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How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight? | Everything is stored in my head

Li-Hsiang Hsu — Sat, 19 Sep 2026 05:04:00 +0000

Forum: Interpreting
Topic: How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight?
Poster: Li-Hsiang Hsu
Post title: Everything is stored in my head

Unfortunately, I don't have that many rates, agencies, projects, or workflows to handle. If an agency or a company assigns me with 15k words to translate each month, another 10k words and so on, that already takes up nearly half of my working time. It’s impossible to do more, even though I would like to.

How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight? | oh!

Zea_Mays — Fri, 18 Sep 2026 19:55:00 +0000

Forum: Interpreting
Topic: How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight?
Poster: Zea_Mays
Post title: oh!

ConquerorWorm's brother!

How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight? | I use a tree manager

Samuel Murray — Fri, 18 Sep 2026 17:56:00 +0000

Forum: Interpreting
Topic: How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: I use a tree manager

[quote]Good Locker wrote:
Do most people track this in a spreadsheet, or somewhere else entirely? [/quote]
I use a tree manager, and I use a free one called Cherry Tree. You create a node for each client, and in the node you write all the agency's requirements etc. Then whenever you do a job or send invoices, you check the node text.

[url removed]

Or if you want to spend $100, try MyInfo, the successor to the original Treepad.
[url removed]
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[Edited at 2026-09-18 18:00 GMT]

How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight?

Good Locker — Fri, 18 Sep 2026 12:25:00 +0000

Forum: Interpreting
Topic: How do you keep agency rates and requirements straight?
Poster: Good Locker

Genuinely curious how people handle this once you're working with more than a couple of agencies. Each one tends to have its own rate, its own mileage rules, sometimes a minimum, and its own way of wanting things invoiced. Some of that probably becomes second nature over time, but I'd imagine keeping it all accurate — especially when something changes — takes some kind of system.
Do most people track this in a spreadsheet, or somewhere else entirely? And does that system tend to hold up well once you're juggling five or more agencies, or does it start breaking down?
What does your system actually look like — one sheet, several, something else?
What usually causes it to fall out of date or get messy?
Has an agency ever changed a rate or requirement and you found out later than you'd have liked?