| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3] > | Is 0.02USD per word a serious/ fair offer? Thread poster: Ewa Hayward
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| Its the outcome that matters | Aug 24, 2009 |
Hello,
actually its not the rate itself that matters. Its a matter of the number of words.
If you have a small job for this money, say 100 words you will get 2 USD or €.
If you have a 20000 words job will get 400 USD or € which is far more than nothing.
However, if you think you can earn more money if you take higher rates then you should do it.
| | | | | Outcome all-important? | Aug 24, 2009 |
Alexander Schunk wrote:
Hello,
actually its not the rate itself that matters. Its a matter of the number of words.
If you have a small job for this money, say 100 words you will get 2 USD or €.
If you have a 20000 words job will get 400 USD or € which is far more than nothing.
However, if you think you can earn more money if you take higher rates then you should do it.
The outcome does matter, but how many DAYS do you need - on average, and assume without CATs - to translate 20000 words at 0.02 Euro/word in order to earn 400 Euro?
AM
| | | | Marcelo Silveyra
United States
Local time: 04:54
Member (2007)
German to English
+ ...
| What about productivity? | Aug 24, 2009 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
Ewa Murawska wrote:
I was asked to do a semi-specialised translation (IT) and offered 0.02 USD per word. Do you think it's fair or a silly offer?
It's hard to say. If the translation is easy and can be done quickly, it may be a good offer. What matters is the total amount of money and how long it will take you to do the job in good conscience.
Not to go off-topic, but I've always wondered about these overly simplistic formulas, i.e., "the total amount of money and how long it will take you to do the job" and/or "figure out how much you want to make per month, how many hours you want to work per month, and how many words you can manage within that time frame in order to figure out your rate". What happened to rewarding productivity? The last time I checked, the reward for productivity in a job like this shouldn't be limited to just "getting more customers because you work faster and cheaper." Sure, that's part of it, but not striking a healthy balance between competitive advantage and additional profit is simply ridiculous. To put it in simple (if grossly hyperbolic) terms: if the average rate per word were .12 (pick your currency) and the average translator were able to translate 500 words per hour, we would total 60 per hour. If someone were somehow able to translate 5,000 words per hour with the same quality, should they charge .012 per word? Really? Because in other businesses, that would be known as poor business skills. To be perfectly honest, I find this "figure out your desired monthly income and your monthly capacity and voilà! You have your rate" myth that keeps getting thrown around on Proz forums simply baffling in business terms. Hopefully it's not just me.
| | | | | However easy it can be | Aug 24, 2009 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
It's hard to say. If the translation is easy and can be done quickly, it may be a good offer. What matters is the total amount of money and how long it will take you to do the job in good conscience.
... even if Ewa manages to do 5.000 words/hour, she still earns only 10 dollars/hour, and if she gets 1000 dollars, that means still the same hourly amount.:-) This is simpliy absurd and offensive.
Furthermore, she does not live in what is known as a "cheap" country.
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| Quickly... still not a good offer | Aug 24, 2009 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
Ewa Murawska wrote:
I was asked to do a semi-specialised translation (IT) and offered 0.02 USD per word. Do you think it's fair or a silly offer?
It's hard to say. If the translation is easy and can be done quickly, it may be a good offer. What matters is the total amount of money and how long it will take you to do the job in good conscience.
OK, let's for the n-th time do the exercise: let's imagine Ewa can translate 8,000 words a day, working some 11-12 hours, i.e. the text is really tremendously easy (it is not, as reported already) and Ewa can type really very fast with no mistakes:
- 8,000 words a day @ 2 US$ cents = US$ 160
- In Euros at todays' rate: Eur 111
- In pounds at today's rate: GBP 96
If we divide that by the number of hours of work and forget about all expenses associated to being a freelancer, we get: GBP 8 an hour or Eur 9,25.
Is that a "good offer"?
BTW: I nearly forgot! My cleaning aid makes 9,5 euros an hour. If you charge US$ 0.02... you better consider a career in home maintenance.
| | | | Samuel Murray 
Netherlands
Local time: 13:54
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| More comments | Aug 24, 2009 |
Christel Zipfel wrote:
... even if Ewa manages to do 5.000 words/hour, she still earns only 10 dollars/hour...
USD 0.02 per word means USD 20 per 1000 words, not USD 10 per 5000 words. Still, I get your point that there comes a point at which the rate is so low that the time it would take to do the work would be so much that it would not make good business sense to do it. I'm not sure what that point is, though. If the OP's text is contextless software localisation with highly repetitive segments and no CAT discounts, the job could be a nice filler for a slow or quiet period. If, however, the requirements of the job means that she can only do 400 words per hour, it is obviously not worth her while unless it is very enjoyable work and she does it when it doesn't prevent her from doing other, more profitable work.
Furthermore, she does not live in what is known as a "cheap" country.
True, but according to her web site, translation is just a side-line for her.
Marcelo Silveyra wrote:
If someone were somehow able to translate 5,000 words per hour with the same quality, should they charge [LSD] .012 per word?
Ideally, they should charge a lot more, if they target clients who need stuff in a hurry and are willing to pay for it.
To be perfectly honest, I find this "figure out your desired monthly income and your monthly capacity and voilà! You have your rate" myth that keeps getting thrown around on Proz forums simply baffling in business terms.
It may be simplistic but it helps to determine what your minimum charge should be.
Tomás Cano Binder, CT wrote:
BTW: I nearly forgot! My cleaning aid makes 9,5 euros an hour. If you charge US$ 0.02... you better consider a career in home maintenance.
Your cleaning lady's hours aren't particularly flexible, and she can't split your home's maintenance work into several pieces of time spread over a week or two to do when she finds herself with nothing else to do.
The plumber/cleaning lady argument is also getting old -- let's face it, some jobs that require little intelligence pay a lot and some jobs that require a lot of intelligence pays very little. If some company were to offer you a cleaning job (on condition that you stop translating completely) that pays ten times your normal monthly income, would you take the job? Or would you stay with your lower-paying translation work?
[Edited at 2009-08-24 14:09 GMT]
[Edited at 2009-08-24 14:17 GMT]
| | | | Andrea Riffo
Chile
Local time: 09:54
English to Spanish
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Serious? Yes, it is. By this, I mean that, YES, I'm pretty sure that they DO in fact expect you to accept that rate and type away for next-to-nothing. I've directly received even more outrageous offers, all of them made in all seriousness. Unfortunately.
As for being fair, I'm pretty sure you can answer that question yourself...
(@ Kevin: great suggestion )
Greetings,
Andrea
... See more Serious? Yes, it is. By this, I mean that, YES, I'm pretty sure that they DO in fact expect you to accept that rate and type away for next-to-nothing. I've directly received even more outrageous offers, all of them made in all seriousness. Unfortunately.
As for being fair, I'm pretty sure you can answer that question yourself...
(@ Kevin: great suggestion)
Greetings,
Andrea
[Edited at 2009-08-24 14:15 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | casey
United States
Local time: 07:54
Member
Japanese to English
| I'd take it... | Aug 24, 2009 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
If some company were to offer you a cleaning job (on condition that you stop translating completely) that pays ten times your normal monthly income, would you take the job? Or would you stay with your lower-paying translation work?
[Edited at 2009-08-24 14:09 GMT]
[Edited at 2009-08-24 14:17 GMT]
I'd take it in a heart beat. Ten times the income for a job that can be put out of the mind at the end of the day? I'd do that and just translate for NPOs in my free time.
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Ewa Hayward
United Kingdom
Local time: 12:54
English to Polish
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TOPIC STARTER | Got the message! | Aug 24, 2009 |
Thank you all for your valuable comments. The jobs involves translating emails/short messages/etc related to IT- I assume it is some kind of IT support. Even if the language is simple, but surely cannot be that basic (IT!), I would have to spend some time on it- more valuable to me than 0.02USD per word.
| | | | | I'd take it! | Aug 24, 2009 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
If some company were to offer you a cleaning job (on condition that you stop translating completely) that pays ten times your normal monthly income, would you take the job? Or would you stay with your lower-paying translation work?
Well, very honestly Samuel if a company offered me 10 times my monthly income for cleaning, I'd take it!! Please spare me the need to tell you how much that figure would be. Probably very high... because I don't charge 2 cents per word...
| | | | | It's a serious offer | Aug 24, 2009 |
The agency stands to make serious money off the job...
| | | | Franco Cappelletti (X)
Local time: 13:54
English to German
+ ...
| Not fair, but serious | Aug 24, 2009 |
The agency definitely placed an offer which was serious from its point of view. Fair it is not, but as long as professional translators (which Proz members claim to be) accept, or even consider accepting, any such offer, the placing of offers for an absolutely ridiculous rate will continue.
I for one only check the "Jobs" section for sheer amusement and I am not expecting to ever find there a job offer acceptable to me (mind you, my (minimum!!!) rate is more than ten (!!!) times th... See more The agency definitely placed an offer which was serious from its point of view. Fair it is not, but as long as professional translators (which Proz members claim to be) accept, or even consider accepting, any such offer, the placing of offers for an absolutely ridiculous rate will continue.
I for one only check the "Jobs" section for sheer amusement and I am not expecting to ever find there a job offer acceptable to me (mind you, my (minimum!!!) rate is more than ten (!!!) times the rate offered to you); I do not, however, work for agencies, and I sincerely wish that the bulk of the Proz members (and all other serious translators around the globe) not do so, either.
We are professional freelancers and should not depend on the mercy, or submit to the laughable conditions, offered by most agencies. Be proactive, approach direct clients, offer unparallelled service, and charge adequately!
Working for agencies is not what freelancing is supposed to be. We should realise that we are independent service providers; no architect, lawyer or comparable professional would accept the remuneration we are offered by agencies, so why should we?
[Edited at 2009-08-24 21:50 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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| You made an excellent point here | Aug 24, 2009 |
Anil Gidwani wrote:
The agency stands to make serious money off the job...
| | | | Angela Dickson (X)
United Kingdom
Local time: 12:54
French to English
+ ...
| Not all agencies are like this | Aug 24, 2009 |
Franco Cappelletti wrote:
Working for agencies is not what freelancing is supposed to be. We should realise that we are independent service providers; no architect, lawyer or comparable professional would accept the remuneration we are offered by agencies, so why sould we?
Not all agencies are like this one. There are good ones who agree to pay good rates. I find it convenient at the moment to work for agencies, as it saves me the time and trouble of marketing myself to direct clients.
I am still an independent service provider and can hold my own in a conversation with architects and lawyers, even a conversation about clients and money.
| | | | C. Tougas
Canada
Local time: 07:54
Member (2009)
English to French
+ ...
| A professional translator's expertise is worth more | Aug 24, 2009 |
Offers like that, when accepted, can lead to an overall drop in expected translation rates in the market. Despite the presence of TMs and other productivity tools that can accelerate the translation process, let's not forget that translators are among the only professionals that charge by volume. And the price they charge has not gone up in the past decade, but seems to be on a downward trend.
Charge reasonable rates and do not accept projects that are priced so low as to diminish the val... See more Offers like that, when accepted, can lead to an overall drop in expected translation rates in the market. Despite the presence of TMs and other productivity tools that can accelerate the translation process, let's not forget that translators are among the only professionals that charge by volume. And the price they charge has not gone up in the past decade, but seems to be on a downward trend.
Charge reasonable rates and do not accept projects that are priced so low as to diminish the value that only a professional translator can add.
That's my two cents ▲ Collapse
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