Fraud of brokers Thread poster: sabrino
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sabrino 
Japan
Local time: 11:20
French to Japanese
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Recently it occurred to me that a translation broker in China sent me a job and they asked for all exported target file, xliff, and translation memory simply to transfer them to their client, while they should have received the order as project manager having capability of the language pair they offer.
This capability includes checking of the delivered documents by themself, for which a tool like trados is required.
But from the manner and the communication they cond... See more Recently it occurred to me that a translation broker in China sent me a job and they asked for all exported target file, xliff, and translation memory simply to transfer them to their client, while they should have received the order as project manager having capability of the language pair they offer.
This capability includes checking of the delivered documents by themself, for which a tool like trados is required.
But from the manner and the communication they conducted with me, it became evident that they do not have such tool at all and only conducting brokerage in between the client firm and the translator.
This kind of activity is fraud and such broker should be identified in this community.
This kind of fraud is still possible due to the invisible internet.
Another case from China recently was a misrepresentation probably by a Chinese guy disguising himself as native Japanese translator.
A decent company in China referred to me if the translation is good or not due to the complaint from the customer. I found it was not written by any native or by someone with reasonable level of basic knowledge of the grammar. Even the source text was not understood so the target was goolge-output-like gabble.
This community has so many fraudsters.
There should be a reasonable verification strategy to identify and verify the true identity and the competence of a project manager (agency) and of translator / proofreaders.
CV or resume can be forged by identify theft or by simple misrepresentation, therefore it is not reliable to ask only for this document.
An email address can be shared by different people, so it is not reasonable to depend only on email communication with (an assumed) translator / proofreader.
A test document can also be done by someone else than the candicate.
The invisibility in the internet has allowed so much space and chance for fraudsters.
For the verification of true presentation and competency, it is one of means to verify by using skype call and also direct dialing by a native speaker to the candidate. ▲ Collapse
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Diana Obermeyer
United Kingdom
Local time: 10:20
Member (2013)
German to English
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| and many ask for that | Apr 26, 2014 |
It doesn't happen much now, but when I first started out, I had a few requests for a brief telephone or Skype conversation from new clients and I guess that many have been stung before. I don't like being disrupted when I work and take a step back when I read "must be available on Skype". But I don't mind a brief call or chat at the start.
On some platforms you can actually watch this. There are certain agencies who pose as individual translators with multiple accounts, placing diff... See more It doesn't happen much now, but when I first started out, I had a few requests for a brief telephone or Skype conversation from new clients and I guess that many have been stung before. I don't like being disrupted when I work and take a step back when I read "must be available on Skype". But I don't mind a brief call or chat at the start.
On some platforms you can actually watch this. There are certain agencies who pose as individual translators with multiple accounts, placing different bids at different prices under separate identities, winning a bid on one platform and advertising the same job under their agency account on the next platform 5 minutes later. I reported that a few times on the relevant platforms, but as they take a percentage of the earnings, they are quite happy to let it continue. Quite clearly it is fraud. It's a severe misrepresentation.
A file-pushing agency is a bit of a grey area, as they may not represent to the end-client that translations are checked in-house - and many legitimate and good agencies don't. They use freelance translators and freelance reviewers and act as an agent to bring them together. If both the review and the translation are completed externally, they don't really need to have the relevant CAT tool, they only need to find freelancers who do. The translation can also be checked in a bilingual export. Classification as fraud requires misrepresentation. ▲ Collapse
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