1. Check the Yellow Pages
2. Search the Web for "translators" or "translation services"
3. Check the lists at translator listing sites.
More about each method --
1. Checking the Yellow Pages for translators will turn up local translators who have (or had) enough money to buy a listing. In large cities you might also find some major translation services. For the most part, the local translators will be working in the major language pairs most needed in the area, like Spanish-English in Los Angeles or Arabic-English in southern Michigan. The large firms will say they can handle your Swahili-to-Basque translation needs, but beware...
2. A search for translation services turns up many sites for truly large, busy, and prosperous firms, but also at least as many firms that wish they were big and will promise anything to hook a client. They are like traditional car dealerships--they won't tell you a price until well into the negotiations. Yes, the price changes depending on the size, complexity, and urgency of the project, but an early estimate is possible. Why don't they just offer a ballpark idea, so you can mull it over? That would be friendly.
3. Translator listing sites: I use www.TranslatorsBase.com to get jobs. There are others, but I haven't paid the fee. The American Translators Association offers an online list of translators, accredited and not, at their site.
When a firm says they can handle your odd language pair, you need to keep these points in mind:
A. Most professional translation is between the most profitable languages, so the firms might keep a staff of in-house translators for those pairs, or have such translators on contract.
B. It isn't profitable to keep a Japanese-to-French translator in the office in Houston, let's say--though the Internet is changing this a bit--so the firms probably keep a few Japanese-to-French freelancers on file and tell clients that they, the firm, will do the work. The firm then quotes something much higher than what the freelancer would charge directly. Ah, if only you could deal with the freelancer directly!
The Economical Solution: sift through the tons of websites for big (or apparently big) firms until you get to a translator listing site, submit your project and get bids from eager translators.
Any other tips?
It's a funny dichotomy of perspectives, translators vs. agencies. Just to play devil's advocate (since I used to be a freelancer and now work for an agency), I wanted to add my 2 cents...
Yes, it would be SO much easier if those seeking translators could just connect with the agencies' contracted translators directly. But why IS the price marked up so high? Because the client is paying for countless services that s/he does not have the time or resources to handle, such as testing for high-quality translators, verifying subject matter expertise, coordinating translation - editing - QA review steps, etc.
When an agency posts (on www.proz.com for example, probably the largest translators' database, and much better in design than translatorsbase) for translators to do Japanese to French, for example, do you know what happens? The agency's inbox gets BLASTED. By translators blatantly ignoring the request for Japanese-French and just bombing their CV in the hopes of 'being considered for other jobs.' I posted once for Urdu and got 45 responses in the first 20 minutes...none of them for Urdu.
In short, I had many frustrations with agencies as a freelancer, and as an agency I have many frustrations with freelancers. What companies who are looking for translators pay for, is the asylum from these frustrations. A GOOD agency will test, test, and re-test in order to keep only the highest caliber of translators for each language pair on file. A GOOD agency will put the requested translations through a rigorous editing and QA process. A GOOD agency is a full-service one, not a stand-in for your own search for translators, who merely marks up in order to make a profit.
:) Did that make sense?
Posted by: Anh-Chi | November 24, 2005 1:27 AM | Permalink to Comment