| Pages in topic: < [1 2] | Is there any database of feedback on freelancers available? Thread poster: Albert Fischer (Dipl. Jur., LL.B., BDÜ)
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| Dealing with unprofessional agencies is far worse | Sep 17, 2012 |
Mirelluk wrote:
Dealing with unprofessional translators is costly, time consuming and can have serious reputation consequences for a translation company if and when corrective steps are not pursued.
Things are much worse for freelancers who have to deal with unprofessional agencies that deliver the freelancer's work plagued with "corrections" perpetrated by the agency's own reviewers, who many times are not even native speakers of the target language. A total disrespect for the client, for the profession and for true professionals.
Believe it or not, at least in the USA, many PM's still see some foreign languages, just because they kind of recognize some words, as derivatives of the English language, and freelancers have to deal with this type of ignorance all the time and beg the agency to please not to implement such horrible "corrections".
| | | | | Lively debate | Sep 18, 2012 |
I think the arguments against a translator BB prevail
| | | | | Post removed: This post was hidden by a moderator or staff member for the following reason: Requested by poster | Tony M
France
Local time: 09:15
Member
French to English
+ ...
SITE LOCALIZER | Against it too, for practical reasons; but I think the need is real enough | Sep 21, 2012 |
Obi Udeariry wrote:
... there is no list of rated lawyers, doctors, acoountants or any other professionals or any need therefor; ...
I think the situation with translation is subtly different; for a start, there are indeed lists of doctors and lawyers — in fact, any profession where it is obligatory to be a member of a professional body in order to practise, and that professional body has the teeth to 'strike you off' and thus prevent you from practising.
The situation in translation is quite different: the whole industry is unregulated — and let me state here and now that I am certainly not in favour of regulating it any further — and for this reason, customers are in the unenviable situation of having to take 'pot luck' when choosing a translator; it is very much a case of 'caveat emptor'. So an argument might be made for some system that would make it easier for customers to make an informed selection. But of course, those people who feel themselves threatened by such a system — presumably, beause they doubt their own proficiency — are likely to speak out vociferously against it. As will those others like myself who, although not fearing for their own skins, can see that the system is too flawed to be feasible.
Obi Udeariry wrote:
... similarly I can buy specific products because I like their adverts, or have used them before, or have heard good things from someone who has used them before
Here again, the world of translation is rather different; for one thing, unlike with most other products, the customer is very often not in a position to judge for themselves the quality of the end result. And the circle of word-of-mouth is inevitably relatively restricted, compared to the worldwide translation market.
Of course, what you say is to some extent true: it would be nice if there was the same sort of possibility for word-of-mouth recommendations (or not!) as works in everyday life; but sadly perhaps, that sort of free exchange of information is not allowed in formalized, written exchanges on sites like this; hence we get a sort of lop-sided censorship, where positive comments can get through and don't get censored, but negative ones are not allowed. This is understandable, certainly from the point of view of the people running the exchanges fora, who could clearly find themselves in a very difficult position.
Which then leads us back to some kind of formalized system like the BB, where the site declines responsibility for the remarks made, and comments are at least 'vetted' before posting. This system seems to me reasonable enough, given that there are 'many' translators who have a need for reliable information about 'few' outsourcers.
But the other way round is fraught with all the pitfalls already enumerated above, to the point of making it sadly open to abuse and fortunately impossible to implement.
Perhaps what we need is an informal system, where people will be left to judge for themselves the reliability of the comments; but I fear this too is too open to abuse to be viable.
So I for one shall continue to rely on my own judgement; after over 10 years participating in KudoZ, I have a very clear idea of those colleagues to whom I can happily outsource work... and those I would run a mile from; and if I have any lingering doubts, then I know I can call on private personal recommendations from my network of contacts. I think it will be hard to find a better system that is workable and equitable for all concerned.
[Edited at 2012-09-21 15:35 GMT]
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| Not quite the same thing | Sep 21, 2012 |
Tony M wrote:
I think the situation with translation is subtly different; for a start, there are indeed lists of doctors and lawyers — in fact, any profession where it is obligatory to be a member of a professional body in order to practise, and that professional body has the teeth to 'strike you off' and thus prevent you from practising.
Well, but you can only be thrown out of the bar or the medical professional body if it is proven --normally in court-- that you caused damage intentionally or because of sheer negligence. You would not be thrown out of the profession just because of the opinion of a customer.
A "translator blueboard" is hardly comparable to a court in the guarantee of fairness to all involved parties and the actual extent of the damages suffered. It would be just a ranting place for outsourcers who did not spend enough time choosing their translators.
| | | | Tony M
France
Local time: 09:15
Member
French to English
+ ...
SITE LOCALIZER | I think you missed my point | Sep 21, 2012 |
Tomás Cano Binder, CT wrote:
A "translator blueboard" is hardly comparable to a court in the guarantee of fairness to all involved parties and the actual extent of the damages suffered. It would be just a ranting place for outsourcers who did not spend enough time choosing their translators.
That's really my whole point: any such system could only work if it had 'teeth' (i.e. the power to stop people from practising) — and as such, would be impossible to implement without all that well-honed disciplinary infrastructure, and of course, some jolly good objective standards to work to.
Hence why, as I was at pains to point out, I would not be in favour of such a thing, as it could never be made workable in the real world.
| | | | Shai Navé 
Israel
Local time: 10:15
English to Hebrew
+ ...
| The BlueBoard is not a Blacklist | Sep 25, 2012 |
The BB and similar lists serve mainly as a database about payment ethics. In the case of the BlueBoard the LWA entry is usually used to specify if the client has paid - on time, with a delay (and significant one, usually a week or two type of "delays" don't even find their way there) or not at all. It does not reflect subjective opinions and measures such as rate levels, average time table and other terms and conditions to which one translator may object but others accept.
If, for e... See more The BB and similar lists serve mainly as a database about payment ethics. In the case of the BlueBoard the LWA entry is usually used to specify if the client has paid - on time, with a delay (and significant one, usually a week or two type of "delays" don't even find their way there) or not at all. It does not reflect subjective opinions and measures such as rate levels, average time table and other terms and conditions to which one translator may object but others accept.
If, for example, an always rushed, low rates type of agency pays always on time, they will probably have a good BB entry by those who are willing to work in such condition, but other than the fact that the agency pays on time, no other important details is available to allow one to judge that agency's professional merits and value in the "real world".
This entire concept, which I agree has its caveats and is being abused to some degree, is not transferable to freelancers; except for, maybe, the issue of delivery on or before the agreed deadline.
Rating agencies on the basis of payment ethics and freelancers on the basics of quality, which is somewhat of a subjective measure anyway, perceived "responsiveness" and other subjective measures is unbalanced, not fair and gives the agencies unproportional amount of power by enabling them to taint someone's hard earned reputation as a whole with a click of a few buttons; This surely will be abused by unscrupulous stakeholders rather than serve as a reliable and effective tool for trustworthy, professional agencies. Sadly, you cannot create an honor-based rating system.
If, for example, someones tries to abuse the BB by falsely claiming that they didn't get paid or that their payment got delayed, the agency can contact Proz, provide some documents (emails or contract specifying the agreed payment terms and method, proof of payment, etc.) and rather easily have that entry removed, thus protecting their reputation. From my experience, translators are usually careful with posting negative comments on the BB, and this is more of a last resort rather than the first course of action; some agencies are even abusing the BB themselves by trying not to pay, and if and when a BB entry is eventually made, they condition the receipt of payment by removing or editing the negative entry.
Instead of creating blacklists, which can and are easily abused, I suggest to establish a mechanism to reduce risks for both parties involved in the form of an arbitration-escrow process.
Escrow reduces the financial risk for both parties (the translator knows that they will get paid, and the agency knows that if their quality dispute is accepted they will get their money back), and arbitration allows for impartial (ideally) professional(s) to settle quality disputes.
I know that this is a far-fetched solution that, sadly, doesn't carry much weight in practice and that can be easily bypassed, but I think that efforts should be diverted into a mutual beneficial solution for risk management instead of blacklists that are abused to taint reputations out of ulterior motives and only contributing to more confusion and spreading of disinformation.
[Edited at 2012-09-25 19:41 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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