I was supposed to receive 3 documents for translation into Chinese from a manufacturing company we recently started to work with. What was emailed to me was a folder that contained much more than the source documents we were expecting. In fact, there was so much extra information and documents, that I had to call the client to find out which ones were part of the assignment and which ones were extra.
I was surprised that, when I called the client, or at least the person in charge of this translation project for our client, she was not upset nor did she apologize for sending over the folder; it appears this was her intent. However, this file contained all kinds of documents I would consider sensitive, or at least not public information. There were plans, bids, contact information, financial information, there was even a series of photos of what appeared to be a family on vacation at the beach!
I have worked in the translations business long enough to know that customers are often careless with information. At one company, where our primary clients were large Cincinnati hospitals, we were all too often faxed or emailed confidential information about a client’s medical and financial conditions.
Customers often ask us to sign non-disclosure agreements, and we happily comply. We send out our fair share of non-disclosure agreements ourselves with the various people and groups we do business with. It’s a good business practice. However, we had no confidentiality agreement with this particular client.
I am not in the business of telling people what to do, especially not clients. In this case, I emailed the folder back to the client (after having saved the documents we needed) with a little message that said, “Oops! Looks like you sent us more information than we need here!” Now I am struggling with myself as to if I should educate the client more on the dangers of sensitive, confidential information, or just leave it alone. Sure, Global2Local isn’t going to do anything with anyone’s information, but the point remains that this client doesn’t know us and acted carelessly, even recklessly.
A decision of this kind is not a fun part of my job, it must be handled correctly. I know that embarrassing a client or giving them the impression that you are scolding them will likely lose us a potential long term relationship. I’m not sure that ignoring the situation is the way to go either, there was too much there, a mixed bag of personal and business information that should not have been emailed out without a purpose.
Any thoughts?
-GB
