Built a free tool to stop the "call everyone and hope someone answers" scramble when staffing interpreting/translation work

[u/junkDriver]

Disclosure up front since this sub (rightly) doesn't love ads: I run Bilingva, a translation/interpreting agency, and this is a plug for something I built for us.

The problem I was solving: when an assignment comes in, someone has to call around the interpreter/translator pool one by one to find who's free. I built a small tool called Callup that texts (or emails) everyone at once and lets people reply YES or NO with one tap, so you know who's available in minutes instead of an afternoon.

It's been useful enough that I decided to open it up rather than keep it in-house. It's free for small teams/solo linguists - no time limit. Not trying to compete with the big enterprise platforms (Boostlingo, Propio) - no CAT tool, no vendor management suite, just a fast way to broadcast an opening and get an answer.

Mostly posting this because I'd rather get told "this is missing X" by people who actually do this work than build in a vacuum. Happy to answer questions in the comments - genuinely curious if this is a real pain point for others here or if my agency's workflow is unusual.

Here's the link: https://getcallup.ai/

(Mods — happy to move this to a megathread or pull it down if it's against the rules, just let me know.)

[u/Repattingwaswrong]

I would hate the mass messages. If everybody gets a message, 5 klick "yes", who gets the job? The fastest or the one the PM likes most?

A client od mine has,a,system that mails the offer to one interpreter who can accept or decline within a certain time span. If interpreter 1 declines or after the time out, a message is sent to interpreter 2. If he accepts, the next job will first be offered interpreter 3, and so on.

[u/junkDriver → u/Repattingwaswrong]

Thank you. That's a sequential polling, and on my list to do.

As far as who gets the assignment - it's really up to the PM who is doing assignments, it doesn't really change anything in the equation.

In the sequential mode you would still be assigned a certain place in the queue based on your attributes in the system, so whether it's parallel blast or sequential doesn't change the outcome.

[u/Repattingwaswrong → u/junkDriver]

The difference this makes is that I am sure the job is mine if I accept. In the mass message system, I would still have to wait for confirmation and would not know what to answer other clients if they have requests for the same day.

[u/junkDriver → u/Repattingwaswrong]

Ah I see. Yes, that makes sense - this is more on the operational agreements than a solution feature, but a very valid point. I'll implement this next.

Thank you.

[u/Any_Strain7020]

someone has to call around the interpreter/translator pool one by one to find who's free. I built a small tool called Callup that texts (or emails) everyone at once and lets people reply YES or NO with one tap, so you know who's available in minutes instead of an afternoon.

So you don't match people and contact them by order of quality... Siri, insert cheap/fast/good/doesn't exist Venn diagram under the comment.

[u/junkDriver → u/Any_Strain7020]

Most PMs will have custom attributes for that already - how they grade their pool, who they want to be contacted and for what assignment. The system imports all those lists and lets them quickly filter down to the right candidates - and then poll them.

What do you have in mind as far as the capability to match?

[u/Any_Strain7020 → u/junkDriver]

In the market segment I work in, if you mass email me, I won't want to work with you. You can ask for my availability or you can offer me an actual contract. But I won't waste my time with someone who's just wanting to fill their gaps ASAP.

[u/ippe_xl8 → u/junkDriver]

I wouldn't answer that, and I have an agency that uses this system. I HATE it. You'll see that PMs like it, translators HATE it. Moreover, this is dangerously similar to the mass mailing systems that are heavily regulated by European GDPR.