Blacklist M



Manta Translations (see Orbe)

horrid company
 

Maremagnum (and other aliasses) 
Arrested for non payment of translators

Great news which can let us hope that things may change.
The Spanish authorities have arrested the two managers of a translation agency who didn't par its translators. Moreover, they used to impersonate some real colleagues in order to get the jobs. Currently, the financial damage is estimated at approx. Euro 20,000, but the investigation is still ongoing."
http://www.lavanguardia.com/local/barcelona/20120530/54301012551/detienen-en-barcelona-a-los-responsables-de-una-empresa-por-estafar-a-traductores.html
 

Mayflower, India 

Spam material, insulting rates, email harassment

This was posted on www.paymentpractices.net last year:

11 Dec 2012 - Posted a 20k legal job, DE>EN, for delivery in 6 days offering INR 1 (USD 0.02)/word
"I have done a paid sample test for them. Then I had to send a reminder to get the payment. They paid.
It seems that, as many other agencies, they hire professional translators to pass tests and get jobs but then they hire other translators for a low rate." (Message 7723)
More recent reports (2014): LinkedIn


Medium

Undercutting crowdsourcer : hiring amateurs and passing it for professional work

Email 11/8/14: 
"I found your email in your blog: http://translationethics.blogspot.ca/ which is quite a fascinating read. As you probably know, Medium (a blogging platform from Twitter co-founder) has decided to go with a crowdsourced translation. To be precise: a post-edited machine translation. Which is a terrible idea for such creative website as Medium. I wrote my opinion about it in my blog: https://medium.com/translators-thoughts/e727bafb5029
I would appreciate it if you could share it with your readers on your blog or in other social networks. Have a fantastic weekend!"


Militaris (SCAM)

Post stolen CVs and use fake pictures"Info copied from Proz. This site even has a picture of a Hollywood celebrity (Mario Lopez) presented as a translator:" http://militaris.net/translators/giulio-lanco/
 

Mind your language, Hong Kong 

Unethical business practices

Email 24/11/14:
"I would like to add another translation company to the ever-growing blacklist. Mind Your Language of Hong Kong pays low (not as bad as some on this list) rates. However, they have an awful workflow. After a translator passes a test to be included in their database, the translator has to take a new test (around 300 words) with no pay to be accepted for each new client, and at that point, a translator is accepted either as "preferred translator" or "backup translator," and there are usually multiple translators for each client. Every time there is a new job from the client, all the translators for the client receive a system email, even though only the "preferred translators" can pick up the job. If the preferred translators are all unavailable, the project manager informs the backup translators. In other words, one spends a lot of time doing free "trial" translations for this company. 
Their contract also includes this statement: "Payments will be made by PayPal in the first ten Hong Kong working days of the months of January, March, May, July, September and November. Payments will only be made for a minimum amount equivalent to HK$500. If the amount due is less than HK$500, MYL will retain this amount until the next scheduled payment month." Since I plan to stop working for them, I guess they will get to keep the money from the small job I did for them back in August.
Thanks for your attention to this, and thank you for your efforts in maintaining this list."



Mittal Publishing, India (SCAM)
Sharing a new scam experience: sham contact from Mittal Publishing India (probably unaware of the fraud)


MOGI

MoGi Group International with head office in Brussels (Belgium). According BlueBoard only bad points, according their balance they are since 31/12/2012 virtually bankrupt: negative own capital, they bear a loss... 

Email 30/05/15: 
I see this group is already on your list, but I want to add my own feedback in hopes it'll help someone else avoid this agency.
Right now, I'm still awaiting payment for a job I finished at the end of December. I finished before the deadline and there were no complaints about the quality of the work. This job was for about $2880 US. I emailed them in mid-April (three and a half months after completion of the job) asking when I would be paid, and they said it would be within one week. They paid me about $200, far less than what they owe me, and said they would pay the rest in "the next payment round". I'm still waiting.
Furthermore, they've been a nightmare to work with from the start. They said I failed their initial test; I asked how, since I thought I'd done pretty well, and they said they'd made a mistake and that I'd passed. The first PO they sent contained detailed instructions on how to create the type of invoice they wanted. I spent about an hour creating such an invoice, only to be told, "We don't accept invoices anymore. You have to submit them through our website. Here's how to login." Later, this site stopped working, with no warning, and I emailed to ask why, and they said it had changed and gave me the new information. This should have been done in advance rather than because I nagged them about it. Their site is now not working again, so I can't even access the information on it about what they owe me. 
 When I've done proofreading for them, the translation is always delivered late, so I have to free my schedule and turn down other jobs to make time for them, and then waste days waiting and then turn down other jobs AGAIN because now it's late and it's urgent and they need it back a few hours after delivery. I complained about this a few times and it was always the same.
 Finally, they do not pay anything for repetitions, a fact they didn't disclose before my first job with them. They (rightly) paid for repetitions for that job, but nothing since then - the last job I was offered and turned down was for about 4000 words paid, but the actual total was something like 15000 including repetitions. I don't ask for full payment for repetitions, but at least something - every other agency I work with pays fully for repetitions for proofreading and at least 10% for repetitions for translation.
 So, it's been a story of nothing but poor communication and disorganization, and I haven't even been paid for most of the work I did. "

Laura.


Mytranslation.net 

Bottom feeder, translators are doing the PMs work! what the hell?

Email 08/09/14:
Furthermore, I would like to confirm the comments about MyTranslation.net. I cancelled my account after one day - the rates are the lowest of all agencies (0.04 - 0.05 EUR per source word), yet the translator takes care of all the administrative tasks, dealing directly with clients as if they were indeed, direct clients! Normally, this is the work of Project Managers. Not a good deal. Many thanks once again for your valuable Translation Blog."


Laila Mohamed (SCAM)




MOGI / MO Group International (Bruxelles) - Non-payers


Report received by email :This translator has been waiting since november 2011 for his payment (so nearly 2 years). Despite promises from the group, then threats of starting legal action, the agency refuses to answer.
"L'agence concernée se nomme MO Group International, basée à Bruxelles. Malgré de très nombreuses relances, celle-ci ne m'a toujours pas payé une facture datant du mois de novembre 2011. Au début, ils me promettaient que ce serait fait "prochainement" mais depuis plusieurs mois, je n'ai plus la moindre réponse, y compris pour les mises en demeure via recommandé avec AR.
L'agence étant basée en Belgique, ma société de portage n'a pas les moyens d'aller plus loin dans la procédure, et je vais sans doute finir par laisser tomber. Mais au moins, j'aimerais dénoncer la pratique par tous les moyens possibles.

Email 30/0/15: 
I see this group is already on your list, but I want to add my own feedback in hopes it'll help someone else avoid this agency.
Right now, I'm still awaiting payment for a job I finished at the end of December. I finished before the deadline and there were no complaints about the quality of the work. This job was for about $2880 US. I emailed them in mid-April (three and a half months after completion of the job) asking when I would be paid, and they said it would be within one week. They paid me about $200, far less than what they owe me, and said they would pay the rest in "the next payment round". I'm still waiting.
Furthermore, they've been a nightmare to work with from the start. They said I failed their initial test; I asked how, since I thought I'd done pretty well, and they said they'd made a mistake and that I'd passed. The first PO they sent contained detailed instructions on how to create the type of invoice they wanted. I spent about an hour creating such an invoice, only to be told, "We don't accept invoices anymore. You have to submit them through our website. Here's how to login." Later, this site stopped working, with no warning, and I emailed to ask why, and they said it had changed and gave me the new information. This should have been done in advance rather than because I nagged them about it. Their site is now not working again, so I can't even access the information on it about what they owe me. 
 When I've done proofreading for them, the translation is always delivered late, so I have to free my schedule and turn down other jobs to make time for them, and then waste days waiting and then turn down other jobs AGAIN because now it's late and it's urgent and they need it back a few hours after delivery. I complained about this a few times and it was always the same.
 Finally, they do not pay anything for repetitions, a fact they didn't disclose before my first job with them. They (rightly) paid for repetitions for that job, but nothing since then - the last job I was offered and turned down was for about 4000 words paid, but the actual total was something like 15000 including repetitions. I don't ask for full payment for repetitions, but at least something - every other agency I work with pays fully for repetitions for proofreading and at least 10% for repetitions for translation.
 So, it's been a story of nothing but poor communication and disorganization, and I haven't even been paid for most of the work I did. "

Laura.

 



Mondragonlingua, Spain (insulting rates)

"This Spanish agency is working on the translation of United Nations documentation from English into Latin American Spanish.The first time they contacted me they asked for my rates per word. I said 0.06 euros per word; 0.03 per word for revision. This is my rate for agencies. I think it's a normal, decent rate.
I got an email offering me work for 0.012 euros per word. I responded a kind "thank you but no." and reminded them they asked for my rates, and of course I was willing to negotiate, but not to accept such a low payment. Got no answer.
Today again the same project manager contacts me again. Again it is a huge document, with very short delivery delay and again it's the same laughable rate: 0.012 euros per word.
I responded firmly "please do not contact me again unless you have a serious proposal" and reminded them of my rates.
This is a joke, but I'm not laughing."


Morningside translation

Unhappy client Review: "BEWARE. ACCEPTS BUSINESS UNDER FALSE PRETENSES.

I did business with the San Francisco office, which passed me off to the New York office once I completed payment authorization. See my review on the
New York listing.


Moscow Translation Agency (insulting rates)

"They pay translators as low as $6.25 per page and as low as $3 a page for editing. Translators also lose out some more when receiving payment because the company does not pay for PayPal fees or bank transfer fees. I lost over $50 off the amount that was owing to me when they sent a wire transfer."



MuchDo Tr. (Low rates, non-payment)

MuchDo Translations offering ridiculous rates Professional in LinkedIn : "I just got an offer for EN-FI translation for 0.03 USD per source word, of which i kindly declined. This translation was only for 300 words and they would have paid the invoice in 30 days or later. "
 

My Genco  

Bottom feeders with low rates, employ anyone

"On MyGengo, I did a test translation for them about a year ago. It took them about 3 months to get back to me to say my test had been approved. Since then precisely two job offers have come in, the latest today, offering US$0.03 per word. Since it was only 122 words, the job was worth $3.66! Not worth turning on the computer for! As has been said before, we don't HAVE to take these jobs, but given the name of this group, just thought I'd do a bit of naming and shaming. Come to think of it, I haven't taken on any agency work for more than 6 months now, since I've yet to come across any that pay more than about US$0.06 per word. What's going on out there?? Or am I asking too much??"
Read more on LinkedIn


Mytranslation.com (Bottom feeder)

Email 11/08/14:
"I received an email from Mytranslation.com in July. It didn't exactly inspire me, but I thought I would click the link to see what they were about. On the website, you can clearly see the job size (word count) and the amount paid to the translator. In some cases, the rates are as low as $0.04 per word, but most seem to come in at $0.065 per word, and they don't seem to apply any minimum charges to short jobs. (One job payment is currently listed as $1.30 for 20 words!) These jobs include legal and technical jobs, which of course should cost more money.

When I asked the person who emailed me where they found my details, all they said in reply was that they had found it on a translator directory website - they weren't willing to state which one."


Myword Localization (rush work, non-payer)

"In September, I was assigned a (proofreading) project by Myword Localization, LTD., (offices in Israel, Romania, and the United States). I had 8 hours to proofread a contract that was translated from Italian to English.
Prior to the assignment, I spoke with one of the company's managers who tried to lowball me, however, he finally agreed to my price because he needed it done "yesterday", and wanted to go home. We agreed on the terms and how much work the document needed.
I sent them back the assignment with my edits and invoice. I received a "thank you". Hours later I received an e-mail complaining that the work was not up to par, and sorely lacking. I responded but refused to go back and forth as I had too much work to do at the time.
30 days later - the company refuses to pay the invoice. I have contacted them and have kindly reminded them of our agreement, and how "urgent" the project was, (few hours deadline). I also reminded them that failure to pay any part of the invoice without an amicable resolution is theft of service
To be continued."

1 comment:

Helen German-English Medical Translations said...

I can confirm exactly what was written about Mogi. Partial (late) payment ("of course there will be more payments for you in our next rounds"), non-payment of repetitions, poor communication, and added to that the ridiculous use of Xbench as the only review tool