Video interpreters for deaf callers organize themselves against burnout

When I grew up, I never viewed myself as an interpreter. It was only life as a daughter of two deaf parents in a world in which the sign language was a lifeline.

I have already learned at a young age that the quality and availability of interpreters were able to determine whether a deaf person had access to the services and rights that the hearing people take for granted.

I became a professional interpreter because I understood how important this access was. But I had never expected to be exploited in this work or burn out of the service that I had always come so natural.

That's why I decided to join the union.

High volume, little rest

I work for a company called ZP Better as a tract -language interpreter based in Puerto Rico and offers deaf people Video -Relay Services (VRS) -not only between American sign language and English, but also from and from Spanish.

VRS enables functionally equivalent communication for deaf, hard -hearing and deaf -blind callers, as required by the Americans with disabilities act. It is financed via the Telecommunications -Relay -Service Fund, in which all Americans are managed by the Federal Communications Commission with a telephone bill.

I work from home in San Juan, but I get calls from all over the country and internationally. I interpret conversations between the deaf and listen to people to simultaneous video and audio demands for a variety of life situations, from personal conversations to emergency calls.

VRS interpreters take care of back every day with a high call volume, often back on back. We don't even know which language we want to make calls. It is expected that we maintain a high degree of accuracy, efficiency and professionalism – but that can be incredibly difficult if we have little time to rest between calls or to process particularly difficult or traumatic calls.

The relentless pace demands our physical and mental health; ZP and its main competitor Sorenson Communications are notorious for high wear rates and burnout. And it endangers the quality of service that we can offer. Deaf people earn a clear and accurate interpretation by qualified, compassionate, well -oriented interpreters.

VRS users are also rightly frustrated with the long, complicated queue that they have to navigate. Callers are abruptly transferred to different interpreters, just to get their calls. It is exhausting, especially for those who are not English speakers of the indigenous people.

ZP now belongs to a French multinational company called Teleperformance. Sorenson is owned by the investment company Ariel in Chicago and owned by the Blackstone Group, the world's largest private equity company.

No retribution yet

Thousands of VRS interpreters from ZP and Sorenson organize themselves with the office and professional employees (opiu) under his ASL interpreter union.

These companies have call centers in the USA; They opened call centers in Puerto Rico and then closed them and then open them again. For the growth of our union, it was important that the organizational committee includes truck interpreters to ensure that the campaign speaks for our special needs.

As a union, we sit down between calls, more workplaces for deaf employees, protection against traumatic or abusive calls, fair working hours, higher compensation for the interpreter, greater access to advantages, higher -quality interpretation and more resources to support us in our roles.

People are concerned about retaliation if they join – especially younger employees who have less experience with unions. It is up to us to explain the protective measures and the advantages of what we want to achieve.

But we haven't seen retaliation yet. This is probably due to the fact that we were very careful to build an organization committee in the USA and Puerto Rico, which has communicated with the parent companies of Sorenson and ZP from ZP since the beginning of our campaign.

I invite all of my colleagues asl interpreters and deaf and difficult to hear Community members to connect us in this movement.

Marina Martinez is a VRS interpreter. Find out more at aslunion.org.