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luce-neidert
Community Member

What does translator mean on Upwork?

I'm in a bad mood, here's why:

 

Recently, I "came across" a client who wanted marketing and medical English to French translation.  I made an offer. He sent me a message saying my rate was too high, that he had found an agency willing to offer that type of translation for $ 0,04 a word (!!!!).

 

We bargained a little, and he generously proposed $ 0,05 a word, which is a rate I proposed 3 years ago to a repeat customer I like working with very much. Obviously, other customers have to pay a higher rate.

 

Why? 

 

Because learning English takes time and dedication. And then, learning to translate from English to French takes an enormous amount of time and energy too. After years of hard work, I earned a Master's degree from my university, which I'm rather proud of.

 

Then, there is the time factor. It takes time to translate, time to research, time to proofread... And time should be money.

 

I just had to make an experiment: I offered a translation job (which I have cancelled since) to see what would happen if I asked for translation at $ 0,01 a word. I did get offers, and only 1/5 of the freelancers bid a higher rate. Some even lowered the rate. Of course, not many of these freelancers had any real training in translation.

 

So here we are: clients don't seem to value translation because they don't know what translation is. They are offered translation by freelancers that haven't much more knowledge than them about what translation is.

 

This must be why we can now see so many job offers where a client is naive enough to require someone to review a Google translation - which I hope no real translator will ever accept to do...

 

I'm still in a very bad mood...

51 REPLIES 51

This is great news! I'm recently noticed that more and more clients asking for translation are implying that they are aware of the existence of machine translation and that is exactly what they refuse to pay for.

How come they have finaly learnt that a machine translation is not worth paying for?

akia26
Community Member

Some, but not all, Clients really think freelancer is a slave. I faced a similar issue recently which I rejected. I don't get how other freelancers are bidding lower than this. I bet they are going to give them something worth than google translation...lol. The right client who acknowledge your skill will come. Don't be discouraged.

I'm not discouraged, I do have clients that know the difference between human and machine translation. But sometimes, you come accross people who have the guts to tell me that they think my translation is very good, but they'll hire the person offering translation for $0.04, or less, even if they don't like the "quality" of their "translation". I just think "good luck to you!".

I just faced the same thing. Do you know what he asked for? He asked me to judge 1000 websites as low, medium, and high only with 8.7$; He wanted it to be completed in one day. He wanted a research specialist, but this is what he offered. Have you ever seen a client who offers such a low amount?  Some are not are in their right mind.


Akia D wrote:

I just faced the same thing. Do you know what he asked for? He asked me to judge 1000 websites as low, medium, and high only with 8.7$; He wanted it to be completed in one day. He wanted a research specialist, but this is what he offered. Have you ever seen a client who offers such a low amount?  Some are not are in their right mind.


Have you asked why he was offering $ 8.7 instead of $ 8.8, or even $ 9?

 

I agree with you, some of these mean "clients" really exagerate, but then some freelancers are so desperate that they offer to work for nothing at all, hoping that by some miracle this will end up making them earn millions of dollars.

He was trying to cover the service fee. He offered 7 USD first. When I told him that Upwork will take 20%, he said 9.7; after a minute he texted me again saying, "I made a mistake, I mean 8.7." So funny...

Do you know what I did? I accepted the offer and judged 260 websites. I am going to refund his money right now, not because he asked, but to teach him a lesson. I did that so he can realize that he is asking me to work for free. I accepted with that in my mind. I am waiting for what he has got to say. I am curious. You might think I am crazy, but I am very satisfied with what I did.

 


Akia D wrote:

He was trying to cover the service fee. He offered 7 USD first. When I told him that Upwork will take 20%, he said 9.7; after a minute he texted me again saying, "I made a mistake, I mean 8.7." So funny...

Do you know what I did? I accepted the offer and judged 260 websites. I am going to refund his money right now, not because he asked, but to teach him a lesson. I did that so he can realize that he is asking me to work for free. I accepted with that in my mind. I am waiting for what he has got to say. I am curious. You might think I am crazy, but I am very satisfied with what I did.


Ooops, beware, if you don't get any money from a contract it might hurt your JSS or whatever, check about it before refunding.

I love the fact that he calculated how much to pay you to cover the 20%. That's an excellent story. And the fact that he miscalculated makes it even better.

petra_r
Community Member


Akia D wrote:

Do you know what I did? I accepted the offer and judged 260 websites. I am going to refund his money right now, not because he asked, but to teach him a lesson.

You might think I am crazy, but I am very satisfied with what I did.


You won't be so "satisfied with what you did" when you get your job success score...

 

Accepting a job with the sole purpose of "teaching the client a lesson" is always a very, VERY bad idea. It teaches the client absolutely nothing, makes you look foolish (why accept a contract that clearly isn't what you want) and affects your chances of getting future work. 

atlinguist
Community Member

Found today:

..."Could you confirm the 3 USD dollars per hour for this translation service as stated in your profile?"...

 

And you think USD 0.04/word is cheap?


Alexandra H wrote:

Found today:

..."Could you confirm the 3 USD dollars per hour for this translation service as stated in your profile?"...

 

And you think USD 0.04/word is cheap?


You're right, I've been contacted for a huge translation job at $ 0.03 a word... I had to turn it down. Even if the total offered was between $300 and $400, I don't fancy spending a week translating for peanuts, I still have better things to do!

Luce N wrote:

Alexandra H wrote:

Found today:

..."Could you confirm the 3 USD dollars per hour for this translation service as stated in your profile?"...

 

And you think USD 0.04/word is cheap?


You're right, I've been contacted for a huge translation job at $ 0.03 a word... I had to turn it down. Even if the total offered was between $300 and $400, I don't fancy spending a week translating for peanuts, I still have better things to do!


I was recently hired to review translations sample it was an easy job because all 9 were machine translations. If these freelancers always deliver machine translalation, $0.03/word is a very easy way to make a lot of money in no time.

0055c7df
Community Member

ok