| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3 4 5] > | 0.07USD a word: Where does this sit, really?! Thread poster: Inspectress (X)
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| English into Irish | Sep 25, 2015 |
It seems the Proz.com community rate page only lists prices from Irish into English. But that still gives you an idea. Hopefully that means that there aren't too many experts like you. So you should definitely be able to charge adequate rates.
| | | | Inspectress (X)
Ireland
Local time: 07:02
English to Irish
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TOPIC STARTER | Requirements and Rates and so on | Sep 25, 2015 |
Thank you all for your extremely helpful responses.
This is happening on a regular basis, both when I am contacted directly by an agency, and when I respond to an advertisement on the job board here.
I think I will sign up for membership, at least for 6 months, and see if many offers do actually come through and try to find out what agencies are picking up the work from the EU institutions. Although that might be tricky to find out. I will ask around though!
... See more Thank you all for your extremely helpful responses.
This is happening on a regular basis, both when I am contacted directly by an agency, and when I respond to an advertisement on the job board here.
I think I will sign up for membership, at least for 6 months, and see if many offers do actually come through and try to find out what agencies are picking up the work from the EU institutions. Although that might be tricky to find out. I will ask around though!
I am glad to hear that others are getting fair rates of pay and working within reasonable deadlines. One of the main gripes I have about the assignment I did for 0.07 was that I was given a very short deadline within which to do c.20,000 words in a technical document, some of which had to be proofread at 0.035 a word and it was clear at least two other translators had their hands on it previous to me. Their work was terribly scrappy and used inconsistent terms through and I abided by the client's express requirement not to use any CAT tool.
I ended up working day and night for about three days straight to get it finished and after all was said and done realised that this is not feasible long term, and that there has to be a better way.
I have a career in tech but I love the Irish language and spent so long studying it in-depth that I appreciate the opportunity to earn a little on the side from it, once I'm not being exploited and admittedly I was naïve previous to this.
I am taking your advice on board. Thanks again. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | agencies which are EU contractors | Sep 25, 2015 |
you can easily find out which agencies are EU contractors for translations into Irish by going to the websites of DG Translation (the European Commission's General Directorate for Translation) and of the Translation Center for the Bodies of the European Union. Both institutions are legally obliged to publish their contractors. Unfortunately they are not obliged to publish the rates they are paying these agencies.
[Edited at 2015-09-25 17:37 GMT]
[Edited at 2015-09-25 17:38 GMT]
| | | | Samuel Murray 
Netherlands
Local time: 08:02
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
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| Maybe you're targeting the wrong market | Sep 25, 2015 |
Inspectress wrote:
I have recently received a couple of emails offering a rate of USD0.06 per word, and for other jobs it seems that if I quote over USD0.07 I won't get the gig.
This happens to me in the Middle Eastern, Indian and Chinese markets, but in the EU and USA markets I get more for my language combination. Which markets have you been targeting?
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Rita Pang
Canada
Local time: 02:02
Member (2011)
Chinese to English
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Moderator of this forum | I was just going to say the same... | Sep 25, 2015 |
Georgia Morgan wrote:
I do not live in Brazil. I too live in an expensive European country!! As you can see quite clearly.....
[Edited at 2015-09-25 16:15 GMT]
Living in Brazil IS expensive, just FYI. It's not a first-world country but often has first-world pricing. To live comfortably and safely so, you'll need to make a North American salary simply to make ends meet if you were to live in a metropolis like Sao Paulo. This is coming from a Canadian based in Toronto who just visited Brazil 3 weeks ago, and I used to live there.
Rates are dependent on demand as well. OP's language pair has less demand and likely less suppliers, thus making it possible to raise the prices higher. That being said, in my main language pair (Chinese/English), I make more translating into English because there's less supply in that field. With English > Chinese, the running rate is 5 cents a word for general, "easier" content so to speak, but we all know many who work with this language pair don't even get to work for 5 cents. There's simply WAY more supplier than demand in that particular language pair, and too many who are joining in this race towards the bottom.
The suggestions made by other posters are great; send these agencies a quote and it'd give you a much better idea of what you can (potentially) get. Since your language pair isn't as common, there's likely fewer points of reference for you to get a clearer picture. Asking for a quote is a simple, quick and smart way to get some answers to your questions.
One has the option to choose either to work at low(er) rates, or stay firm with what you think is a fair reflection of the time/effort you put in. I choose the latter.
[Edited at 2015-09-25 20:52 GMT]
| | | | jyuan_us
United States
Local time: 02:02
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
+ ...
| What is a niche language pair? | Sep 25, 2015 |
Inspectress wrote:
Hi all,
I work in a niche language pair (English to Irish) as a freelance translator
And why yours is one?
| | | | | About deadlines, markets and rates | Sep 25, 2015 |
Hi all,
I think you need to target the market you can serve, and vice versa, depending on your personal situation, the market type suitable for you will also be quite narrow. At least this is what I have experienced during these last few years.
I completely agree with Sheila that “freelance translation really isn't a suitable second job”. When people saw me going through hard times regarding my quite fluctuating income (knowing also that I have two small kids and that my ... See more Hi all,
I think you need to target the market you can serve, and vice versa, depending on your personal situation, the market type suitable for you will also be quite narrow. At least this is what I have experienced during these last few years.
I completely agree with Sheila that “freelance translation really isn't a suitable second job”. When people saw me going through hard times regarding my quite fluctuating income (knowing also that I have two small kids and that my time is quite limited), they always tried to suggest or convince me that I MUST take on a 4-5-hour job as an employee somewhere, to secure a minimum income. Sometimes I am getting tired to explain to them that freelancing is a tough job, with many aspects that have to be taken care of (on some occasions it may seem from the outside that you haven’t anything to do, but you are really busy with a thousand questions that need to be solved, improved or anything alike). I am tired to explain to them that you must focus on your objective, even if you experience hard times, since your client base and reputation won’t build up in only one year, maybe not even in two... If I don’t have enough time now that I work full-time, how on earth should I manage my business with even lesser time and being bound by another activity? It simply would be impossible. For sure it does work out for some translators, at least in the beginning, but I think there are others who feel that it is impossible to reach a solid client base under these circumstances.
I said that it is important to find the market that you can serve. It depends on you, the way you work, the stronger and weaker abilities or preferences you have. In the present I cannot work under tight deadlines (this has more than one reason, and I am sure this will change in the future). This means also that I have to find direct clients who accept MY deadlines, and I can assure you it is the only way I work. Direct clients accept your deadlines, especially if it is not the first time you do a job for them. It is very interesting to go to translator’s meetings (powwows, for example, because they are quite informal), there you will hear so many things that you may not even believe what you hear (although it seems true ):
For example:
- People who like to talk on the phone with the client or write e-mails each time it is necessary, who like direct contact with the end client, like to go to company meetings for interpreting, and do not have any problem to be responsible at 100 % for the outcome of the translation (me, for example). This has (as everything) negative implications as well – a wider range of topics that must be covered, occasionally reverse translations that have to be handled for the same client/project, all of which are questions that have to be professionally solved. Payments are received from direct clients usually between 15-30 days here in Spain, with some exceptions. And many pay the same day you deliver.
- There are also translators who work mainly for translation agencies; sometimes they suggest you to charge even higher rates than what you admittedly charge (0,09 €/word in my case), but then you find out that they might be working for almost half of that. No problem with this, because agencies need a higher daily output and not everybody can cope with that – if somebody is able to handle tight deadlines, he will earn the same money as somebody who works much slower. Here is Spain, payments are made by agencies (as far as I know) after 2-3 months – this again is not a problem for many freelancers who always work for agencies, because there is a certain order of incoming money and as soon as you are “on the train”, payments arrive with a three-months delay . Another aspect is that I think it is hard to find good agencies with whom you may build up a long-term, trustful business relationship.
I gave you only a few examples, many more can be given, because I literally see here in Mallorca (this is quite a small island, naturally part of the Spanish market), that each translator finds his own particular way, we are quite different. But as I said before, our preferences, possibilities and inclinations are different as well. The only thing that counts is professionalism and reliability. It will depend on your situation how you can accomplish these, I think. And I have definitively reached a conclusion: do not expect a general base rate, there is no such thing as a “base rate”, as you were wondering in your initial post, the market is global and therefore too big, and there is place for everything, positive and negative as well.
I would give you the advice to accept only rates and deadlines that you are comfortable with on the long run, I think this is the only way to find out if you can make a living out of this (continuous learning is a vital part of the process, too). Jeff’s system is infallible: send a request for a quote with a fictitious text and check what they charge their end clients (but this is only out of pure curiosity, it won’t change the reality, i.e. what they are paying to their freelance translators).
Whish you the best of luck,
Agnes Lenkey ▲ Collapse
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jyuan_us wrote: What is a niche language pair? Inspectress wrote:
Hi all,
I work in a niche language pair (English to Irish) as a freelance translator
And why yours is one?
Because very few people master that language. "Irish" is a language in itself. You may think it's the English spoken in Ireland? Try this:
Irish: Níl aon tinteán mar do thinteán féin.
English: There's no fireplace like your own fireplace (= There's no place like home.)
Very niche.
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Andy Watkinson
Spain
Local time: 08:02
Member
Catalan to English
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| Nails and stuff | Sep 26, 2015 |
Hi,
I obviously agree with most of what has been written above.
"That rate makes more sense for sure but when asked to by an agency and whenever I have quoted even 0.10 or as low as 0.09 I never hear back, with one agency who contacted me insisting on 0.06 which I of course refused. "
A comment on the above: I have no idea how many agencies you've been in contact with but a handful is no indication of the rates some of them would be willing to pay. There are literally th... See more Hi,
I obviously agree with most of what has been written above.
"That rate makes more sense for sure but when asked to by an agency and whenever I have quoted even 0.10 or as low as 0.09 I never hear back, with one agency who contacted me insisting on 0.06 which I of course refused. "
A comment on the above: I have no idea how many agencies you've been in contact with but a handful is no indication of the rates some of them would be willing to pay. There are literally thousands of agencies and the fact that "one" insisted on something is statistically irrelevant.
I'd say, for your language pair, that Phil is right in saying that the largest potential clients are probably going to be governmental, municipal, regulatory bodies/institutions etc.. many of which may simply file these translations away without bothering to look at them - a common occurrence.
That's their problem.
What I don't understand is this: "client's express requirement not to use any CAT tool."
Clients may (and often do) require you use a particular CAT tool. That's their decision and often a loss at the same time - they opt for a translator with the right piece of SW but an inferior one to another who doesn't happen to use/like it.
But no-one can tell you can't use a CAT. I find the idea quite absurd and am surprised no-one's mentioned it before. I strongly suspect that what they "expressly required" was not to use MT - THAT makes sense.
Sending a fictitious text can be an eye-opener - I agree.
Actually, I think you have a somewhat privileged position.
A) You work in a niche pair, as you said above- although someone apparently didn't understand the term (what's not to understand?)
B)And you have something which many lack when starting out which is a main source of income.
All the more reason to demand much higher fees.
And remember Sheila's comment on agencies, i.e. the ones you want to avoid:
"The agencies who are offering peanuts often don't get their jobs from direct clients but rather act as intermediaries. A multinational "big name" agency lands the job, they sub-contract it to a smaller agency, who sub-contracts ..., until finally some PM runs around like a headless chicken until they find that one translator who's naïve or desperate enough to accept the now-crazy deadline and the peanuts that are left after all the others have taken their share."
[Edited at 2015-09-26 01:51 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Joakim Braun
Sweden
Local time: 08:02
German to Swedish
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| Not so absurd | Sep 26, 2015 |
Andy Watkinson wrote:
But no-one can tell you can't use a CAT. I find the idea quite absurd (...)
Not absurd at all, if they've seen a lot of bad CAT-aided texts.
Perhaps it's their way of saying they want translators who think about what the text means, and don't simply accept the first TM match they encounter.
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Inspectress wrote:
0.07USD a word: Where does this sit, really?!
I have recently received a couple of emails offering a rate of USD0.06 per word, and for other jobs it seems that if I quote over USD0.07 I won't get the gig. I recently agreed to a do an assignment for this rate of 0.07 purely because it was a large assignment and I needed the extra cash and I did it despite the deadline being incredibly tight and the document being of a quite technical nature.
I am just wondering if this rate is the reality on the ground for this and other language pairs?
When I wrote 10 Ways to Save Money on Translation, I mentioned "the void" in Item #4, "Price ranges" as something I had never seen commented elsewhere before:
the 60 slot – If you were really paying attention, you’ll have noticed that I skipped the 60. This region is turning into a chasm, whatever you’d name an unpopulated area. Outsourcers and end-clients have been gradually realizing that they can get this same level of service for less (or for free, with automatic translation), so they are moving out of it, downwards. Translators previously operating in this area have been gradually discovering that either they can’t get this much for what they have to offer and lowering their rates, or finding out that their deliverables are worth more, so they are moving upwards.
As I only work both directions in one language pair, I have no info on others. However it seems reasonable that, for the reasons above, every language pair should have a "void" somewhere in the price range.
| | | | Andy Watkinson
Spain
Local time: 08:02
Member
Catalan to English
+ ...
Joakim Braun wrote: Andy Watkinson wrote:
But no-one can tell you can't use a CAT. I find the idea quite absurd (...)
Not absurd at all, if they've seen a lot of bad CAT-aided texts. Perhaps it's their way of saying they want translators who think about what the text means, and don't simply accept the first TM match they encounter.
a) As I mentioned above, there are agencies which for obvious reasons simply wish to extract their translators' knowledge in the most convenient and recyclable manner possible (which explains the insistence on a certain CAT tool in particular), and that they should insist on this is therefore understandable, other considerations apart.
b) But to insist a translator should NOT use a CAT tool is absurd.
An agency can insist on the quality of a text.
But unless it's an a) type of agency, it has no reason to insist on the manner in which the text is produced.
I'd be interested to know if anyone reading this has ever had a client who insisted they should not use a CAT or knows of anyone who has experienced this.
In any case, such an agency should be avoided, I believe.
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| I don't understand | Sep 27, 2015 |
Joakim Braun wrote: Andy Watkinson wrote:
But no-one can tell you can't use a CAT. I find the idea quite absurd (...)
Not absurd at all, if they've seen a lot of bad CAT-aided texts. Perhaps it's their way of saying they want translators who think about what the text means, and don't simply accept the first TM match they encounter.
Why would using a CAT tool make a translation worse?
Surely it can only help, especially with technical texts where terminology can play a major part.
| | | | Inspectress (X)
Ireland
Local time: 07:02
English to Irish
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
I'm not going to name the agency involved but once assigned a translation they send the text together with a list of requirements which includes a clear stipulation that no CAT tools be used. They didn't give their reason for asking this. And I completely agree, it really adds to the workload when there is a lot of repetition in documents and you are of course at the same time expected to be 100% consistent in the use of terms.
I will take a look at the EU websites and try to make ... See more I'm not going to name the agency involved but once assigned a translation they send the text together with a list of requirements which includes a clear stipulation that no CAT tools be used. They didn't give their reason for asking this. And I completely agree, it really adds to the workload when there is a lot of repetition in documents and you are of course at the same time expected to be 100% consistent in the use of terms.
I will take a look at the EU websites and try to make direct applications through the agencies they list there.
Thanks again everyone for such a wonderful response to my cries! I really appreciate it. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Neil Ashby
Spain
Local time: 08:02
Spanish to English
+ ...
| The market is far too diverse to apply just one general rate. | Sep 27, 2015 |
Teresa Borges wrote:
The question was is this too low or not? In order to set one's own rate, one has to know what is the "market" rate...
The market rate is irrelevant when setting your own rate - the market lives in over 200 different countries and each translator has different expectations according to their training, commitment, outlay for resources, etc.
What you need to worry about is how much you need to make per hour/week to live in your particular location and circumstances - for example, maybe you have the luxury of not needing to pay rent, hence you could charge less if you wish to. Another important factor is the width of the quality spectrum, you can market yourself at very different points of that spectrum and expect to be paid accordingly. If you can't find enough clients to pay "good" rates then maybe you can't survive as a full-time freelance translator (I certainly wouldn't recommend lowering your rates to meet their expectations or you'll just end up working 60+ hour weeks). Or at least it will be difficult for the first couple of years until you build up a good client base, i.e., a solid group of GOOD clients, not a large database of clients who are not-so-good.
With time, quality wins over and one creates steady relationships with good clients. The alternative is to work for race-to-the-bottom rates by passing translations through Google translate and then cleaning them up a bit, working outside your native langauge, doing anything for a few euros but never really building up relationships with good clients who prefer native accuracy over general jist translations that are full of errors.
IMO USD 0.07 is very low for Ireland; when I say low, I mean it appears to be too low to live off but I'm sure there are 100s of agencies willing to pay you such low prices. If you start working for them it will be difficult to find time to look for work from better paying agencies - I'd just tell them your rate and leave it at that. Don't worry about "not winning jobs", they're the sort of jobs you don't want to win (that includes the vast majority of jobs advertised here on this very platform, which I won't name). They'll often hire someone very cheaply and get cheap results, then come looking to you to correct the poor translation, costing them more in the long run.... hopefully the agency will learn.
Subject specialisations are also very important when it comes to demanding higher rates.
Patience, persistence and perseverance.
Good luck.
[Edited at 2015-09-27 12:14 GMT]
[Edited at 2015-09-27 12:16 GMT]
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