tomorrow".
And don't forget: PD usually allows you to preview the files before you submit a quote.
[Edited at 2023-01-05 18:28 GMT]
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[quote]Samuel Murray wrote:
And why am I being put in a position to haggle...
Because that is what buying a carpet in a souk involves.
[\quote]
FIFY 😂
Professionals normally set their own rates on a take-it-or-leave-it basis. I would never work for a company that haggles like that.
| | | | | Perfect agencies in Russia: rates and business model | Jan 5, 2023 |
A joke I came across yesterday while web surfing: Good guys are necessary so that bad guys could keep getting richer.
The largest agency in Russia offers approx. $0.02 per word to its translators for documents that are a translator's nightmare. With the resultant tremendous churn rate among their translators, they have to keep posting job adverts here and elsewhere with extremely high frequency.
No highly skilled language professional would work for them unless t... See more A joke I came across yesterday while web surfing: Good guys are necessary so that bad guys could keep getting richer.
The largest agency in Russia offers approx. $0.02 per word to its translators for documents that are a translator's nightmare. With the resultant tremendous churn rate among their translators, they have to keep posting job adverts here and elsewhere with extremely high frequency.
No highly skilled language professional would work for them unless they are truly desperate. As soon as their situation improves, professional translators drop this agency like a rotten apple.
Agency bosses claim on their websites that clients are getting translations from top translators, which is not true. During my five-year employment with a major international law firm, we refused to pay for two or three projects because the translations were horrible.
Six months ago I spent some time analyzing competitive bidding processes run by Russia's largest corporations, such as Rosneft, Rosatom, Sberbank. Bids submitted by Russian translation agencies were 2-3 times lower than my rates. This tells a lot, doesn't it? ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Smells like... | Jan 5, 2023 |
Baran Keki wrote:
The jobs they send are extremely hardcore/heavy-duty medical stuff (not easy-peasy, MT friendly Clinical Trials), about cancer, cardiology that require a good deal of medical expertise, and they are always from Turkish to English. This is important - they ask you to translate into your 'source language' (or they're under the illusion that you're a native English speaker). Now, since no sane British or American medical professional would ever dream of quitting their medical practice to learn Turkish with a view to becoming a Turkish to English medical translator, these translations are done by Turkish freelance translators who have no actual on the job medical experience (like their Am or Br counterparts, no Turkish doctor in their right mind would quit their job to take up translation).
Anyways, the point I'm trying to make is this: these Turkish medical reports are extremely difficult to understand, written in an esoteric medical lingo understandable only to those who penned them (they're sometimes hand-written), and (having checked out a few of those 'proof' jobs without accepting them to see what's what) they're, as can be expected, very badly translated. Complete gibberish, makes little to no sense to their intended audience.
... they (mis-)use a normally low-paid language combination as an intermediary step for translations in a language combination that normally is higher paid and where they try to save money by hiring translators from low-cost countries who have no scruples or where it is almost necessary to translate into the foreign language because there's no alternative doing so. Walking in their shoes, a specialized medical report from English into German (or vice versa), which normally would cost € 0.12 per source word, when done by an experienced and native speaker of German (or English), perhaps first undergoes the intermediary step from English into Turkish (for let's say € 0.3) and then from Turkish into German (also for € 0.3), with all steps done by non-native speakers either of English or German.
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Edward Potter
Spain
Local time: 14:01
Member (2003)
Spanish to English
+ ...
| Perfecto Mundo | Jan 6, 2023 |
I have an inkling about the company to which you refer. I worked with them for several years, then called it quits.
From the very start it was like banging my head against a brick wall. I remember their onboarding process which was intransigent and impersonal. It was their way or the highway.
I lost plenty of time sorting out invoices with them. Their invoicing system required one invoice per job, uploading them one by one with an excessive amount of clickedy clicking.... See more I have an inkling about the company to which you refer. I worked with them for several years, then called it quits.
From the very start it was like banging my head against a brick wall. I remember their onboarding process which was intransigent and impersonal. It was their way or the highway.
I lost plenty of time sorting out invoices with them. Their invoicing system required one invoice per job, uploading them one by one with an excessive amount of clickedy clicking. All too often there were payment issues to sort out.
Then there was the haggling for each job. I asked them several times to refrain from offers below my stated rate. I ended up taking the constant low offers as part of doing business with them.
The whole thing was maddening from start to finish and I really don't miss them due to all the aggravation in dealing with their bureaucratic way of doing business. I have other great customers out there.
How can they have a gross income of over a billion dollars? I believe they have an excellent sales team in a wide open market. We only see their weakness on the supply side of things.
This company is vulnerable to a smart and efficient competitor coming in, making the same sales, but more efficiently dealing with suppliers.
I hear the company was offered a buy-out for a cool billion about 5 years ago, which they turned down. I also hear that some significant internal strife has been resolved. We'll see if they have what it takes to stay competitive when others come into their space with better solutions to these ongoing supplier problems.
On the marketing front, in their attempt to have a fun side, I noticed last week they are co-sponsoring a minor bowl game.
[Edited at 2023-01-06 06:27 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 16:01
Member
English to Turkish
TOPIC STARTER | What baffles me the most | Jan 6, 2023 |
To be honest I don't care about haggling, poor rates or their complicated system as I have no desire to work with them (and they're also a bad payer according to Blueboard).
What I can't understand about this company is that they ask you to translate impossibly difficult medical texts into your source language and the result (translated output) is shit (from what I've seen).
I don't think those texts are purely meant for regulatory purposes as they appear to be personal in nature (i.... See more To be honest I don't care about haggling, poor rates or their complicated system as I have no desire to work with them (and they're also a bad payer according to Blueboard).
What I can't understand about this company is that they ask you to translate impossibly difficult medical texts into your source language and the result (translated output) is shit (from what I've seen).
I don't think those texts are purely meant for regulatory purposes as they appear to be personal in nature (i.e. a pathology report of a certain female, surgery notes for somebody..).
I mean it's almost impossible to understand what's written in Turkish (you must have some real medical work experience under your belt, have breathed the same air as that physician who wrote that report, graduating from medical school is not enough), let alone translating that stuff into English. But it's somehow getting done (atrociously) and in short time (given their deadlines), and apparently they have happy customers, who are able to make sense of that rubbish and they come back for more!
If this isn't a 'success story', I don't know what is. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Michael Newton
United States
Local time: 08:01
Japanese to English
+ ...
| still in business | Jan 6, 2023 |
I don't know if this is the same company or not. In the early oughts I worked for a huge (they say the biggest) company feverishly virtually full-time translating Japanese medical and pharmaceutical patents for $0.12 /word for three years. They paid regularly with no problems. I used the income to travel to China, Russia, the Middle East and so forth. There was no onboarding. Then, reality set in. Rates went from $0.12 to $0.08 and then to $0.05 and downwards for an accomplished medical translat... See more I don't know if this is the same company or not. In the early oughts I worked for a huge (they say the biggest) company feverishly virtually full-time translating Japanese medical and pharmaceutical patents for $0.12 /word for three years. They paid regularly with no problems. I used the income to travel to China, Russia, the Middle East and so forth. There was no onboarding. Then, reality set in. Rates went from $0.12 to $0.08 and then to $0.05 and downwards for an accomplished medical translator. I spent four years in a medical school in Japan so I was eminently qualified. They were obviously not interested in quality. I fear for the safety and health of the patients whom medical professionals eventually treat after reading the "translations". I have heard (hearsay, mind you) that a physician in India can make more money translating than by practicing medicine. In times past when I was not allowed to indicate the name of a dodgy translation agency, I have made the name available on my proz page. Perhaps the same could be done in this case. When I have answered proz.com ads for medical translators, the agencies are not interested in a medical background. They are looking for the lowest of the low. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Michael Newton
United States
Local time: 08:01
Japanese to English
+ ...
| still in business | Jan 6, 2023 |
How are EasyJet, Ryanair and Aerolineas Britanicas still in business for that matter?
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Dan Lucas
United Kingdom
Local time: 13:01
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
| Intransigent indeed | Jan 6, 2023 |
Edward Potter wrote:
From the very start it was like banging my head against a brick wall. I remember their onboarding process which was intransigent and impersonal. It was their way or the highway.
I had the same problem when I was approached by one of their representatives in Japan. They insisted that I read and sign their business associate agreement and several other documents - as well as take an unpaid test - before they would even discuss rates.
I declined to proceed. My thinking was that my other clients treat me with fairness and transparency. Why should I help this large and predatory agency compete against them, especially when it treats its freelancers so poorly?
Regards,
Dan
| | | | Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 13:01
Member (2008)
Italian to English
Michael Newton wrote:
....Aerolineas Britanicas...
I know British Airways is a poor airline but converting their name into something that sounds Spanish, as a way of communicating how bad you think they are....(I'll stop here).
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Tom in London wrote:
Michael Newton wrote:
....Aerolineas Britanicas...
I know British Airways is a poor airline but converting their name into something that sounds Spanish, as a way of communicating how bad you think they are....(I'll stop here).
So, to avoid any conflicts here, perhaps we should agree to focus on another airline, that would fit to the topic of the OP:
https://youtu.be/6VLYpKGVBUg
I wish all of you a nice weekend (if you have any)*
* I do have.
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