Seeking a “Quality” Translation - Part One
Nov 6th, 2007 by admin |It’s amazing how many people out there need translations, but don’t know where to look, or even when they find a company, they aren’t really sure what they are getting. What constitutes a “quality” translation? It is simply using professional translators? What is the difference between a certified translation and a standard translation? In this series, we will examine various aspects of the translations process, what some companies overlook or neglect, and why it matters.
Seeking a company
Most of our staff at First-Translations comes to us by way of another translation agency. Oddly enough, the biggest complaint from over 90% of them was not the work environment at their previous jobs, but rather the way that the company would take advantage of their clients. One of our senior-level management, who worked for a very large and well known translations company (if you’re reading this, there’s a very good chance you’ve heard of them) that would:
“Hire anyone who walked through the door to do a translation. I was a Belgian national and spoke the Dutch language very well, but was certainly not yet certified to teach the language. They asked me to instruct classes teaching Dutch. When I explained that I was not certified to do this work, they responded that I must learn at some time, and that the class was mine.”
Of course, we’re grateful that many of our staff has received such real-world experience and training so quickly and early on in their career, but the real question is: Was it worth it to the client? In most cases, certainly not. It is not the client’s job to directly pay for the training of the company’s resources. We love getting work from new clients, but it breaks our hearts when they have already spent twice as much on poor, sub-standard work.
The point to take here is that the biggest company is not always the best, especially when it comes to translations work. A translation is a delicate task and does not belong anywhere near the world of bureaucratic office protocol. Each document translation should be handled and managed by a trained professional through every step. Passing off a document through its document life-cycle, is not efficient, it’s just plain dumb.
So, lets look at a list of things to look out for when selecting a translation company:
- Be wary of companies that will give you an “instant quote” online or otherwise. The primary factor in building a quote is source word count/target word count and there are many reasons why this needs to be a subjective analysis done by a trained professional. Translation is subtle work. Companies that overbid by overestimating document word count (i.e. double spaced PDFs, etc…) will not return or mention the extra charges, but will not hesitate to charge you more in the case that your pages contained more words than they estimated. Steer clear of word count estimating without a trained human looking at the document first.
- Watch out for companies who promise same-day or oddly amazing turnarounds. A quote process for a fairly complex document should take one business day by itself. That document needs to be transmitted to a number of qualified translators, and a translator selection process needs to take place that we’ll examine up close a little later. Companies that promise suspiciously rapid services may be skipping essential steps needed to get the job done right.
- Also, look out for suspiciously low fees. Both of the problems we examined above contribute to a company being able to afford to charge clients rates that “blow away the competition.” Unfortunately, the finished product doesn’t. As a rule of thumb, we’ve done quite a bit of market research in the past 17 years and are convinced that we can offer quality services at prices up to 35% less than our competitors. But if your getting quotes at 40% or more less than what the going rate is, then look deeper into the companies methods of executing work.
That should get you started. Stay tuned for the next article in the series where we will examine up close, the translator selection process and the crucial parts of that process, as well as the document life cycle and what steps should be taken to ensure a smooth and successful translation.