Paul Sulzberger
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Recent Posts
- “Liar, liar! Pants on fire!” Who can afford to tell the truth about translation quality… and who can’t?
- The price of translation – why is it like buying a second-hand car? #xl8
- Are bad translators driving out the good?
- Translator Pay: Will waving a magic wand be enough to make the pain of international payments disappear?
- Paying translators – let’s stop tearing out our hair and just fix the system!
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Author Archives: Paul Sulzberger
“Liar, liar! Pants on fire!” Who can afford to tell the truth about translation quality… and who can’t?
When everyone else is shouting that they deliver “quality”, is there some trick translators can use to get paid more for doing a better job? Is there some realistic way for customers to figure out if you are telling the … Continue reading
The price of translation – why is it like buying a second-hand car? #xl8
What comes to mind when you think about used car salesmen? The words “sleazy”, “disreputable”, “untrustworthy” or “con man” perhaps? Of course, this assessment may be totally unfair to used car salesmen… But the market for translation has many similarities … Continue reading
Posted in OpenBorder
12 Comments
Are bad translators driving out the good?
Many of us have a sense of unease from what seem like conflicting signals from the translation marketplace. On the one hand, the demand for translation appears to be increasing worldwide, but on the other, prices appear to be dropping … Continue reading
Posted in OpenBorder
27 Comments
Translator Pay: Will waving a magic wand be enough to make the pain of international payments disappear?
What magic is making this translator so happy? (Hint. Her foreign customers always pay her invoices in full - in her own currency and free of any foreign exchange charges or bank fees.) Is this just some sleight of hand or are … Continue reading
Posted in Getting paid
4 Comments
Paying translators – let’s stop tearing out our hair and just fix the system!
Dear Translator, XYZ Translations is a leading language service provider in London, UK. Attached, please find a document in German which we need to have translated into US English. It is an analysis of the German market for fixed-income government bonds … Continue reading
Posted in Getting paid
Tagged Currency, money transfer, translation, translation industry
12 Comments
The headache and heartache of paying translators. How LSPs feel about cross-border payments.
Paying and getting paid – it’s a pretty touchy subject. Few of us are immune from strong feelings on the subject. In a previous post, I looked at what freelance translators felt were the main frustrations of getting paid across different … Continue reading
Posted in Getting paid
Tagged currencies, Currency, Exchange rate, Freelancer, LSP, Payment, payment system, Small business, translation
13 Comments
The Banks vs. Translators: What do freelancers think about how they get paid?
After you’ve done the hard work – it’s great to get paid. But getting paid is not always as straightforward as we might prefer it to be. In a previous post I posed the question – Does the global banking … Continue reading
Does the global banking system disadvantage translators? Can we fix it?
Is someone taking an unjustified cut from the payments you receive from your local or foreign customers? Do you always receive the full amount you are owed when you are paid? Or is a proportion of your income disappearing into bank … Continue reading
Posted in Getting paid
Tagged Currency, Exchange rate, globalization, Small business, translation
5 Comments
Can crowdsourcing coexist comfortably with professional translation? Or is it a threat? #xl8
In a previous post I suggested that the share of the global translation pie available to professional translators is not shrinking in favour of machines or crowdsourced amateurs, but rather the whole pie is expanding – potentially to everyone’s ultimate benefit. As … Continue reading
The end of linguistic diversity? Or a bonanza of new opportunities for translators?
In 2004, I remember picking up a magazine from a street kiosk in Milan because it had an article which predicted that within 10 years or so, Italians would be speaking English at work and the local language would only be … Continue reading
