The compensation is ridiculous. Their hiring process is actually very tough, so they have lots of very talented and bright people working in what is almost a minimum wage job. The hours are excessive and the work at times relentless, for poor pay and benefits.
The real horror of working here, however, is the corporate "values" and environment. From the moment I set foot at Translations.com/TransPerfect, I realized that I was not going to get along with these people. It's like the McDonald's of translation. No attention to quality, no respect for translators - just churning things out for clients on impossible deadlines while paying us peanuts. The is almost no praise or reward for doing your job well, but a LOT of criticism the second you deviate from the company playbook (my boss would read my emails that I sent to our translators and get upset if I was too "chummy" with them and letting them know how our process worked). I was completely micromanaged and had no autonomy, even though I could do the job in my sleep by about week three. The work has almost nothing to do with translation. It's all file conversion, emails, administration, running spell checks, and dealing with web problems.
My boss told me flat-out that he does not believe in bilingualism (which is interesting since I am bilingual and this is...a translation company??).
The office has a Stalinist-type system of denunciation. Every time you do something wrong (which can be as minor as taking longer to finish a project by a day because you are proofreading very closely because the translator did a bad job) you suffer a public denunciation, where you are "CAF"ed - a complaint is written up against you on the company intranet. You then have to do your own mea culpa and admit to your shortcomings and how you will prevent this in the future. Eventually, if you get enough CAFs they will dock that money from your bonus (and trust me, without the bonus the job does not pay enough for a life in NYC).
There's also a ridiculous system involving alphabet blocks as "rewards" - seriously, like gold stars. No money, days off, or other perks - just an alphabet block that you are supposed to proudly display on your desk.
Because everyone is fighting to get the greatest number of projects and blocks, and the lowest number of CAFs, it is actually a fairly antagonistic place to work, even if some of the individuals are quite nice. People will pre-emptively CAF you so that you can't CAF them if you two are working on a project and it's not going well.
In addition, the physical working environment was incredibly poor. I did not see out of a window all day, and sat at a portion of a desk (not even a cubicle) with people inches away from me. It was either freezing or incredibly hot and the vents were right above me. Within months of working there I developed constant headaches from the poor light and air quality.
Lunch breaks are not guaranteed in ANY way (it's generally frowned upon to take more than 10 minutes for lunch!!!) and are unpaid if you're on the clock (last I remember working at an hourly wage at Starbucks, THAT lunch break was guaranteed AND paid....)
If you want to leave any day before 6:30 you have to let your boss know, because it's common for people to stay that late no matter what. I have friends there who often stayed until 8pm.
It was the most negative, demoralizing work experience I've ever had (and I've done some jobs I really didn't like).
