Poll: Have you ever had to deliver late due to technical difficulties on your end?
Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
ProZ.com Staff
ProZ.com Staff
SITE STAFF
Mar 27, 2018

This forum topic is for the discussion of the poll question "Have you ever had to deliver late due to technical difficulties on your end?".

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neilmac
neilmac
Spain
Local time: 08:08
Spanish to English
+ ...
Don't recall Mar 27, 2018

But I have a vague impression that something like that may have occurred at least once. It can't have been a big issue if it did happen though, or I'd remember it.

 
Agneta Pallinder
Agneta Pallinder  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 07:08
Member (2014)
Swedish to English
+ ...
No - but often worried Mar 27, 2018

Living in a rural, windy area of Northern England, we are somewhat prone to power cuts - and sometimes it has been touch and go whether the power cut would be sorted in time for my deadline.

I work on a desktop computer, so taking myself and computer off to a friend's/relative's house with power is not an option.


 
Yetta Jensen Bogarde
Yetta Jensen Bogarde  Identity Verified
Denmark
Local time: 08:08
Member (2012)
English to Danish
+ ...
Yes Mar 27, 2018

Oh yes, that happens a couple of times a year.

Twice it was because of a blackout (the electricity).


 
Maria Teresa Borges de Almeida
Maria Teresa Borges de Almeida  Identity Verified
Portugal
Local time: 07:08
Member (2007)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
No Mar 27, 2018

Honestly, in over 30 years, it just happens that I can say no (knock on wood!), but of course this hasn’t kept me from feeling panicky from time to time.

[Edited at 2018-03-27 09:44 GMT]


 
Muriel Vasconcellos
Muriel Vasconcellos  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 00:08
Member (2003)
Spanish to English
+ ...
Not in recently Mar 27, 2018

Technical problems occurred more often "back in the day" when word processing and personal computers were new. I was working in-house at the time.

Since then, my computer did crash once when I was working on a document about 5 years ago. Had to buy a new computer and was working on a clunky netbook in the meantime.


 
Jasa Pipan
Jasa Pipan
Slovenia
Local time: 08:08
French to Slovenian
+ ...
Don't want to jinx it ... Mar 27, 2018

... since I have two ginormous projects due tomorrow but no, not yet.
*knock on wood*


 
José Henrique Lamensdorf
José Henrique Lamensdorf  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 04:08
English to Portuguese
+ ...
In memoriam
Not on either END Mar 27, 2018

One of my house policies is: NO late deliveries!

I keep a very effective time management system derived from my days as a consultant, when I had to develop and lead diversified management development courses, Time Management being one of the most popular subjects.

Last year I got a new client, who asked me to translate online using their Memsource on the cloud.

I had a previous experience using MemoQ on the cloud, myself being in Sao Paulo, and the server
... See more
One of my house policies is: NO late deliveries!

I keep a very effective time management system derived from my days as a consultant, when I had to develop and lead diversified management development courses, Time Management being one of the most popular subjects.

Last year I got a new client, who asked me to translate online using their Memsource on the cloud.

I had a previous experience using MemoQ on the cloud, myself being in Sao Paulo, and the server located in Toronto. It worked fine, until a heavy snowstorm in Canada caused a major power outage. In two hours, the agency owner, located in Florida, hired a portable generator to power up that server, and moved all her content to another server in Los Angeles, so we could resume work.

I tested that new client's system during the weekend, and it worked all right. When I got the job on Monday, their server supposedly being located in the UK, each translated segment took ages to cross the possibly congested cloud over the Atlantic during business hours. So I delivered the job 2½ hours late.

They understood, applied no penalty, and ever since I've been using their Memsource offline. This was my only translation job delivered late since 1973.
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Amir Arzani
Amir Arzani
Iran
Local time: 10:38
English to Persian (Farsi)
+ ...
Yes, very recently at that Mar 27, 2018

I was translating some menu functions for a TV in Excel and I'm always used to programs auto-saving my progress after 10 or 20 minutes but this particular excel file had a compatibility issue in its cells so the autosave function wasn't working and I didn't receive any messages so after around an hour of translating the excel file crashes (cheery on top) and since there was no autosave the recovery function didn't work either.
Luckily though I was able to get a short extension on the proje
... See more
I was translating some menu functions for a TV in Excel and I'm always used to programs auto-saving my progress after 10 or 20 minutes but this particular excel file had a compatibility issue in its cells so the autosave function wasn't working and I didn't receive any messages so after around an hour of translating the excel file crashes (cheery on top) and since there was no autosave the recovery function didn't work either.
Luckily though I was able to get a short extension on the project at the cost of losing some face value. So ever since that incident, I try to manually save my progress after like 30 minutes just to be sure.
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JaneTranslates
JaneTranslates  Identity Verified
Puerto Rico
Local time: 03:08
Spanish to English
+ ...
Yes. Last September we had this little hurricane... Mar 27, 2018

...named María, and it knocked out power in all of Puerto Rico. After six months there are still people without power, and those of us who have it know that it could go out at any time. The infrastructure is very fragile.

I have a mobile hotspot that helped me out until my wifi came back, but my biggest problem was keeping my laptop charged so I could work. Fortunately, the clients I was working for at the time are also located in Puerto Rico, so they were very understanding.
... See more
...named María, and it knocked out power in all of Puerto Rico. After six months there are still people without power, and those of us who have it know that it could go out at any time. The infrastructure is very fragile.

I have a mobile hotspot that helped me out until my wifi came back, but my biggest problem was keeping my laptop charged so I could work. Fortunately, the clients I was working for at the time are also located in Puerto Rico, so they were very understanding.

--Jane
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Mario Freitas
Mario Freitas  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 04:08
Member (2014)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
Yes Mar 30, 2018

A few times we've had power or internet connections issues that delayed my deliveries a bit. I guess everyone is subject to this kind of thing and many other more serious events mentioned by some colleagues above.

 


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Poll: Have you ever had to deliver late due to technical difficulties on your end?






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