Imports - Breaching the Language Barrier

[Import Australia]

One of the most common problems that newly born import businesses face is breaching the language barrier with overseas suppliers. If you are importing goods from the United Kingdom or Canada, you shouldn’t encounter too many difficulties. If you are dealing with an overseas supplier, however, things might begin to get a little complicated. As most of us struggle to speak a second language with any degree of fluency, it can sometimes be incredibly difficult to get the correct message across.


In some cases, your supplier will be familiar with this particular problem themselves and will already have an English-speaking employee who can help you with your order. This is especially true of companies who already export large amounts of product to countries where English is a primary language. If you are struggling to make yourself understood, however, it might be advisable to hire the services of an interpreter or translator for certain transactions.

[EmilyF]

The company I represent at the moment exports from China and have representatives that can speak in multiple languages to ease trade between different countries. The problem we face in China is actually communicating within the country itself. Although standard Mandarin is most widely used in business, the fact that there are 292 languages spoken within China in total can cause huge problems.

Yes... We use interpreters too!

[Dubbo Pete]

I read a book that said Chinese interpreters are pretty inexpensive and plentiful when you visit? I wonder if that is true?

[EmilyF]

I couldn't honestly tell you a cost, Pete. It's not really my department (I'm more sales orientated these days). One thing I can be pretty certain about is the fact that the company I work for will have overseas interpreters on a retainer so that would obviously be factored into any costs. I'd imagine very few (if any) of the directors within our company have actually met our foreign interpreters on a face-to-face basis anyway.

We do have at least one interpreter working in our office so I'd imagine he does quite a lot of our work himself. He'll be on a fairly decent salary with the company though. We're a fairly big organisation and there are literally hundreds of people working in our offices. I get to see most of them at Christmas parties when they've had a drink or two too many.

...and guess what? It's our works Christmas do tomorrow night!

[Dunworking]

I hope the festivities went well, Emily.

Regarding interpreters, but I've encountered many across the years and my advice is to use one from your own country (for example, you should use a chinese interpreter living in Australia). I find interpreters to be a little like brokers and when they are used for business negotiations, they often have a vested interest in pleasing one particular party. I was a company director for an engineering firm in the early 1980's and we managed to source some excellent raw materials in Italy. We took a trip to their production centre and hired an interpreter in Turin to help us with negotiations. Throughout negotations, it became clear that the interpreter had no interest in pushing our side of the argument even though we were footing the bill and after two hours of frustration, negotiatons were cancelled and we went home soon afterwards.

We tried to find another supplier (without success) and eventually bit the bullet and returned to Italy with our own interpreter a month or so later. Having built a strong rapport with the interpreter on the flight over (and in several wonderful Italian restaurants), she absolutely worked her socks off on our behalf. We forged an excellent deal, the Italians were charmed by her and We were able to build a relationship with the company that was still going strong when I moved on to new pastures.

[Binyamin]

Hey Pete,
i work for a buying office in China, we help foreigners to source products and everything associated with that. We have a couple of translators in our office, the normal price in China and the price that we charge is US$100, that usually includes 8-9 hours work, visiting shops, factories markets etc, the translator though also knows the city well and can help guide you to different wholesale markets etc. Its really not translating only, but also a whole wealth of information that comes with it that is valuable. hope it helps
Benny

[Import Australia]

Good for members to know we now have somebody here to fall back on if the need arise, Benny. We've just released our new edition of IMPORTING AUSTRALIA and at the moment, we're very busy on the promotional side of things. We pick up quite a bit of interest from Aussie Tycoon and although we try to encourage readers to explore suppliers in as many overseas countries as possible to find the best products and prices, we openly accept that China is a massive market.

If anything arises from our customers on this subject, I'll make a point of guiding them towards you.

[The King Game]

Hey Pete,
i work for a buying office in China, we help foreigners to source products and everything associated with that. We have a couple of translators in our office, the normal price in China and the price that we charge is US$100, that usually includes 8-9 hours work, visiting shops, factories markets etc, the translator though also knows the city well and can help guide you to different wholesale markets etc. Its really not translating only, but also a whole wealth of information that comes with it that is valuable. hope it helps
Benny

Hey Benny

Why not post a special offer to Members in the special offers thread. You may get some takers ... Perhaps some who have just bought the importing book.

[Amanda - AT Forum Admin]

Hi Benny

King is right. Try this link for posting your offer - http://www.aussietycoon.com/forumdis...Special-Offers