~/about $ cat README.md

the kettle clicks off. across the desk, someone mutters “may, or must?”

That mutter is the whole business. Hallowell & Voss is a small translation desk at 1938 Ocean Pkwy in Brooklyn, built around one irritating fact: in a contract, one little verb can cost more than the rest of the page combined.

So we translate contracts, regulatory filings and product documentation between German, Portuguese, Spanish and English, and we make a lot of people stop and argue about modal verbs before anything leaves the building.

Send us the page you’re dreading Call (908) 309-2031
Illustration of the Hallowell & Voss desk: two dictionaries, a marked-up contract, a kettle and a certification stamp
fig. 1 — the desk, mid-argument. kettle: on.

~/desk $ ls -l roles

four jobs touch your file. none of them mark their own homework

You will never email “the team”. Every file passes through four roles, each with one thing they do and one thing they are forbidden to do. The forbidden column does most of the work.

  1. the drafter

    writes it the way a native would

    A translator who writes the target language as a first language, with a background in the kind of document you sent: contracts, pharma, engineering, whichever way your file leans. Decisions about terms go straight into your glossary.

    forbiddenproofreading their own draft. Ever. They’re too fond of it.

  2. the cold reader

    reads the English without the source

    A second linguist reads your English first, blind, to hear whether a person wrote it. Only then do they compare against the original, line by line, and flag every difference as a query.

    forbidden“improving” the wording on a hunch. They ask, they don’t rewrite.

  3. the signer

    puts a certified name to it

    A certified translator signs the certificate of accuracy: the English is complete and accurate against the original. It’s in the fee, because a promise you pay extra for is a weaker promise.

    forbiddensigning anything they haven’t compared against the source themselves.

  4. the query-keeper

    keeps the fee, the log and the glossary

    One person holds the fixed quote, the numbered query list and the termbase, and is the human you actually hear from. If you phone, they’ve read your file, or are about to.

    forbiddena fee that drifts upward at 4pm on the due date.

~/glossary $ grep -r "argued about" .

four small words we’ve argued about over tea

This is what the work really looks like: not “translate this”, but “which of these two reasonable words survives in court”. Every answer ends up in your termbase, exportable and yours.

de → en · corporate

Geschäftsführer

  1. − “manager”
  2. + “managing director”
  3. ✓ in the glossary, once, for good

“Manager” is a job title. A Geschäftsführer is a legal office of a GmbH. The difference matters on a signature page.

pt-BR → en · jurisdiction

foro de eleição

  1. − “election forum”
  2. + “forum selection (venue) clause”
  3. ✓ nobody voted for anything

“Foro” is where a dispute gets heard, and “eleição” here means chosen, not elected. Literal translation produces a very confusing ballot.

es → en · company form

sociedad limitada

  1. − “limited society”
  2. + “limited liability company (S.L.)”
  3. ✓ suffix kept, as Spanish filings expect

Nobody is hosting a society. We keep the S.L. suffix visible so the entity stays recognisable on both sides of the border.

de → en · obligation

soll

  1. $ translate --pair de→en clause_9.docx
  2. ! query 3: “soll” — shall, or should?
  3. + answered by you in one line

German softens obligations more easily than English does. We don’t pick the flattering reading. We ask, and the final text carries your decision.

~/house-rules $ diff yes.txt no.txt

what we say yes to, and what gets a polite no

Every desk has habits. Ours are written down, partly so we can point at them when somebody asks for a rush on a Friday at 4:46.

yes, gladly

  • reading the whole file firstSo the fixed fee is based on the real word count, not page one.
  • numbered queriesA short list. You answer in a line or two, and the decision is on the record.
  • your glossary, your propertyExportable, never held hostage if you move on.
  • variants on requestGerman DE, AT or CH. Portuguese BR or PT. Spanish ES, MX or US. We write for whoever reads it.

no, thank you

  • free web translatorsYour files stay off them. NDA signed before we open page one.
  • creative contract writingWhen the source is vague, we ask. We don’t invent.
  • the hourly meterOne fixed fee per project, billed by invoice when the files ship. No deposits.
  • quietly “fixing” your sourceIf the original says something odd, you hear about it as a query.

Fixed fees start at $265 for a one-pager. Certification and the second read are included.

See the fee sizes

~/visit $ ./first-appointment

bring paper originals. leave with a plan.

You don’t have to come by. Plenty of clients never do, and we’re fine with that. But if you’d rather hand over a stack of paper and watch somebody read it, here’s what makes the first visit short and useful.

what to bring

  • the original, even if it’s coffee-stained
  • the target country (pt-BR and pt-PT are different jobs)
  • who has to sign it off, and by when
  • any terms you already insist on
Request my fixed fee
the desk
1938 Ocean Pkwy
Brooklyn, NY 11223
Walk it from your door →
Hours
Mon–Thu 9am–5pm
Fri to 3pm
Sat & Sun: the kettle rests
Billing
Invoice on delivery, for the fee we quoted. Same number.