| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3] > | Nationality discrimination by British agency Thread poster: Carlos Sabena
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Nicole Schnell 
United States
Local time: 03:42
English to German
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In memoriam | A question, Carlos: Did you send your initial email with a request for a "Read" receipt? | Jan 13, 2012 |
Don't. Please never, ever do that. It comes across pompous, to put it mildly. Also: needy and in desperate search of a job. This is soooo annoying to any outsourcer. Even as a translator I have to bite my teeth when one of my favorite long-term clients does that with each and every little bit of communication, including "Thanks" and "Hello". It doubles the amount of all my emails in a snap and steals my time. It demonstrates that you firstly do not trust the technical set-up of their email syste... See more Don't. Please never, ever do that. It comes across pompous, to put it mildly. Also: needy and in desperate search of a job. This is soooo annoying to any outsourcer. Even as a translator I have to bite my teeth when one of my favorite long-term clients does that with each and every little bit of communication, including "Thanks" and "Hello". It doubles the amount of all my emails in a snap and steals my time. It demonstrates that you firstly do not trust the technical set-up of their email system, secondly that you consider their PMs amnesiacs, superficial and unreliable, and last but not least that you consider yourself extreeemely important.
Self-marketing at its worst.
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| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 12:42
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
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| Only one recipient | Jan 13, 2012 |
Carlos Sabena wrote:
It was sent via Windows Live Mail. Updated version. To only one recipient.
What are the odds?
The odds are there. I'm not an agency but even some of my mail is copied automatically when it arrives at my inbox.
When I worked inhouse at a translation department previously, it was standard practice for incoming e-mails to be delivered to multiple recipients (e.g. the supervisor, the translator, the proofreader and the graphic artist) The original mail had only one recipient but the mail server is configured to deliver it to multiple people, which using his own computer and whose mail software is unaware of what the other mail software does with it. In that company, the supervisor needed to see the mail to write it into a log book, but he could see sufficient information for that in the preview pane, after which he promptly deleted the mail. If his computer was set up to give delete receipts, it would have sent such a receipt even though the other people still had the mail on their computers.
I would imagine that in a translation agency, mail routing such as this would be the norm, not the exception. This is yet another good reason why one should not trust read receipts.
Oh, and the mail software that would cause a bug is not the sender's, but the recipient's, for it is the recipient's computer that sends the message "deleted without being read".
Nicole Schnell wrote:
A question, Carlos: Did you send your initial email with a request for a "Read" receipt? Don't. Please never, ever do that. It comes across pompous, to put it mildly. Also: needy and in desperate search of a job.
I disagree. Read receipts seem like a good idea to many people when they become aware of it, so they enable it when they see it, not knowing what it looks like to the recipient. Not all mail programs inform the recipient that a sender's mail program had requested a read receipt (even if they send it). It is also possible that people who install a mail program might have fiddled with their settings initially but later forgot about all the various things that they checked (including that nice-sounding feature called "read receipts"), so I don't think anyone should read anything into the fact that an email is accompanied by a read receipt request.
[Edited at 2012-01-13 08:25 GMT]
| | | | Nicole Schnell
United States
Local time: 03:42
English to German
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In memoriam | The settings | Jan 13, 2012 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
I disagree. Read receipts seem like a good idea to many people when they become aware of it, so they enable it when they see it, not knowing what it looks like to the recipient. Not all mail programs inform the recipient that a sender's mail program had requested a read receipt (even if they send it). It is also possible that people who install a mail program might have fiddled with their settings initially but later forgot about all the various things that they checked (including that nice-sounding feature called "read receipts"), so I don't think anyone should read anything into the fact that an email is accompanied by a read receipt request.
But that is precisely what I meant. Such messages may be blocked in the first place, depending on your email provider (I have to deal a lot with such issues because US cable companies - they guarantee spam-free email - apply extremely high security levels. Colleagues, outsourcers or applicants who are too cheap to spend a single cent on any paid email provider, yet still believe that they can have high-end service for free, haha, might not be able to get their freebie email with attachments through a service provider's security systems, or with serious delays only) See it this way: A spammer will always try to verify your email address, right? That's exactly what you do when you send a "Read" receipt. Depending on your security settings you might as well receive a notification that the recipient declined to send a receipt-confirmation.
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I know this is not Kudoz, however would I be allowd to choose the best answer?
(... though I'm not the original asker)
neilmac wrote:
IMHO it is more likely to be just another case of a widespread and irritating practice - which I often complain about myself - of agencies spreading their nets wide to "recruit" possible translators for their "database", who may subsequently never contact you, or will even simply delete all the emails that reach them once they have the chosen the handful of drones they currently need from the larger corpus of unwary punters who trustingly take the bait.
Every single day I see a bunch of agencies calling translators in all language pairs to send their CVs, always with their best rates, that they have a high volume of work to be assigned immediately in all pairs, etc. This has become so trite that it displaced "cry wolf" to second place.
Do they really have a 6-digit number of words to be translated from Guarani to Uzbek or in any other unusual pair? Urgently?
No. They just want to have an idea of what the market offers, and at what rates. Some will obdurately demand contact information for three recent work references, so they can spam them to the tune of Whatever this jerk does for you, we can do it faster, better and cheaper!, in an attempt to get some work to do.
neilmac wrote:
It is also possible that after making the initial offer, they found that Castilian Spanish rather than L. AM variants were what was required (most English speakers are unaware of the many differences between the several countries where Spanish is spoken
Spanish has a multiple-variants issue. Portuguese has two major variants, however the issue is more critical (see #6 on this page if you think it's an overstatement). I'm quite familiar with it: I write outsourcers who merely requested "Portuguese" asking them whether they need the Brazilian or European variant, warn them that I can only work into PT-BR, and never hear from them again.
If the end-client needs translation into PT-EU on account of business they have in Portugal, accusing the agency of discrimination against Brazilians won't have a leg to stand on.
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| Acknowledge receipt request - OK in the 90's... not today | Jan 13, 2012 |
Nicole Schnell wrote:
Did you send your initial email with a request for a "Read" receipt?
Don't. Please never, ever do that.
Indeed I agree. The acknowledge receipt request was perhaps more understandable in the early 90's, when it was a bit uncertain whether emails would make it to the other end, but today it is a bit annoying to have to confirm receipts and/or delete them from the outbox. I also agree that it conveys a negative message.
| | | | | server disables any tracking tools | Jan 13, 2012 |
I've sent an e-mail to the same outsourcer several minutes ago. I've received a confirmation containing the following text:
"Please note that our server disables any tracking tools so you may receive false reports of emails being returned or deleted".
| | | | | Can you actually set the e-mail to do that? | Jan 13, 2012 |
First of all, I didn't know you can actually set your e-mail so that it tells you when a message is read or deleted by the recipient. But since Carlos could, I guess it is possible.
Secondly, I really don't think it is an issue if the recipient deletes an e-mail. Maybe it went to their junk mail. When they are interested and serious about contracting a translator/interpreter, they will contact them back.
Look at the bright side, Carlos: at least you don't have to work for these peo... See more First of all, I didn't know you can actually set your e-mail so that it tells you when a message is read or deleted by the recipient. But since Carlos could, I guess it is possible.
Secondly, I really don't think it is an issue if the recipient deletes an e-mail. Maybe it went to their junk mail. When they are interested and serious about contracting a translator/interpreter, they will contact them back.
Look at the bright side, Carlos: at least you don't have to work for these people. Stop wasting your time with this, it is not worth it. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Pedro Castro
Mexico
Local time: 04:42
English to Spanish
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| Maybe it's something else | Jan 15, 2012 |
Hi, Carlos. As a fellow Spanish-speaker, I did just as you with my locale. I received exactly the same message, but from someone else's (I think it's not necessary to place names) email instead of the Project Manager's one.
Maybe their server disabled Outlook's tracker.
Maybe a massive mail was sent to every worker when we replied the original mail and he/she deleted it because this was not his/her business.
Maybe they DID get our mails.
I do think, however... See more Hi, Carlos. As a fellow Spanish-speaker, I did just as you with my locale. I received exactly the same message, but from someone else's (I think it's not necessary to place names) email instead of the Project Manager's one.
Maybe their server disabled Outlook's tracker.
Maybe a massive mail was sent to every worker when we replied the original mail and he/she deleted it because this was not his/her business.
Maybe they DID get our mails.
I do think, however, that talking about discrimination at this point is somewhat biased. Technology DOES fail.
To our fellow translators: Maybe European and North American (excluding Mexico, of course) servers never fail to deliver e-mails, but in other countries we do need to get confirmations of e-mail deliveries.
This is what I will do: I will keep working hard and looking for other projects while I get an answer.
I wish you the best of luck. ▲ Collapse
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| Ghost projects | Jan 15, 2012 |
José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
No. They just want to have an idea of what the market offers, and at what rates. Some will obdurately demand contact information for three recent work references, so they can spam them to the tune of Whatever this jerk does for you, we can do it faster, better and cheaper!, in an attempt to get some work to do.
Thank you Jose! I accidentally came across your post and it happened to answer a question that was bothering me for a while. I am new to the 'big world' translation business (despite my several year's experience) and I am still learning the tricks and traps. I indeed replied to two job postings, followed by filling out an extensive on-line form and... never heard anything back... Moreover - I have seen the same jobs posted by a different person.
I guess it all deserves a new topic, I just wanted to thank you for opening my eyes. Obrigada!
| | | | | Even if it was discrimination... | Jan 16, 2012 |
... a company is still free to choose vendors according to their own preferences, as strange as they may be.
Saw one hilarious incident in one of the translator lists on Facebook. A guy sent his resume to an agency, stating as reference his work for a left wing member of parliament who is known for being in favour of gay rights (a normal thing in many countries, still an issue in that particular country). Answer from the agency: "You better keep working for that goddammed politician... See more ... a company is still free to choose vendors according to their own preferences, as strange as they may be.
Saw one hilarious incident in one of the translator lists on Facebook. A guy sent his resume to an agency, stating as reference his work for a left wing member of parliament who is known for being in favour of gay rights (a normal thing in many countries, still an issue in that particular country). Answer from the agency: "You better keep working for that goddammed politician, we don't need you."
[Edited at 2012-01-16 10:33 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Completing the lesson | Jan 20, 2012 |
InterPole wrote: José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
No. They just want to have an idea of what the market offers, and at what rates. Some will obdurately demand contact information for three recent work references, so they can spam them to the tune of Whatever this jerk does for you, we can do it faster, better and cheaper!, in an attempt to get some work to do. Thank you Jose! I accidentally came across your post and it happened to answer a question that was bothering me for a while. I am new to the 'big world' translation business (despite my several year's experience) and I am still learning the tricks and traps. I indeed replied to two job postings, followed by filling out an extensive on-line form and... never heard anything back... Moreover - I have seen the same jobs posted by a different person. I guess it all deserves a new topic, I just wanted to thank you for opening my eyes. Obrigada!
Interpole,
The way I got rid of these poachers was by publishing this on my web site, and referring to it any prospects who require references,
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 12:42
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
Wolfgang Jörissen wrote:
... a company is still free to choose vendors according to their own preferences, as strange as they may be.
Whether it is ethical to do so is another question, though. Still, discrimination based on nationality is rife, even here. Just do a forum search for "Indian" or "Chinese" to get the picture.
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Ty Kendall
United Kingdom
Local time: 11:42
Hebrew to English
| Nationality discrimination | Jan 20, 2012 |
....is a fact of life, and it isn't always unethical or underhanded...especially when working in languages with 2 [or more] major variants (English, Spanish, French, Portuguese...etc).
Still, discrimination based on nationality is rife, even here. Just do a forum search for "Indian" or "Chinese" to get the picture.
I think this "discrimination" is based more on poor rates and a pattern of bad working practices which are endemic to these two countries in particular, rather than something more sinister. These two countries have this reputation (as unfortunate as it is for the honest agencies located in them, it remains a fact nonetheless)....
....Just as Nigeria has a reputation for being the homeland of scams....
Reputations/stereotypes do not exist by random chance, however politically incorrect this is to say. India and China have bad reps because a lot of "bad" business has come from them, Nigeria is avoided because of the sheer number of scammers who originate from there. Therefore, discriminating based on these criteria isn't really on the same level as discriminating against someone for [suspected] racist/nationalistic/other reasons.
Was I discriminated against yesterday when I was unable to apply for a job on here because they were asking for a US English speaker? Isn't this discriminating against all other English speaking nationalities? Perhaps so, but for a [semi-reasonable] reason - they wanted US English.
Perhaps it was/is nothing more than a preference for a certain variety of English/Spanish/Portuguese and nothing more (although the fact that people seem unaware that one variety of a language can often be quite easily reproduced by someone who speaks a different variety is silly in my opinion).
| | | | | A small agency experiences | Jan 27, 2012 |
As a small agency, I regular receive more than 50 emails everyday. Cannot read them all because there are so many many tasks to complete each day. It's not about discrimination at all, indeed.
You might be a very good translator but at that time the agency maybe very very busy and didn't have time to look into all applications. It's all about luck, also.
| | | | | A dead topic | Jan 27, 2012 |
I wonder why and how the topic became dead. Maybe it was a mistake to start it in the first place.
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