We discussed rates as well as fuzzy match discounts. I agreed to do a test. The test was not according to the industry standards at all. It was way more extensive than the person who I had talked to had indicated. It took their staff an unreasonable amount of time to reply to my reasonable questions about one part of the test.
After I had finished the test, I received feedback from their evaluator. Overall, the feedback was great but their evaluator also said that I had not translated something which was not true and showed that he or she had no idea of basic translation strategies such as transcreation, which made this translation agency look really unprofessional.
After that, they send me a contract which did not contain the fuzzy match discounts that we had agreed before and it also contained high liability clauses. Furthermore, they told me that I should send them the contract via postal services (in the 21st century) and they said that if I did not get a certificate of residence, they would reduce my rate due to the taxation. I told them that in this case, I would simply add the tax to my rate and there was no need to get the certificate. They refused to accept that.
They should have told me in advance that they required a certificate of residence and all the other paper work. Furthermore, the high liability clauses in the contract were completely unreasonable. Not to mention that they did not adhere to what we had agreed to in our negotiations. Based on this overall experience with them, I told them that they were not the right partner for me and I left for good.
Other agencies in the same field in Poland did not have these requirements regarding taxation and I had no contractual issues or overly extensive tests, which is why this agency did not seem easy to work with.
