Hello,
I wanted to share this to see if I'm the only one that has experienced these very frustrating issues or if this could be a wider problem with regards of how jobs are reviewed.
First up there's the issue of subjective matters, and I can take direct examples of my own experiences so we're not even talking about imaginative scenarios. I've gotten marked multiple times as errors cases where I've translated words correctly but that the LS's consider that the English word is commonly used and should be left as is. Now, while I agree that a segment of the population, mainly the well-off and the ones that already speak English would have no issue with words in English being thrown in, I'm thinking here of people who speak no English at all. One example is the word: "vintage" and in this case it was used to describe clothing. I translated it as "con acabado antiguo" which in English would be something like "with an antique look". So, my translation isn't incorrect in the sense that I am not choosing the wrong words to convey what the original text says, but the LS's consider that it is an error because they consider that the word in English is widely used and should not be translated. All of this are subjective matters and what interests me is the question if my translation should be marked as an error? I would totally be okay with a suggestion (which is not marked as an error, mainly as a note for future jobs), but why is it an error? And who decides when the English word is sufficiently used to leave it as is? Yeah, I'd understand it and my English-fluent friends would as well, but I'm sure my immediate family who doesn't speak any English at all would struggle with those. Again, this is only an example but the list of words where this very same issue could happen is an extensive one. But the fundamental question is: in these cases; should they be marked as errors or simply as suggestions? I think it's also worth noting that our job is to translate and the goal is to translate one text and make it fully intelligible in the target language. When you consider this, I'd argue that my take on it, to translate them instead of leaving the source text as it is, is the better option of the two.
Another issue that I've seen happen is when it comes to large volume and multiple jobs from the same customer. I know we're not supposed to talk about who the customers are - according to the Translation Agreement -, as far as I understood, and I want to respect that, so let's just say that in this case I'm talking about a large e-commerce platform that sells all kinds of products. Pretty much anything you can imagine, you'd find it in such platform. Now, the issue here is mainly about brand names. And I want to point out that in the customer's instructions, there is no glossary of brand names nor any links to product's pages in order to see if the text is referring to the actual description of the product or if it's part of the name of the brand, and to see where in the text does the brand name begin and where it ends. I can also use a real-life example of one that occurred to me. So apparently there is a clothing brand whose name is: "Screaming Eagle", and in my case the text was describing a jacket from this brand. Now, I don't know if screaming eagle is the name of the brand or if the actual jacket has a screaming eagle and the product description is describing that. I should note that all of these jobs are TM jobs, so very poorly paid and again, no info or reference as to what are brand names or even links to the products so that translators can check them. It is also worth mentioning the immense volume of jobs coming in sometimes and the ranges of products that are covered, in essence: anything you could find at a large e-commerce store. So, I'm talking about products and categories that vary from auto parts - and those being both electrical and mechanical parts -, clothing, musical instruments, camera gear, baby products, food products, toys, furniture, home appliances, electronics of all kinds (computers, phones, tablets, etc.), audio equipment, beauty products, personal hygiene, cleaning products etc. And that is only to name a few or the ones that come to mind right now. Am I supposed to be familiar with all the brands that exist in all of the above mentioned (and beyond) categories of products? And with no index or listings of brand names or any links to the products themselves? And on top of that, with the incredible volume of these type of jobs and the very low compensation? And yet, they were marked as critical errors, and thus, severely impacting my final score of the review.
At this point I'm simply tired and don't even want to submit re-review processes because they never seem to understand what my actual point is, and in many cases, they only double down or simply ignore some instances and they don't even comment on why they don't think it was wrong, so in some cases I don't even get any answers from the LS's. And sometimes people simply don't want to admit they were wrong and instead double down on their stance.
I thank you for taking the time to read all of this, and I wonder if there's others that have faced similar frustrating situations like the ones mentioned above?
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Hello,
I have also often felt frustrated by the absence of any communication channel with the LS.
I would suggest that the link towards the rereview process be present on all our reviews, instead of having to search for it deep down in the support guidelines:
https://support.gengo.com/hc/en-us/articles/360043592993-What-is-a-re-review-request-and-how-do-I-submit-one- (try finding the "here" which is barely visible in a slighter greener font in the middle of the page).
Or at least, there should be some form of messaging service to ask for clarification on the error. I usually don't go to the trouble of asking for a rereview (It annoys me to have to explain that a translation of "twenty" to "vingt" in French is clearly not a misspelling error for example. Even if the style guide says we should use numbers, I can give you hundreds of examples where Victor Hugo writes "vingt", and the customer clearly chose to use letters in the source text...).
If one could leave a quick comment or question to the LS, I think we would all feel less frustrated by the LS's "ivory tower", and we would learn a thing or too in the process instead of being put off (and frustrated) by all the warnings on the "rereview request" page.
Hello all,
I think that very many of the issues you have with LS, or the customer for that matter, regarding e.g. brand names or using commonly used English terms like 'vintage' in the target text could have been easily avoided/solved by posting comments like the following in the customer comments field: Example 1) "I am aware that 'vintage' is commonly used and understood in Spanish, however in this particular context I have used a Spanish term, as that flows better here. (Please advise if you nevertheless prefer that I use 'vintage' as is.)" Example 2) I have assumed that 'Screaming Eagle' is a brand name and left it untranslated. Please advise if that is not correct, or if you neverthelss want me to translate it."
Gunnar
Hi Fernando,
It sounds like a frustrating situation. You're not alone. Over the years that I've followed these message boards, I think I've read more frustration and angst regarding translation reviews than for any other general workflow topic here.
For the issue of brand names:
I translate into English from a language where the source material is always inconsistent with capitalization (brand names are often written in lower case while common nouns are frequently and inexplicably written with initial capital letters). Obviously, this makes it difficult at times to determine what is and isn't a brand name.
However, the main TM client for whom I see jobs of this nature supplies accompanying photographs of the items in question, and invariably one of the photos shows the brand logo or label, solving the confusion. Otherwise, a quick Google search usually provides the answer I need.
Yes, it's a bit annoying, and yes, those TM jobs don't pay very richly, but it is what it is. When I accept one of the jobs, I realize it will often require a good deal of research to make sense of sloppy, error-ridden source text. I try to make it fun and take pride in correcting source misspellings of brand names, designer names, etc.
As for "vintage," I wonder if a standard Spanish-only dictionary published in your country/region (ie Europe or Latin America) lists the word? If it does, I would consider it fair game to leave in a Spanish translation. If it doesn't, then wouldn't a good bilingual dictionary give you the standard, "official" translation? It seems to me that if you follow standard practice as found in an authoritative dictionary for your region or country, then you're basically covered from a LS review perspective. (With the caveat that some clients offer glossaries for certain words/terms that would take precedence over a general dictionary. The client that I alluded to earlier, for example, provides a glossary that includes "vintage.")
Hang in there!
Same here. It is frustrating. It simply puts us at the mercy of senior translators who sometimes downgrade our scores for no legit reason.
Hi Fernando,
I think Kevan above has offered great advice regarding those TM jobs -- research :) Of course, you're not expected to be familiar with all brand names (could someone, ever, really?) but when in doubt or unsure, a quick Google search of the product should be enough to shed some light and point you in the right direction.
As for "vintage", in the fashion industry in Spain, this is a term which is used as is (untranslated) to describe a certain style, which doesn't always entirely match the connotations that the word "antiguo" has when you translate it. Please note that it's always important to stay aware of the context, the type of text, and the type of target audience for that text, meaning that in the context of a product description or even a fashion magazine, you can assume that the intention is to use language consistent with industry standard.
Regardless, while I do understand your frustration and that there may have been other instances that you don't mention above, as always, the best way to address these issues and to have the team look at them is to fill out a review for a re-request. These requests not only provide feedback to the LS and to the Quality team at large, but also serve as a reference for us to know when something may not be working as intended.
Hope this helps!
Lara
Hi Ballmar — my apologies. I actually just checked in my email and saw that you did email me after Antonio’s reply, but it somehow didn’t show in my Primary folder. For this one email, I do apologize that I missed it. Over the years, we’ve repeatedly exchanged lengthy emails and never once I have failed to reply to you (or to any other translator) on purpose.
Regardless, there was no need for me to reply further because Antonio’s explanation is correct: you did receive a review on May 16th. Perhaps, just like I missed your last email, you missed the email notification about it. Or perhaps there was a malfunction on that day with the notification system. Luckily, all of our translators have access to their GoCheck history from their dashboard so it’s easy for you to verify this information. I have just hijacked your account and checked the GoCheck history for your FR>EN-GB and the review of May 16th is there. Please click View History next to FR>EN-GB on your Scorecard to view all your past GoChecks :)
At any rate, as you know, I’m always open to discussion — but this doesn’t mean that I can change the system.
@Ballmar — I understand you perfectly and like always, try to explain things as clearly as I can. Like I’ve mentioned before to you personally via email, however, respect is a two-way street and I’d appreciate it if you kept a civil tone.
The review affecting your score is the one from May 16th which you’ve pasted, not some “non-existing collection”, despite the slight time delay (we can’t really know at what time exactly you saw or noticed the change) but looking at your score changes, it does match your scores and the deduction that you keep mentioning. I infer your issue is rather that you can’t accept that this review had an effect of decreasing your score, being a 10/10, and you expected it to increase — this would be a better, more objective way to frame your question. In reality, like Antonio has explained to you, like it’s written in our Support articles, and like I have explained to others here in the forums, this is not always necessarily the case because the average part of your score is weighted. This means that while your newest score is a 10/10 and in as simple average calculation it would indeed increase your score, in the weighted calculation it reshuffles the weight of each score taken into account. As Antonio mentioned, this job is shorter than the 10/10 it pushed out the list, and therefore it has a lighter weight on the overall result. As the weight was reshuffle other slightly lower scores for longer jobs also became heavier and therefore the final score is slightly lower than the previous. Additionally as always, the standard deviation is deducted. How this one specific score results in this calculation has, once again, been shown to you, and while I understand that you may not agree with this type of formula, there’s no ongoing “irregularity.”
If you wish to further discuss this topic, please feel free to email me directly.
I would also additionally like to remind you of our Guidelines for participation, as your tone, not only to me but also to fellow translators trying to help you understand what I’m explaining, is growing increasingly aggressive:
Guidelines for Participation
DO help others—if you can! :)
DO respect your fellow translators and Language Specialists / Reviewers
DON’T report urgent technical issues; these go here
DON’T make comments that are hurtful, mean or likely to make anyone uncomfortable
Hello Lara,
If Gengo is truly serious in saying in your own words :
"this is actually important, not only because the review might change, but because it serves as feedback, both for the LSs and for us, and it also leaves a track history that we can always go back and refer to (track history of your requests, track history of patterns with an LS that we may come to see later, and so on and so forth)."
Then I would really like to repeat my above suggestion: the link towards the rereview form should be displayed on all the Gocheck reviews, instead of having to search for it deep down in the support guidelines, and having to reread all the dire warnings about submitting a rereview request.
I think that would definitely help alleviate some of the frustrations vented here.
Thank you !
Now I am quite impressed. I submitted a revision request in which out of the 6 points that I appealed, 3 of the explanations provided were quite poor, to the point where in one of them, not only did they failed to see it was marked as an error (they told me it had been marked as a suggestion and of course, they didn't correct the error) but they even went ahead and provided a link where my point was confirmed. That's just really frustrating. Everyone's allowed to make mistakes and I do expect them to be made from LS's as I expect Gengo to be reasonable when us translators make them, we're all human and we're always going to be prone to making mistakes, it's simply inevitable, but for god's sake that's the whole point of a revision request, to look very carefully and make sure to double check everything. Now it seems that LS's don't even read their own sources fully. Why is it like that? Do they fear that if they don't come up with errors that they'll be seen as not doing their jobs? I just simply don't understand it.
After reading all the posts in this thread, it's clear to me that I'm not the only one and that the issue is not me. At this point it's just simply disappointing. I just wish all the best to my fellow translators.
A couple of days ago I submitted a re-review request (I even managed to do it via the new "improved" form Gengo has now) providing my comments regarding the numerous cases the LS marked as "wrong term" in a job. I strongly believe a re-review must be done by another LS, not the same person reviewing the job the first time. There used to be two language specialists in my language pair (RU-EN), and every time I requested a re-review, the job was reviewed by the second person. But Gengo seems to have "optimized" the process because today, instead of receiving the second reviewer's opinion, I just received my request back with the comments of the LS who reviewed the job in the first place and whose corrections I don't agree with. Moreover, some of his new comments were like this: "Reviewers aren't required to explain every correction." or "Don't argue corrections, try to learn from them."
Learn? The same reviewer decreased my score some time ago because he believed that the word "tunic" didn't exist in the modern world (while the text was a description of a garment for a fashion retailer, and it was a tunic!). This person also thought that a belt can't be "skinny" and jeans can't be "high-rise", only buildings can... So what can I learn from this specialist? Back then, the second LS was a ray of hope for me. Now, all hope is gone. Most of all, I am frustrated by the fact that the second LS that used to work in this pair was actually a professional and provided valuable comments but, for some reason, that person doesn't work here any more.
For me, that was the last drop... I will never pick up another job in this language pair.
I realize nothing will change. Just wanted to share my experience in case someone is wondering if he/she is the only one treated unfairly.
A couple of points to clarify regarding the issues brought up by @galyna.p :)
As a reminder, I also thought to share this Support article where we explain how we monitor LS performance, please be sure to take a look!
I'm going to try to be brief... I'd say that yes, the reviews can be frustrating sometimes, although in my experience the reviewers are right in most cases.
Re: vintage, I'd personally agree that one is debatable although it would have to be considered in context. In my understanding, "vintage" does not always refer to new products with an oldfashioned look, but mainly to things that are genuinely old...
Re: brand and product names, I hate that one as well. I don't get to see the example you mention in my language pair, but there are others. I think that basically everything that's capitalized, such as, Screaming Eagle, is suspicious of being a name, so you basicaly have no other choice but to Google it if you want to check. I have encountered one case though, where the customer wanted to have all the product names translated - converting the whole thing into a "transcreation" (as opposed to translation) job. Whenever I find that kind of requests I'd rather not accept them, especially not at Standard rate.
@Ballmar — About your score deduction, I have seen your exchanges with Support in which not only the way the score is calculated has been repeatedly explained to you, but also they have provided the charts on a spreadsheet to show how each of your scores affected the overall final calculation. You may agree or disagree with the formula, of course, but on our end we have done as much as we can to try to explain it to you.
Also, for the record: last time you wrote to me, you were already in touch with Antonio and he was already familiar with your case. I immediately responded to inform you of this and that he was working on a reply. While it’s true that it took him a while to respond to you, he eventually did, and I expressly wrote to you to inform you about this as well. If you didn’t receive our emails, as you claim, I’m more than happy to resend them anytime :) Just let me know!
@Bruno — please email me at lara.fernandez@gengo.com so I can bring this up with the team. While this is not standard procedure, and while I can’t promise changes, we understand LSs are human and can make mistakes, and I would rather double check just in case, especially if there’s only one LS in your language pair.
Hi Ballmar,
What seems to be implied is that at least the score change on the 17th of May was simply a delayed effect of the review on the 16th.
Have you considered this / can you exclude this? (Not trying to be insulting, btw., and I don't think it was anyone's intention to insult you.)
@gunnarbu — Great advice :)
UPDATE:
I am still waiting for the first re-review.
I have a feeling that the result won’t come easy – I can only imagine how difficult it will be for the reviewers to digest the fact that they committed 18 mistakes out of 19 in a single text.
Another possibility is that, due to the fact of not being able to substantiate the errors pointed out in their first review, they decide to find “new” errors, so they can keep the same rating and prevent the translator from defending his position regarding the “new” errors found in the re-review, since “the re-review decision is final” - I already went through that road before (I wonder if the reviewers do this to protect themselves from being “punished” for admitting a large number of mistakes).
I really think that the re-review should be limited to the first errors found – if you don’t have the opportunity to submit another re-review, it makes little sense to talk about new issues, otherwise, the game is obviously rigged.
Let’s hope for the best.
Hi Nelson! Thanks for keeping track of this. I pinged the team on Friday when I saw your "Still waiting" comment, and I'm disappointed to know you haven't received you re-review yet. I will get in touch with the team again and hopefully you can receive your re-review within the week. Please do note that Thursday and Friday are national holidays in Japan this week, so I won't be available for follow-up until next week (if needed, which I hope won't be the case!)
I am an EJ translator, and like qx1984, I also had been forced to stop working for Gengo for very a long period of time partly due to a review-related issue. But, I have also come back here around April because I too was affected by COVID-19, and completed many jobs since then.
It seems that the person who was one of the persons involved in the issue for which I was forced away is still performing review. I noticed it because of very distinctive ways of pointing out what the person claims to be mistakes, most of which are not mistakes at all in my opinion. The person even rewrites the original sentence when the person thinks an original or translated sentence is unclear or awkward even though it is not something like a marketing copy, for which you are expected to exercise some creativity.
If I agree my translation is indeed somewhat awkward in some instances, I think that for the reward for a standard level job, it is too much to mark one as an error and suggest a revised translation that significantly writes the original sentence which in my opinion is even more awkward than mine and does not fit in the context, or to correct a translation of a somewhat unclear oral statement into a smooth language that is not really said (spoken language is not always coherent, but in usual business translation, I don’t think you are allowed to change what is said, with some exceptions). Even if it is not an oral statement, original texts are not always well written as you know, but the person doesn’t take it into consideration at all.
I didn’t request re-review for fear of retribution, for which I regret now as I have to anyway continue to receive unfair review. I don't know why, but the frequency of reviews itself has decreased quite a bit recently. However, it seems that I am getting review by the same person while I’m not very sure.
Dear Gengo,
Will you please, at the very least, make it impossible to identify a translator from the reviewer side. I believe if one can truly objectively evaluate works as you claim, a reviewer does not need to be able to identify us.
Best regards,
Hello. Just to bring some balance into the picture - for me the system seems to work very well. I have requested a number of re-reviews over the years, and a number of them have actually resulted in a higher score. I am not sure if it has been done by a second LS or not, but I have so far always been treated fairly. Reading some of the comments here and in some of the other ongoing threads, like the one on 'Delay of job approvals' one could wrongly get the impression that Gengo is a bad place to work. If these are the only complaints from 20.000 + translators, then I would say that the rate of complaints is quite microscopic :-) (Probably there are more complaints submitted by other channels, but it would surprise me if this was a huge issue). Of course there can be instances of poor LS work, and this should be reported and dealt with, and as Lara commented somewhere it also seems that Gengo proactively is using other means to discover this, e.g. by monitoring abnormally high frequencencies of re-review requests towards certain LS etc.
Ah, Gengo were finally able to reach the second LS and my job was re-reviewed. Now I see what’s going on.
In the past, second reviews were “blind” reviews of the same job by another person. Now, the second LS reviews the corrections made by the first LS. It is absolutely obvious that it is done to eliminate cases when “the results of the second reviews often turn out to be very different from the original one”.
So today I received my job with all the comments from the first LS and a tiny comment form the second LS at the bottom: “From your alternative reviewer: as you will see from my comments, I agree with most of my colleague's points. However, all of these issues were quite minor, so I removed some of them and "downgraded" some to suggestions.” This person mentions his/her “comments” while there are none of them in fact, only the same comments that the previous LS provided. As a result, the score for the job increased by 0.7.
Now I feel sorry for some people working as a LS. They are pushed to make their review stay as close as possible to the previous one.
I want to thank everyone for their replies and contributions to the discussion. That's the main reason why I thought it was important to start this topic and I can already see that there's many like me that feel that this process has a long way to go when it comes to perfecting it.
Rup75 - You mention that you'd rather not take those types of jobs, especially at a Standard rate, but this one's are not even standard rate, as I mentioned in my post, due to them being TM, they're almost half of what a standard rate job is.
Emre Yapar - I do think it is frustrating when they don't offer a genuine chance for dialogue, and like I mentioned in the post, some people only double down on their original stance when questioned by others.
KevanSF - Thank you for your lengthy reply and your insights. I think you understand what I mean when I say that it seems unreasonable to work that way when the client doesn't provide any photos or links so that translators can see what the product or brand is. I've relied on Google searches to look them up, but given the wide range of products, sometimes you don't really find an easier. While a lot of them are big brand names that I don't even have to look up, a lot of them are not or they seem to be more like Made In China products that will not have a website or easily accessible information. It's funny that you mention the dictionary example, because I have used that as a guidance and I have been penalized in other reviews for doing that. In an example that I remember, I used a word provided by the dictionary in order to avoid a colloquial term that you couldn't even find in a dictionary, and I got it marked wrong because the LS determined that the word isn't commonly used in my country. Again, this is why I allude to "subjective matters" in reviews. How am I supposed to know what one LS considers fair game and thus will not be marked as an error, and what another doesn't and thus, will be marked as an error.
Lara Fernandez - I guess the first part I already answered above, in my reply to Kevan, that a Google search (which is a practice that I regularly use due to the lack of info provided for these jobs) doesn't always help. The example that you provide doesn't apply because I was translating for Mexican Spanish and not from Spain.You say: "Please note that it's always important to stay aware of the context, the type of text, and the type of target audience for that text" and you are precisely saying that I'm right. Because precisely because of those reasons, I based my decision in translating it instead of leaving the English word. In my country, 42% of the population live in either poverty or extreme poverty, the vast majority of these don't speak English, many of them hardly have basic formal education and some don't even have that. I'm thinking of those people who will not understand words that are in English. Even if the small minority of the top classes do and use them around frequently. I know neither you nor the LS have any bad intentions nor do it on purpose, but I think it's a bit insulting to not think of the people who will not understand that. Again, our job is to make a text fully intelligible to everyone, and I always try to keep in mind that the person reading the translation might perhaps not know a word in English, so it's my job that they'll still be able to fully understand the translated text, if not, I think you're failing at what you do. And again, as I mentioned in the original post, and as others have replied, sometimes you submit a re-review only to have parts of it completely ignored, no explanation and no modifications, in essence the message they send (whether they intend to or not) is: It's an error because I say so. I don't think this speaks very well, or it doesn't seem like there's an enthusiasm for listening and learning about what could be improved as you mentioned in your reply.
AlexF - Yes, I have also been intimidated and put off due to all the warnings of submitting a re-review request. In fact, in the link you provided, it warns that it should be done sparingly.
gunnarbu - Thanks for your reply and tips Gunnar. However in this case that process doesn't apply because the ones marking an error are the LS's and not the customer itself. It could very well be that the customer is perfectly happy of my decisions but it doesn't matter because the LS is the one determining that it is wrong. In fact, given the nature of these jobs, you wouldn't even be able to get a reply from the customer, but even if you could and acted upon their requests, it doesn't matter if the LS in the end thinks that it is wrong from his perspective. In at least two occasions, I've gotten bad reviews for following customer's orders. I don't know if this is because LS's don't have access to the job comments and instructions or simply because they don't read them, and thus, don't take it into account when reviewing the final translation.
Thanks again to everyone for their contributions, I think we all can learn everyday and this is why we do this.
@Fernando - I fully understand you frustration, and what you mean about the context of the demographic in Mexico (and it is commendable that you always try to put yourself in the shoes of the reader like that, I think this is an amazing skill and trait to have!) What I wanted to point out in my comment (more or less successfully) is the fact that sometimes the "target audience" is a demographic familiar with a certain industry and it may call for the usage of language specific to said industry (and I understand how this, in certain situations, may seem "exclusive".) Also, please note I'm just trying to bring up that perspective as something to also think about and consider :)
At any rate, while I also understand that it might be "tiring" to fill out a re-review request, please just allow me to reiterate that this is actually important, not only because the review might change, but because it serves as feedback, both for the LSs and for us, and it also leaves a track history that we can always go back and refer to (track history of your requests, track history of patterns with an LS that we may come to see later, and so on and so forth).
Thank you so much for your elaborate comment and for opening up the discussion :)
Oh, also (sorry for the broken comments) @gunnarbu's tips are actually useful because, even though the comment section is for the customers, LSs are supposed to take said comments into account when reviewing a job, so that would give them insight into your thought process and choices when considering whether to mark something as an error or not :) And if you've ever gotten a review that is contradictory to the customer's specific requests, you're more than entitled to have the job re-reviewed, as our LSs are supposed to prioritize customer's instructions (it just may happen that they failed or forgot to read the instructions, as they're human after all, but if you were indeed following said instructions, you should request a re-review). Please keep this in mind in the future!
When I submit a re-review I always get a new email with a revised score (or an unchanged score ...) with a verbal feedback.
Hi Lara (and all),
Wow!!! After all these years and 1,317,425 words... this is a first!
I have just received a review pointing out 16(!?) "errors".
I can easily substantiate my choices with official sources, links, etc.
The problem is... I only have 6 fields to do this.
Would you be so kind as to tell me what to do?
Best regards,
I feel you guys.
Clients style guide : "Overall tone: Informal".
Does this mean that you should turn your translation into a literary or academic text? Nope. Nevertheless, as soon as you start using an informal, relaxed, conversational tone... you better watch out for the trigger happy reviewer hidden behind the barrel. If you use an informal tone, of course, the reviewer will always be able to find a better version.
BTW - Dear Lara,
How can I defend against an accusation based on a simple "because I say so"? In practical terms, the translator is always considered guilty until he/she can prove otherwise. It does not make any sense.
Substantiating every decision should be mandatory for proofreaders. This is the only way you can be sure that the reviewer did a proper research and knows what he/she is talking about. Additionally, the substantiation of the decision allows you to accept it immediately or challenge it based on real facts. It would save a lot of time for everyone. Is it my job to ask for a re-review just to explain the difference between "app views" and "app impressions", when the reviewer could have researched this before considering it an error?
And why are suggestions still being treated as errors?
Best,
Nelson Brás
Update: 20 "errors" (1671 words) - 5.81 / 10. WOW!!!
And there goes my score... from 9.8 to 8.4.
Be honest - if you were in my shoes, wouldn't you be thinking "there's something wrong with this reviewer"?
Now I see why the previous translator declined this job. My instinct was telling me to do the same, but the need to provide for my family was stronger... and we are all living difficult times due to COVID19 after all.
Yep. This is the kind of text where a happy-trigger reviewer can find a lot of opportunities to express his/her creativity (let's call it this way).
This is not my best translation, I know (the client asked for an informal tone and my style is a litlle more technical/legal/formal) but, after working as a full-time translator for several governments, major brands and international organizations... I finally found a reviewer who considers my work below average! I don't even know how to react.
My question is still the same: only 1 out of these 20 "errors" pointed out by the reviewer can really be considered an error. No problem - I can easily substantiate my choices with official sources, links, etc. - Wait a minute... I can't! I only have 6 fields for 19 errors!
???
Today I have been penalised for an option that the LS did not quite like (he/she suggested his/her own option which in his/her opinion sounded more natural). Is it about errors or LS's personal linguistic preferences?
Hi Lara,
Thank you for replying so quickly.
I have already submitted a request to the Support Team with an extended version of the re-review form.
Let’s wait for the answer.
Meanwhile… another day, another review, another suggestion treated as if it was an error… and another re-review request.
Here’s what I mean:
Source - “Different wearables and devices sync steps data in different ways”
Translation – “Os diversos dispositivos utilizáveis e outros tipos de dispositivos sincronizam os dados sobre os passos de várias formas”
SL’s comment: Error – word structure (Low) – “Por uma questão de facilidade de leitura, deveria ter sido utilizado outro termo que evitasse a repetição de ‘dispositivos’. Outra possível tradução seria ‘equipamento’".
In a nutshell:
- “weareables” = “dispositivos utilizáveis” (Client’s official translation)
- “devices” = ”dispositivos” (Client’s official translation)
According to the reviewer, to avoid repeating the word “dispositivos”, I should have ignored the terms adopted by (client name) and choose a different translation for the second term, thus improving readability.
The SL finishes his/her judgement by providing a “possible alternative": “equipamentos” (equipment).
1 - I always try to follow (client name)‘s guidelines/terminology as much as possible - since they are the major accepted standard you can find for apps, operating systems, etc. - and I always add a comment stating that “all technical terms were checked against (client name)’s terminology collection” where appropriate.
2 - There is a huge difference between errors (mistranslations, omissions, untranslated terms, etc.) and suggestions (“I think it would sound better this way”).
Bottom line: this is definitely not an error, but rather a suggestion, and it should be treated as such.
It seems like the message “By popular demand, Language Specialists also have the ability to add suggestions that will not deduct any points and are purely for your information and to help you improve your translations” (you can find it here, along with a real-life example https://support.gengo.com/hc/en-us/articles/231441287-How-Gengo-measures-quality) didn’t reach the reviewers.
This is an issue that could be easily solved through better communication between Gengo and the reviewers in question. Just imagine what you could save on re-review requests!
Best regards,
Nelson Brás
Hi Nelson - please note I’ve had to edit the customer name out of your comment as these forums are public and we’re not allowed to disclose our clients names, style guides, or content of their translations (even if just a single line.) Please note that the issue of confidentiality is clearly stated in Section 1 of our Translator Agreement :) I see also that you mention you’ve submitted a request for re-review - thanks!