| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3] > | How is this company still in business? Thread poster: Baran Keki
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Tom in London wrote: Michael Newton wrote:
....Aerolineas Britanicas... I know British Airways is a poor airline but converting their name into something that sounds Spanish, as a way of communicating how bad you think they are....(I'll stop here).
Perhaps Michael hinted at the fact that British Airways is sort of Spanish, as it belongs to the Spanish-registered IAG Group together with Iberia😁 But let's not have a runaway, heated row about that😉
| | | | Edward Potter 
Spain
Local time: 20:53
Member (2003)
Spanish to English
+ ...
| Aerolíneas Británicas | Jan 7, 2023 |
Tom in London wrote: Michael Newton wrote:
....Aerolineas Britanicas... I know British Airways is a poor airline but converting their name into something that sounds Spanish, as a way of communicating how bad you think they are....(I'll stop here).
LOL! I didn't catch that the first time.
Hilarious joke merely by translating the name.
| | | | Michael Newton
United States
Local time: 14:53
Japanese to English
+ ...
| still in business | Jan 7, 2023 |
A once great airline that was a joy to ride. Now a budget airline with premium fares. The seats are designed for contortionist dwarves, the food seems to have been sourced from Pret A Vomir and the flight attendants look like they just got out of Broadmoor.
The best airlines: Japanese Airlines, ANA and Cathay Pacific.
| | | | Michael Newton
United States
Local time: 14:53
Japanese to English
+ ...
| still in business | Jan 7, 2023 |
Sorry: Japan Airlines.
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Edward Potter
Spain
Local time: 20:53
Member (2003)
Spanish to English
+ ...
| Good question | Jan 7, 2023 |
Michael Newton wrote:
How are EasyJet, Ryanair and Aerolineas Britanicas still in business for that matter?
Are you alluding to the fact that they are big enough to get some "official help"?
| | | | Michael Newton
United States
Local time: 14:53
Japanese to English
+ ...
| still in business | Jan 7, 2023 |
Actually, I was referring to the fact that no matter how poor the service is (or how low the translation rate), many passengers (translators) don't mind being abused.
Americans are stuck on which is the worst US airline: Delta, American Airlines or Southwest. Answer: all of them. The Asia and the Middle Eastern airlines seem to be best
| | | | Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 19:53
Member (2008)
Italian to English
| I no longer care | Jan 7, 2023 |
Michael Newton wrote:
which is the worst US airline
I no longer care. I have decided to stop flying.
You know why.
| | | | Kaspars Melkis
United Kingdom
Local time: 19:53
English to Latvian
+ ...
| different perspectives | Jan 7, 2023 |
If you put on a black hat, you can say that it is a very good company. They make sure that no personal medical information gets leaked by translators misplacing pdf files or losing their laptops. The special software makes sure that your computer doesn't have any spyware as well. As for the quality, these jobs are not for patient care but for regulators who need to see what side-effects the study drug might potentially have and therefore don't require impeccable style. The most important is that... See more If you put on a black hat, you can say that it is a very good company. They make sure that no personal medical information gets leaked by translators misplacing pdf files or losing their laptops. The special software makes sure that your computer doesn't have any spyware as well. As for the quality, these jobs are not for patient care but for regulators who need to see what side-effects the study drug might potentially have and therefore don't require impeccable style. The most important is that the translator doesn't miss anything even though it is understood that most of included information is not relevant. The regulations are useful as they make sure that all steps of the process are duly performed.
From another perspective, however, ticking all the checkboxes can be superficial and a lack of quality culture can be disastrous even in tightly regulated environment. A good recent example is an Indian pharmaceutical manufacturer who changed the supplier of one of the ingredients for their cough syrup, and many children died due to poisonous impurities in it. It makes me wary of medicines manufactured in India even though the regulators assure that they are produced according to the same strict quality standards. Regulators cannot inspect every facility all the time and if the Indian culture is to tick the checkbox without verifying the actual product, that is not worth much.
Some parts of the regulatory institutions can also be corrupted. When the FDA approved aducanumab for treatment of Alzheimer's disease it was done against the recommendation of the FDA scientific committee. The drug not only has very low effectiveness but it can also cause brain swelling, a serious side effect that arguably in some cases had caused death. The drug trials are often run internationally and in this case precise translation of medical reports are important as mistakes could lead to a missed safety signal.
I have no axe to grind about this company. I worked for it but when they couldn't pay me as much as I wanted, we parted our ways. I am not going to badmouth a translation agency just because they pay less than I wanted. It may be that I am just greedy and overestimate my capabilities. Whatever, I prefer working with texts that are more challenging and require high quality even if such jobs are rarer. It may not be suitable for everyone but I can see where this agency stands, what is the global business environment and why they cannot pay more. The rotten part is elsewhere and they are just trying to make money, just like all of us.
[Edited at 2023-01-07 09:29 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 21:53
Member
English to Turkish
TOPIC STARTER | Thanks for your input | Jan 7, 2023 |
Kaspars Melkis wrote:
I have no axe to grind about this company. I worked for it but when they couldn't pay me as much as I wanted, we parted our ways. I am not going to badmouth a translation agency just because they pay less than I wanted. It may be that I am just greedy and overestimate my capabilities. Whatever, I prefer working with texts that are more challenging and require high quality even if such jobs are rarer. It may not be suitable for everyone but I can see where this agency stands, what is the global business environment and why they cannot pay more. The rotten part is elsewhere and they are just trying to make money, just like all of us.
[Edited at 2023-01-07 09:29 GMT]
and steering the discussion away from airlines. You may be right about their security measures, annoying as they were. But my gripe is not about that, I just mentioned that to draw attention to their peculiarity (not many people might appreciate being forced to install alien software on their computer).
My issue with this company is the difficulty of the medical texts they want you to translate into your source language (they must know that you're not a native English speaker and have not worked as a surgeon before making the switch to medical translation). Take a look at the medical report below, though I must say it's not a particularly difficult text to translate (though you wouldn't know that, because it's in Turkish), but note the layout and the illegible hand-writing, and this is a report intended for a person, nothing to do with regulatory affairs (if they're collecting such personal reports for regulatory purposes, then I wouldn't know) and there is a lot more difficult stuff than this (like explaining the surgical procedures in a highly peculiar language that makes no sense to the laymen, but only to the doctors involved in those procedures), and they're offering 3 cents per word (to their credit, they leave the door open for 'negotiation') maybe they're offering more money in your language.
| | | | Kaspars Melkis
United Kingdom
Local time: 19:53
English to Latvian
+ ...
| thanks for your response | Jan 7, 2023 |
Baran Keki wrote: Kaspars Melkis wrote:
I have no axe to grind about this company. I worked for it but when they couldn't pay me as much as I wanted, we parted our ways. I am not going to badmouth a translation agency just because they pay less than I wanted. It may be that I am just greedy and overestimate my capabilities. Whatever, I prefer working with texts that are more challenging and require high quality even if such jobs are rarer. It may not be suitable for everyone but I can see where this agency stands, what is the global business environment and why they cannot pay more. The rotten part is elsewhere and they are just trying to make money, just like all of us.
[Edited at 2023-01-07 09:29 GMT] and steering the discussion away from airlines. You may be right about their security measures, annoying as they were. But my gripe is not about that, I just mentioned that to draw attention to their peculiarity (not many people might appreciate being forced to install alien software on their computer). My issue with this company is the difficulty of the medical texts they want you to translate into your source language (they must know that you're not a native English speaker and have not worked as a surgeon before making the switch to medical translation). Take a look at the medical report below, though I must say it's not a particularly difficult text to translate (though you wouldn't know that, because it's in Turkish), but note the layout and the illegible hand-writing, and this is a report intended for a person, nothing to do with regulatory affairs (if they're collecting such personal reports for regulatory purposes, then I wouldn't know) and there is a lot more difficult stuff than this (like explaining the surgical procedures in a highly peculiar language that makes no sense to the laymen, but only to the doctors involved in those procedures), and they're offering 3 cents per word (to their credit, they leave the door open for 'negotiation') maybe they're offering more money in your language.
They paid me $0.10/target word or maybe $0.12, I don't remember anymore. It might be that 3 cents is just more reflection of your local market realities than the nature of this company. Although some former project manager on this company on reddit was surprised that I got paid that much. On the other hand I only know a couple of other translators in Latvian who can do medical translations while regulative market is the same as for bigger countries. So maybe I am in a privileged position indeed.
I would make a case that their software was rubbish. The malware scanning was slow and made many false alarms. I know what I am doing on my computer and it was not necessary. I understand that many translators have less computer skills and really mess up their systems. At the end of the day, my laptop is for business use and I don't mind using their software if they want, as long as they pay me adequately. I wouldn't definitely want this trouble if I was paid only 3 cents per word.
As for the complicated formatting, they sometimes gave templates to minimise issues. It is actually mostly unnecessary and people involved don't understand the purpose for those texts. I just wander why more efficient companies who can better communicate with clients and negotiate more appropriate specifications don't win competition. Possibly it is due to the rot in the regulative sphere that we cannot do much about.
My final thought is that the reproduction of complicated formatting could be a perfect field where AI could excel. Of course, they would make a mistake here or there but overall this is a simple and boring thing that computers can do much better than humans. Whereas translating text is much harder and requires more human input. It again may be the case when communication of real problems and need to solve them don't get properly communicated. Or alternatively AI capabilities are overblown.
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 20:53
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| I refuse those kinds of jobs | Jan 7, 2023 |
Baran Keki wrote:
Take a look at the medical report below...
My standard response to such requests is that "Sorry, I'm not available for the translation or revision of scanned, faxed or handwritten texts". Sooner or later a PM then removes you from that particular list.
You need quite a bit of local medical knowledge to translate these handwritten reports, because doctors/nurses who write things by hand don't write with translation in mind, and sometimes use abbreviations or non-standard expressions that they (and their immediate peers) understand, but no-one else (including other medical professionals from different sub-specialties).
Also, what an abbreviation stands for, depends on the context -- you can have several identical abbreviations in the source language that need to be translated with different (non-identical) abbreviations in the target language, and only someone who is familiar with that particular type of form would know which is which.
Although I no longer accept these types of jobs, I have the distinct impression that many other translators that do, tend to guess a lot. And apparently the end-clients are fine with this.
| | | | Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 21:53
Member
English to Turkish
TOPIC STARTER
Samuel Murray wrote:
You need quite a bit of local medical knowledge to translate these handwritten reports, because doctors/nurses who write things by hand don't write with translation in mind, and sometimes use abbreviations or non-standard expressions that they (and their immediate peers) understand, but no-one else (including other medical professionals from different sub-specialties).
Also, what an abbreviation stands for, depends on the context -- you can have several identical abbreviations in the source language that need to be translated with different (non-identical) abbreviations in the target language, and only someone who is familiar with that particular type of form would know which is which.
Although I no longer accept these types of jobs, I have the distinct impression that many other translators that do, tend to guess a lot. And apparently the end-clients are fine with this.
I sometimes see those medical 'abbreviations' asked as Kudoz questions here by those who don't seem to have a great command of English.
Let there be no misunderstanding, I have nothing against people translating into their source language, and since there are very few native English speakers translating from Turkish (and fewer still are 'certified translators'), Turkish translators will translate into English (I know I did when working as an in-house, but given the choice I'd translate into Turkish as it's easier for me, not because I care about 'ethics') and they're not fussy about the subject matter.
I was just astonished by the fact that this company is doing so well (1.1 billion USD revenue) by delivering poor translations and delivering them late (judging by their tight deadlines) and ain't offering much in the way of 'after sales support' (seeing as how their translators stop responding to the PMs' queries; I guess 3 cents per word can buy you only so much).
I suppose the task of translating difficult medical texts into your source language that require expert medical knowledge and getting paid a pittance for your trouble (and throwing the shitty DTP work into the bargain) is reserved for my language pair only. Their clients for TR>EN translations are not fussy just like the translators who translate those texts. Other translators are only translating into their target languages and getting paid a tolerable sum after haggling.
I rest my case. I might be tempted to translate that kind of stuff (without any research, zero attention to detail and care for quality) as they don't seem to care about quality themselves (at least when it comes to Turkish by the looks of it), but the shitty DTP work puts me off. I think I'll continue to give them a swerve.
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Kaspars Melkis
United Kingdom
Local time: 19:53
English to Latvian
+ ...
| it could be for regulatory purposes | Jan 8, 2023 |
Baran Keki wrote:
Take a look at the medical report below,...
and this is a report intended for a person, nothing to do with regulatory affairs (if they're collecting such personal reports for regulatory purposes
The main giveaway is that if the patient's name is redacted out and replaced with a code, it is most likely for clinical trial purposes. While the original report is written for regular care purposes, the patient might be a part of a clinical trial. If he experiences a serious adverse event, the investigator may request all medical files for this patient to review the possible connection with the study drug (it might also be placebo) and regulators sometimes want to review this information as well.
It is not necessary to reproduce the formatting faithfully (the requirement by some agencies that I complain about). Those forms have fancy formatting for the benefit of clinical care professionals in their environment but investigator just needs to see precise clinical information. A plain format translation with simple tables that are easy to read and find relevant information would be enough.
My complain is that often the agencies don't disclose what is the purpose of the translation. It goes against the basic translation principles that we don't translate the words but the meaning and according to the target audience needs. Translation agencies are usually staffed by former translators or at least with translation degrees but somewhere higher in business chain the service specifications are written by people who are not experts in translation and it creates unnecessary difficulties for us.
| | | | | DTP and pre-prepared forms + regular work on same trial | Jan 8, 2023 |
Hi Baran,
I am not aware of the company which needed that encryption software etc. Maybe, I did not work work them at all.
I am, however, a graduate in life sciences, have post-graduate and work experience in medical field in various settings and have been working only in medical translation, basically doing clinical trials for decades now.
In my experience, the agency would send a DTP'ed form in this kind of work. If not, I ask --they sometimes agree to first hav... See more Hi Baran,
I am not aware of the company which needed that encryption software etc. Maybe, I did not work work them at all.
I am, however, a graduate in life sciences, have post-graduate and work experience in medical field in various settings and have been working only in medical translation, basically doing clinical trials for decades now.
In my experience, the agency would send a DTP'ed form in this kind of work. If not, I ask --they sometimes agree to first have it DTP'ed & more than often, I already have a pre-prepared form of myself and I use it.
If not, I would send it to my DTP coworker and she will prepare a form to fill in for me.
The agencies I work for usually instruct in style guides to write hand-written parts in italics. I then fill in those parts in italics. And does not take more than 10 minutes to finish actual task for me, final reading included.
I keep an archive of those forms and previous works where I am allowed to.
The time period between an initial trial dossier submission is made to CA, all patient-facing documents are prepared and approved, adverse event notifications are done, queries resolved, all sites closed and final reports are drawn... is years.
I had times when I worked on the same clinical trial for more than 5 years. It was the same kind of reports, same doctors, at least same hospital with same report formats, same forms same DSURs and similar IB and protocol amendments over and over again.
Now I am more in academia, therefore cannot handle as much work as I used to, but what I intend to say is agencies/translators doing this for decades have such a kind of practice. At least it is my experience. Maybe this specific company had mergers and acquisitions and some irregularities have raised. I do not want to speculate, my experience was quite straightforward.
I also agree that the Sponsor companies keep a pool of documents for regulatory purposes. I suppose they probably have NLP-based adverse-event or laboratory abnormality record keeping as well. Less likely, certain events result in queries and to finalize that specific query, they need more documentation, then they need translations. This maybe the only type of translation read by human at the Sponsor's side. (Most of other translations are done for submissions to CAs and they are handled by local CROs, the Sponsor is just aware of the invoices.) ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Impossible expectations | Jan 8, 2023 |
After completing the application process, this company denied me because I don't have a bio/medical degree. As you said, why would a doctor or scientist be doing translation instead of focusing on their main job? The number of people who would choose this, and are not already working another company, is very few.
Meanwhile, I have gotten plenty of medical jobs (patient paperwork, research papers, clinical trial documents) from other agencies that are less picky about translator back... See more After completing the application process, this company denied me because I don't have a bio/medical degree. As you said, why would a doctor or scientist be doing translation instead of focusing on their main job? The number of people who would choose this, and are not already working another company, is very few.
Meanwhile, I have gotten plenty of medical jobs (patient paperwork, research papers, clinical trial documents) from other agencies that are less picky about translator background. I enjoy patient paperwork because the grammar is straightforward and I feel that someone is being helped directly. ▲ Collapse
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