Was it correct of me to reject this job? Thread poster: Jesper Stilling
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I recently rejected a job with a total wordcount of 71k words. I was getting paid for post editing 16k of the 71k words.
However, when I received the package, all 71k words were untouched (in other words everything was MT). There were no TMs or TBs.
According to the agency all the internal repetitions, fuzzies and internal fuzzies were not to be touched by me, hence no pay.
My problem with this setup is that I might have to do unpaid work because of all the internal fu... See more I recently rejected a job with a total wordcount of 71k words. I was getting paid for post editing 16k of the 71k words.
However, when I received the package, all 71k words were untouched (in other words everything was MT). There were no TMs or TBs.
According to the agency all the internal repetitions, fuzzies and internal fuzzies were not to be touched by me, hence no pay.
My problem with this setup is that I might have to do unpaid work because of all the internal fuzzies, and because I don't trust that all the repetitions will actually auto-propogate (due to slight differences). Am I being paranoid or does this look suspicious to you too? Let me note that I am quite new to this.
I am definitely not used to receiving jobs in which repetitions and fuzzies are not marked as such.
Thanks for your contribution! ▲ Collapse
| | | | Samuel Murray 
Netherlands
Local time: 10:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| You should ask... | May 23, 2022 |
Jesper Stilling wrote:
I don't trust that all the repetitions will actually auto-propogate (due to slight differences).
You should ask on the subforum dedicated to your particular CAT tool, whether all internal fuzzy matches that are indicated on the analysis actually appear as match suggestions while you work.
| | | | Kay Denney
France
Local time: 10:08
French to English
Only you can know if it was right for you or not. I personally wouldn't touch such a job with a barge pole, it's like asking for trouble. PEMT I don't touch as a matter of principle, since it gives me a headache. And for CAT tools to understand that something is a fuzzy match I'm pretty sure you do have to have validated the previous similar segment. I only ever validate during my final onceover, to avoid messing up the TM with multiple entries, so that wouldn't work for me.
And 16... See more Only you can know if it was right for you or not. I personally wouldn't touch such a job with a barge pole, it's like asking for trouble. PEMT I don't touch as a matter of principle, since it gives me a headache. And for CAT tools to understand that something is a fuzzy match I'm pretty sure you do have to have validated the previous similar segment. I only ever validate during my final onceover, to avoid messing up the TM with multiple entries, so that wouldn't work for me.
And 16k words in a CAT tool must be mind-numbing work indeed, whatever the subject! ▲ Collapse
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I think they used "Homogeneity" which is not great for multiple reasons, for example proofreading the file after the MTPE step is only (financially) possible within the CAT tool (I like reviewing the files in the final format after I'm done with the editing step but there are too many repetitions for that in this case). I am sure that things would be propagating just fine otherwise, it's just hard to keep consistency between the fuzzy matches (I feel like they should pay us more, not less, for f... See more I think they used "Homogeneity" which is not great for multiple reasons, for example proofreading the file after the MTPE step is only (financially) possible within the CAT tool (I like reviewing the files in the final format after I'm done with the editing step but there are too many repetitions for that in this case). I am sure that things would be propagating just fine otherwise, it's just hard to keep consistency between the fuzzy matches (I feel like they should pay us more, not less, for fuzzy matches, it's like double the work ).
[Edited at 2022-05-23 21:48 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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Whether it was correct or not for you to reject that job, only you can tell but I do not blame you for rejecting it. I only wish more translators would reject such a job as that is why the translation industry is in such a sorry state. I mean I would feel very hard done by if I had accepted a job with those terms. I mean the agency is getting a 71K job and only paying for what? 16K? This type of jobs take you forever to do; I've learnt the hard way as I once naively accepted such a job (it was a... See more Whether it was correct or not for you to reject that job, only you can tell but I do not blame you for rejecting it. I only wish more translators would reject such a job as that is why the translation industry is in such a sorry state. I mean I would feel very hard done by if I had accepted a job with those terms. I mean the agency is getting a 71K job and only paying for what? 16K? This type of jobs take you forever to do; I've learnt the hard way as I once naively accepted such a job (it was about 2000 words but it took forever) and the agency only paid for about 600 because of the 'fuzzy' matches. Well, those 'fuzzies' also condition you so you tend to spend longer on them and I've learnt not to touch them with a barge ▲ Collapse
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 10:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
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Josephine Cassar wrote:
I mean the agency is getting a 71K job and only paying for what? 16K?
If I were to hand you a book of 71K words and ask you to translate only three chapters (totaling 16K words), then it is not a "71K job" but a "16K job".
Well, those 'fuzzies' also condition you so you tend to spend longer on them and I've learnt not to touch them with a barge [pole].
In the OP's job, he would not have to spend any time on fuzzy matches. Indeed, he is asked very specifically not to touch the fuzzy matches. The only reason for this strange request is that his client is insufficiently skilled in the CAT tool to lock the segments that should not be translated, and he is asking the translator to carefully step over those segments as if they are locked.
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Because they sound like idiots. You can't ignore fuzzy matches... A fuzzy match by definition is not a complete match and so needs attention.
Samuel Murray wrote:
If I were to hand you a book of 71K words and ask you to translate only three chapters (totaling 16K words), then it is not a "71K job" but a "16K job".
Yes, but when have you ever had a CAT job where all the new segments are nicely grouped together in separate chapters unrelated to the rest in content, style and terminology?
The reality is that the new segments will be peppered around the text so you have to read and improve the whole lot. Both full and fuzzy matches will be drawn from different translations by different translators and will be riddled with inconsistencies and errors. Even the new sections you translate from scratch will need to be tied in with previous phrasing and terminology.
The reality of translating 16,000 out of 71,000 words is that it will take waaaay longer than translating a 16,000 word document from scratch.
| | | | Jesper Stilling
Spain
Local time: 10:08
English to Danish
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TOPIC STARTER
Thank you all for your input!
I see that some of you would not have touched such a job either. That makes me think that I was not completely wrong in rejecting it.
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Adieu
Ukrainian to English
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| Did you look at it thoroughly? | Jun 17, 2022 |
Maybe that's just repetition pay?
16k paid out of 70k sounds plausible for a "weighted" job consisting of 5-10 (depending on their discount grid) near-identical forms/contracts/applications
| | | | TTilch
Local time: 10:08
English to German
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| You were right to reject such a job | Jun 20, 2022 |
You should always be able to calculate before starting a job how much time you'll require to complete it and how much you'll have earned by hour.
If it is not clear if repetitions/fuzzy matches need touching (and be it only because they are not locked and you have to walk through them in the CAT tool), then you'll have to assume they'll cost you time. And time spent needs to be paid. Period.
I'm all for paying translators by time spent anyway and not by words, characters, fuzz... See more You should always be able to calculate before starting a job how much time you'll require to complete it and how much you'll have earned by hour.
If it is not clear if repetitions/fuzzy matches need touching (and be it only because they are not locked and you have to walk through them in the CAT tool), then you'll have to assume they'll cost you time. And time spent needs to be paid. Period.
I'm all for paying translators by time spent anyway and not by words, characters, fuzzy discounts etc. - it's just stupid. I never heard of a software programmer being paid by the characters they type for coding...
Best,
Tanja ▲ Collapse
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