What strikes me in the first place (my native language is not English, and I do not come/write from an English-speaking country) is that not a single blog whatsoever (sorry, slip of legalese) ever mentions the possibility of a smaller client not being able or willing to pay for excellent translation work. You never mention the money issue as if it were not important or those small businesses were capable of paying for everything at its face value. They cannot and will not borrow funds from a bank to pay a translator all he deserves. Solvency is a problem. Even more so in these days when so many countries fail economically round Europe.

Secondly, everyone takes for granted that businesses are run by the educated only. Or that the texts businesses produce will easily pass a quality test in their own right (and field). Nothing of the sort. Many of them learn from their mistakes. They know nothing about accounting, contract drafting, and so forth. All they know is that they must run a private business in order to succeed in this world this way or another. And then they turn to you. And then you (not me, I am sure !) start flattering them.

Think it all over again well.

I’m not averse to an external copyeditor reading the translation–I actually love the idea, though it seldom happens–as long as I get the chance to read through his changes and suggestions afterward. And, of course, as long as he’s worth his salt. I used to translate for an author who wrote a huge series of instructional computer books, until I randomly opened one of the bound copies he sent me and saw a terrible, horrible error of the kind I don’t make–you know, “effect” where it should be “affect”–in a sentence that moreover was no longer sensible. Turns out the client had his webmaster, who was an American but otherwise in no way qualified, do final editing. Having no training as an editor, she thought her job was to recast the sentences the way she would have written them herself, apparently. (Incredibly ironic, as one of my struggles as a translator is to keep from making the prose better than it is in the orginal; my job is to translate what the author wrote the way he wrote it–unless specifically asked to “spruce it up,” of course.) I was livid. And I ended that relationship. My name is on those books! I still shudder when I think about it.

I might add that working in house is perhaps the best way of all to get educational feedback on your work. The Japanese-to-English translators working in my little publishing house spend plenty of time each week in meetings with the translation checkers (native J. speaking) or the editors (native E.), and often with our clients themselves.

When we work with freelancers, we’d prefer of course to be able to have similar meetings with them, since this is a way to improve their output considerably. Unfortunately deadlines and busy schedules don’t generally allow for this. We do try to at least send back the change-tracked .doc files and provide them with additional guidance (use AP style for this stuff, not Chicago; that sort of thing) if it’s an ongoing project.