Translators: what to do when you are accused of using AI

A client believes a translation came from a machine rather than a person.

What is at stake

Repeat work, and a market where machine translation has genuinely compressed rates.

Your evidence position

Glossaries, terminology decisions, client queries, successive drafts, and the reasoning behind choices. A translator who documents choices has a strong file.

Do this first

Show two or three decisions with their reasoning. It demonstrates a human weighing alternatives, which is precisely what the accusation denies.

The trap

The blunt version of this accusation, which is really about price. Separate the quality question from the rate question.

Related pages that will help

Translator disputes usually turn on the same few things: what a detector actually claims about its own accuracy, which pieces of evidence survive scrutiny, and whether a contract put the risk on you. The pages below cover each.