Training for Translators

Classes for translators and interpreters

Reader questions


Corinne McKay

Reader question: freelancing in the EU

A reader asks:

I am a freelancer working largely through agencies. I am retired and a US citizen, and I currently live in Vietnam. I am considering relocating to Europe – more specifically, France – and I am uncertain what the tax consequences would be. Currently I do not pay taxes to anybody except the USA, I am not paid directly in Vietnam for any work I do and none of my agency contacts are in Vietnam. My suspicion is that if I were to relocate to France I would have to pay French taxes on my work (and perhaps charge VAT) even though none of my clients are French and I am paid for all my work by transfer to accounts in the USA or Thailand currently.

I should say that I’m not an international tax expert, and I don’t live in the EU, so I’m mostly looking for input from other readers here. I have investigated freelancing in Switzerland since my husband is a Swiss citizen, but that’s a different situation since Switzerland is a member of the Schengen Area but not the EU. It seems to me that freelancers who want to do the location-independent thing for a while (and why not…it’s a huge advantage of our profession) have a few issues to think about:

  1. Immigration/visa requirements
  2. Tax requirements
  3. Getting paid

So let’s have at it! Readers, I’m looking to you for tips, so please add them in the comments.

Immigration/visa: this reader didn’t mention whether he’s a citizen of any EU/Schengen Area country, but let’s assume not. If you’re a US-only citizen, you’ll need to figure out how to legally stay for more than 90 days in the EU (after which, on a US passport at least, you have to leave for at least 90 days before you can re-enter). Here’s a post from Nomadic Matt that gives a good summary of the situation and your options. There are EU countries that issue long-stay tourist visas (I know two freelancers currently using that option: one in Spain and one in Italy), but it’s a long process to apply for one, and many countries will require that you have a significant amount of money in savings and that you waive your right to work while you’re there. It’s also a little unclear whether you’re considered to be “working” if, for example, you’re freelancing for clients in the US but living in France? More on that later…

Out-of-the-box options that might be worth investigating: The Savvy Backpacker has a full rundown of these, which may be more or less appealing depending on your financial resources and risk tolerance. Apparently, Germany has a freelancer visa that you can apply for in Germany, as opposed to other countries’ long-stay visas that you must apply for in your home country. If you have even a moderate interest in being a full-time student, you could investigate the student visa requirements for the country where you’d like to stay. There are also ethically dubious, but probably often-used, ways to stay in the EU: finding an inexpensive university program and paying the tuition in order to get a student visa, but never attending classes (or attending only on the first day so that there’s some record that you attended; overstaying your tourist visa, hoping you don’t get arrested for anything, leaving the EU over land or on a ferry (where you’re less likely to have your passport checked), and then flying out of a non-EU country. Not recommended, although many people probably do pursue those options.

Taxes:
Here I’ll have to defer to readers who know more about this than I do. Do not take any of this advice as reliable: always consult an attorney or tax professional before you make any decisions about taxes. Short version: it’s complicated. Basically, if you’re a US citizen, you probably have to file US taxes no matter where you live or earn money. This is unusual: I’ve even seen claims that only the US and Eritrea require non-resident citizens to pay tax on the income they earn while living abroad.

However, there is a substantial (up to $99,200 for the 2014 tax year) exclusion for *earned* income (not pensions, interest, capital gains, etc.). Note that this applies only if you meet the definition of “living outside the US”: currently, you must live outside the US for at least 330 days in the calendar year, not just for a majority of the year. I’m also not clear on whether that exclusion applies to income earned from US clients, because it’s called a “foreign income exclusion.” Here’s an article from The Freelancers Union that touches on some of those issues. Whether freelance work performed in a foreign country for a US client would be considered US-sourced or foreign-sourced, I’m not really sure.

Depending on where you live, you may also have to pay taxes in your country of residence. Here’s the IRS web page for US citizens and resident aliens abroad, and here’s the introduction to taxes abroad page from the American Citizens Abroad organization. Whether you have to pay in-country income tax depends on the US tax treaty with the country where you live. To answer our reader’s question, my impression (see disclaimer above) is that a US citizen in France would have to file a tax return in both the US and France, and pay French tax at least on his/her French-sourced income. Our reader comments that he doesn’t have any clients in France, so this might not be an issue for him.

To address the VAT issue: again, it’s complicated, not least of all because EU-based clients seem to have differing views on paying VAT on non-EU translators’ work. For example, many of my clients have told me that it’s financially advantageous for them to use non-EU translators because translation services procured outside the EU aren’t subject to VAT. But then, other translators have told me that that’s completely false, and that any translation service that an EU client pays for is subject to VAT. No clear answer there, unfortunately. Readers, I’m counting on you for some insights!

Getting paid
If you live abroad, it’s worth thinking about how your clients will pay you: not least of all because the payment method may affect your immigration status (complicated enough for you yet?). For example, if you’re a US citizen living in France, but with no French clients, and all of your clients are paying into your US bank account, it seems that you could make a reasonable argument that you’re not “working on the local economy.” But if you do have French clients and they’re paying into a French bank account, it might be hard to make that same argument. I think that it’s ethically fairly straightforward if your clients are in the US and paying into a US bank account; it’s less straightforward if you have clients in the country where you live. For example if you direct those in-country clients to pay into your US account, that might look fishy (tax evasion) if the in-country tax authorities investigate you.

The bottom line

Like lots of other things in life, this whole process is easier if you have a significant savings cushion. If you have enough money in savings or enough income from other sources (retirement accounts, investments, etc.) that you can present yourself as not needing to work in order to pay your basic living expenses, you have a much better chance of getting a long-stay tourist visa from an EU country. If you have all of your clients pay into your US bank account, with no income funneled through the EU country and no EU-based bank accounts, and you pay US taxes on what you earn, the chances are probably slim that you’ll run into trouble. The situation gets more complicated if a) you’re dependent on your freelance income to support yourself (as most of us are!) and/or b) you have clients in the country where you’re hoping to live.

I’m sure that there are some social/cultural factors at work as well. For example in our reader’s case, the fact that he’s retired from another career is probably a plus: he has an ostensible source of income in the form of personal savings, Social Security or a pension. I’d say that in the EU, it’s also more common for people to completely retire in their 60s, so people probably won’t wonder how our reader supports himself; that situation would be different for a younger person and certainly for a family. So, lots to think about here!

Readers, over to you (help!).


Corinne McKay

Reader question: deviating from the source text

A reader asks: I come from a court interpreting background, and we have to be super-faithful to the original–how much do you advise a translator to deviate (if that’s the right word) from the original?

Short answer: In 2003, PEN held a tribute to Gabriel García Márquez. Edith Grossman, (legendary translator of García Márquez and other Nobel laureates) was one of the speakers, and she explained her translation method by saying, “Fidelity is surely our highest aim, but a translation is not made with tracing paper.” I guess you have to be old enough to know what tracing paper is, but I love this quote so much that I have it posted above my desk. So that’s my short answer: be faithful to the original, but don’t be enslaved to it.

Longer answer: Every translator is going to have their own take on this question, and it depends on the specifics of the situation: are we talking about a patent or a marketing slogan? A legal brief or a poem? And what’s the purpose of the translation? To be used as a marketing slogan in another language, or just to know what it says?

Personally I’m more interested in the effectiveness of the target text than in an exact reproduction of the source text.  If a client sends me a corporate communications document that’s written in typically French style (“the company” instead of “we;” lots of passive voice), I’ll nearly always rewrite it in a more active voice. Unless the client tells me otherwise, my assumption is that they want something that will work in the target culture, and passive voice and impersonal forms of address are not going to do that.

Also, there are situations in which you have to deviate from the original because your language has no way to express the individual words in the source text. An example of this would be the formal and familiar forms of address that most languages (but not English) have. If you’re translating a corporate video script and the employee calls the boss “vous” but the boss calls the employee “tu,” you have to find another way to deal with it. Maybe first name versus Mr./Ms.; but just translating the words as “you” isn’t going to get the point across.

However I do think this emphasis can go too far: a translation can be beautiful but totally inaccurate; smooth and flowing but completely different in meaning than the source text, and that’s no good either. I’ve heard translators argue that, for example, no one makes French people write in the passive voice. Presumably they’re doing so because they like the way it sounds, or they find a more active voice too harsh, like asking someone “What the %^&*& is your problem?,” rather than “Can I do anything to help you?” I’ve also heard translators argue that when someone deviates significantly from the source text, it’s because they don’t understand it thoroughly: they figure that if they make the source text very different from the original, it’s easier to cover up the lack of understanding.

There are definitely documents that call for a fairly direct translation. Birth certificates, patents and legal briefs don’t cry out for creativity. On the other end of the spectrum, literary translators have to be just as skilled as the novelists, playwrights and poets they translate for, only in two languages instead of one.

Readers: thoughts on this? Thoughts on explaining this fine line to clients?


Corinne McKay

Reader question: how do I find good agencies to apply to?

A reader asks: I’d like to apply to more translation agencies, but how do I find good agencies to apply to?

This question applies to a lot of people who want to work with agencies, so let’s talk about it. There are various online databases of translation agencies; for example I launched my freelance business back when ATA still mailed every member a paper membership directory, like a phone book for the translation industry. I opened it to the agencies section, started at A, and applied to a couple of agencies every day. By the time I had gotten to M or so, work started coming in from the As and Bs. It was a spaghetti-against-the-wall system, but it worked. But many translators want to know how to find good agencies to apply to. This is important, and tricky, because you can’t just Google “high-quality translation agencies” or “agencies that will treat me like a professional and value my work.”

If you’d like to pursue a less spaghetti-against-the-wall system, you could use the system I used, but with some improvements. Resources like the ATA directory are great for finding a heap of agencies, but you need to vet them somehow, to determine a) whether they’re hiring new translators, b) whether you fit what the agency is looking for and c) whether the agency is credit-worthy. So, you could:

  1. Use a resource like the ATA directory to find agencies’ names and websites
  2. Never contact the agency directly by using the contact information in the directory (don’t e-mail the person whose e-mail address is there, because it’s often a violation of public directories’ use policies to use them for marketing purposes)
  3. Take a look at the agency’s website: are they hiring freelancers, and do you fit what they might need? If it’s a financial translation agency and you do IT and patents, move on.
  4. If the agency seems like a potentially good fit, then check their creditworthiness. Because when you do a job for an agency without being paid in advance, you are extending credit. My favorite translation agency rating service is Payment Practices (not an affiliate deal, I just love them). A subscription is $19.99 per year, and you can get 25% off and a 7-day free trial through the ATA member-to-member program. Other potential resources are the ProZ Blue Board (some access with the free ProZ membership; full access requires the paying membership or payment with ProZ points), or various industry blacklists (I won’t list those here because I don’t use them and thus can’t vouch for their trustworthiness, but they’re easy to find on Google).
  5. If the agency is hiring, looks like a potentially good fit and is creditworthy, then visit the agency’s website and apply to them. Most agencies now use online forms or even an online vendor management portal, but some still use a dedicated e-mail address where you send your resume.

Or, especially if you want to target agencies in a specific geographic area, you can start with a database like Payment Practices. For example you could search only for agencies in Switzerland, or Boston, or Florida, that are rated 4.0 or higher in both of the categories that Payment Practices rates. Again, do not use the agency’s direct contact information as you find it on Payment Practices; go to the agency’s website and use the application information that’s there.

A few other potential ways to find better-quality agencies to apply to:

  1. Ask translators who work in a different language pair or specialization than you do. Approaching people whose profile is relatively similar to yours is always tricky, because it looks like you might poach their clients. But if you translate German, ask some French translators; if you do legal translation, ask some medical translators (as long as the agencies aren’t medical-only).
  2. Ask translators who work primarily or exclusively for direct clients: what agencies have they heard good things about? If these translators don’t actively apply to agencies any more, or if they charge more than most agencies will pay, they’re not likely to view you as competition.
  3. Look at agencies that exhibit or present at industry conferences. You still want to check them out on a site like Payment Practices, but this is an indication that the agency could be good to work for.

If you’re interested in what happens after you do this marketing campaign and get some bites from good agencies, check out our Speaking of Translation podcast, Insider tips for working with translation agencies.

Readers, any other thoughts on finding quality agencies?


Corinne McKay

Which language is "the best"?

I am often asked this question, in various forms:

  • I want to become a translator/interpreter: which language should I study?
  • Which language is the most in-demand for translation and interpreting?
  • What is the best language for a translator or interpreter to know?

The answer, like the answer to many freelance-related questions, is a resounding it depends. I’ll give you my thoughts here, then please chime in with yours (so that I can use them to answer this question the next time it comes up!).

To me, “in-demand” and “best” are two different things. For example in the U.S., the most in-demand language in general terms is undoubtedly Spanish. It’s the second most commonly spoken language in the United States, after English (insert one of my favorite factoids, that the U.S. has no official language!). But when people ask about the “best” language, I usually assume that they’re talking about a balance between demand and income potential, even when they don’t phrase it that way. And in terms of income potential, Spanish translators face a lot of challenges, starting with heavy competition from in-country translators in Latin America whose cost of living is often much lower, and who are in the same time zone as U.S. clients. In addition, because there are so many Spanish speakers in the U.S., true professional translators and interpreters often come up against the “anyone can do it” mindset held by some would-be translators and interpreters and even some clients. So, despite the very high demand for Spanish in the U.S., it’s probably not the language that I would encourage someone to learn if they’re starting from scratch.

I think that every language has its pros and cons. For example I think that for U.S.-based translators, French and German are appealing because there’s a good balance between work volume and rates, and because U.S.-based translators have some financial advantages (generally lower cost of living, and the fact that we don’t charge VAT). Also, the U.S. time zone is an advantage, as European clients can send work at the end of the day their time, to be returned the next morning. However, the European business culture is very relationship-based, and it can be hard to find and retain direct clients in Europe unless you can go there with some frequency.

In terms of critical need, I think that Middle Eastern and Asian languages are certainly the winners. Also, I think that Japanese to English is one of the highest, if not the highest-paid language combination in most market surveys. But my sense is that for some of these language combinations, there is a lot of competition from translators who are not native speakers of English but who translate into English anyway, even if they shouldn’t. Also, these cultures are much less similar to American culture than European culture is, and it is probably more difficult for translators who grew up in the U.S. to “fit in” in China or Saudi Arabia than it is in Spain or Switzerland.

Then there’s personal affinity: I love the sound of Italian and Portuguese. I’m such a nerd that sometimes I listen to Italian or Portuguese news on the radio (via TuneIn) even though I can’t understand it at all. Biking through the Dolomites last summer was one of the best vacations of my life: I just love Italy! If I were going strictly for income potential, I’d probably go for Japanese, but I really struggle with character-based languages–for example when my husband and I traveled to Nepal, I had a relatively easy time with the spoken language but couldn’t read anything, while he was the opposite.

Anyway, enough rambling thoughts on the merits of various languages! Readers, what do you think? A high school student e-mails you and asks “What language should I study?” and you respond…