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I would not recommend to any freelance translator to work with Flow Languages. They simply don't pay for the jobs! I completed job assignments back in October, 2014 and since then I am trying to get in touch with Cecillia Macchione, who I was told is in charge of payments and invoices, and find out I am still not fully paid and why. But whenever I call Flow Languages I am told she is either not in the office, or in the meeting, or on holiday, etc. I am asked by Paul or Vickie to leave my contact details and promised that I would be contacted but it never happened. I sent numerous emails requesting explanation but no replies whatsoever. Never thought that I could be conned. Again if you are a freelance translator DO NOT WORK WITH THEM, including their associate agency--http://wwidebusiness.com/!
Iv'e got to echo this. I did a job in mid October and in January was asked if I'd accept 4 payments of £8 each instead of the £35 I was owed. It's the end of February and I'm still waiting. Even if they paid, their terms are rubbish: 6.3 Payment shall normally be paid sixty five (65) calendar days from the end of the month when a Task has been completed. All payments shall be made in UK Pounds Sterling
Here's the e-mail, with my info. redacted and spelling mistakes left as they were.
From: Accounts Worldwide Business
Sent: Monday, February XX, 2016 2:20 PM
To: XXXXXXX@hotmail.com
Subject: RE: Chasing up payment
Hi XXXXX,
I saw that you haven’t answer our proposal to split the payment in 4 instalment. Have you got our proposal ?
Unfortunately I cannot schedule your first instalment until I got your acceptance
Please let me know
Kind regards
Lucia Donatellis | Finance Dept
Hi, any news about the payment? Did you receive anything?
Hi everyone! There is a guy in that thread, called Joern Pfaff, with the email jhp10e@gmail.com, DON´T GET IN TOUCH WITH HIM - HE IS A SWINDLER and a lover of Patrizia Pinna ( - someone mentioned her here as a coworker of that translating company). I don´t know what is his interest here, but he is dangerous, especially regarding all financial issues.
Flow Languages = Worldwide Business! Be warned. Company has made staff redundant. They cannot pay anyone. They are hiring new translators and will not pay "the old" translators. They do not care about anything. I will provide all details about James and Cecilia if anyone needs more detailed information.
Hi,
I'm currently drawing up a Statutory Demand for payment to send them so any information you have would be of great help.
Hi, do you have a phone number of them?
I need to report them. Any help
Just report about them everywhere, stalk all of them on skype, facebook, linkedin and leave bad reports about them. Make sure they do not get away with this. The frauds names are: Cecilia Macchione, Maria Jose Graves, Stephanie Allardyce (Steph Allardyce on Facebook) Drew McClean
Please send an email to alex-coopad-nospam (a) outlook.com to get in contact with the other victims of this corrupt company. The number of people is growing fast and we are all getting together to take down this business and get the money we owe from them
Stalk them? really?! What an irresponsible suggestion! It could render you a court action for public slander!
If anyone wants to talk to me, just reach out. I have nothing to hide. I was an employee at Worldwide Business for 9 months. If I knew the kind of people they were, I would have never accepted to work for them! Furthermore, I was Project Manager in charge of assigning projects and quality control. Other people were in charge of accounts, finances and payments to linguists, not me. I would happily answer any questions I can answer, if only you ask me. Do not associate my morals to the bad practices of directors James and Cecilia. All the other names you mentioned were mere employees!
You can't just hide behind the internet and slander and defame people without checking your facts first!
You can reach me at my facebook page, as you well know. Always happy to answer any questions you have, just reach out rather than using my name cowardly on the net.
The websites http://wwidebusiness.com/ http://ww-business.com/ have been non-existent since Monday 13 March 2017. Also is the Facebook-page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Worldwide-Business/982579025086420. Very disturbing...
Llinkedin page has not been updated since 5 months ago: https://www.linkedin.com/company/worldwide-business. But Cecilia Macchione does have her own Llinkedinpage: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cecilia-macchione-24189910a/. And also a personal Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/cecilia.macchione.50 .
Cecilia Macchione Director
Phone [protected] E-mail: cecilia.macchione@ww-business.com
Address: 53 George Street,
Edinburgh
EH2 2TH
United Kingdom
Twitter-account still working! https://twitter.com/wwidebusiness
but latest tweet on 10 August. All their social media are sleeping and non functional.
Nominated for Scottish Export Awards 2016 ?
Websites www.ww-business.com and www.wwidebusiness.com have been terminated since Monday 13 March 2017. Even the Facebook-page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Worldwide-Business/982579025086420 is offline. Very disturbing. The Llinkedin page has not been updated for 5 months.
Old website still viewable at: https://web.archive.org/web/20170301082742/http://wwidebusiness.com/
Hi everyone, yes we are more and more victims as I can see. This is insane. Just contact me at alex-coopad-nospam (a) outlook.com . we are a group of victims and have started legal actions (class action). The fact that they didn't pay is apparently not the only offense they committed. The report is huge.
Hi Alex, I'm trying to email but my email keeps being rejected. Hi Alex,
I saw your email whilst looking for other victims. Flow owes me £736, it is supposed to be the last instalment of a payment plan I accepted as they kept saying they couldn't pay me the full amount owed, and they haven't even been capable of respecting these instalments! If you are starting a legal action count me in. Since I did so much work for them, this has put me in a very precarious financial situation as until I get paid from other clients next month I have literally nothing. I am fuming, never thought I would be conned so badly. I called everyday and impossible to reach Cecilia, now nobody isn't picking up when I try to call anymore.
Please let me know what I can do to join the class action. Thank you: emilie.declaron (a) yahoo.co.uk
Emilie.
Hi Alex, I wrote you some days ago regarding this. I am a victim too. Please let me know if you got my email sent on 1st of April.
Are you still helping?
Flow owes me £736, it is supposed to be the last instalment of a payment plan I accepted as they kept saying they couldn't pay me the full amount owed, and they haven't even been capable of respecting these instalments. I called everyday and impossible to reach Cecilia, now nobody isn't picking up when I try to call anymore. Help!
Cecilia Macchione (owner of Worldwide Business) contact information:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ceciumac/
Skype: cecilia.macchione or Cecilia_Macchione
Wordpress: https://ceciliamacchione.wordpress.com/
Linkedin
Her boyfriend: https://www.facebook.com/john.need
Phone number of her boyfriend: [protected]
They also have a website about dogs, there is an address of their studio with the same phone number. Website is http://www.muttfacephotography.co.uk/
Everybody keep contacting and harassing her!
If you have more contact information (also of James Canter) then please reply to this post.
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cecilia-macchione-24189910a/
Hi, I am Joern, I am based in Edinburgh, translator, and I am doing legal claims for all my colleagues. As I am based in Edinburgh it does not cost me anything. If you are interested in help or advice please feel free to get in touch with me jhp10e@gmail.com
It has been 70 days since I delivered 28, 000 words translated Dutch to English, but no payment. Their website has gone offline. I fi do not receive my due payment, I will take other measures, . Good luck all of you, Regards, Kenneth.
I'm waiting for payment as well (around £500)...It's a shame I did not see this post before...
Today I received a letter from the insolvency company KSA Group that MC Holdings Limited (which we know as Worldwide Business) is asking for insolvency / liquidation. A meeting of creditors will be held on 11 may at 11.45 at 10 Henderson Street in Edinburgh.
Do we have to do something ? I'll probably never see my money.
Be careful, they (James Canter, Cecilia Macchione/Cecilia Need and Victoria Nicol) are operating under a new name 'Strategic Translations' https://www. strategictranslations. co.uk/ - Don't do business with them and help us take them down!
I'm not sure if it's any help but the company used money for the two directors to go to Necker Island a couple of years ago. That was when the very first started to lapse on payments. I'm not 100% certain of the legalities of using that money for that purpose but if anyone wants to look into it I can provide more info.
I found this board about Flow Languages / Worldwide Business and found out I am far from being alone concerning this company's payment problems. They owe over £2450 and, even after proposing to pay me in installments, they met never making a single payment.
They then stop replying me emails and phone calls and now closed their website and social media presence. Any help with this would be very appreciated as I am Portuguese and it is hard to make pressure on them from here.
Please let me know if there any news or updates about this awful situation.
That would be very appreciated.
Thanks in advance
Hello Sara, I'm also Portuguese and they owe me money also. It is difficult to do something from here, if you have any information of what we can do contact me to silvabernas (a) hotmail.com
Hello everyone,
I'm glad to have come across this site, shame that I have not seen it before, but anyway the company changes it's name each month.
Please notice that after "www.strategictranslations.co.uk", I believe they call themselves "alphatrans.co.uk" now. So don't work for them.
I am from Algeria and I have also been waiting for a year for a payment for tasks of French proofreading (12/10/2016). At that time, the company was called ww-business.com, but now it no longer exists and all e-mail addresses no longer work.
Here is the list of people with whom I have been in contact before their disappearance:
Patrizia Pinna,
Maria Graves,
Stephanie Allardyce,
Drew McClean,
Hope this can be helpful for someone.
Please let us know if the is something new, or if we can put our complains in other site.
(Sorry for the English I'm not native)
Regards.
No, Alphatrans is not a company from them. I am with a group who did extensive research. The main responsible people are James Canter, Cecilia Macchione (both directors of MC Holdings Limited and - first as an emplyee, now as a director- Victoria Nicol. The others persons are personnel. You can not blame them personally for what the directors have been doing.
James Canter: e. james@jimcanter.com m. [protected]
James main company is http://reaction-grp.com/contact/
Cecilia Macchione: [protected] e. cecilia@ceciliamacchione.com
They are in fact at it again via Strategic Translations' https://www. strategictranslations. co.uk Company number [protected]
Vicki Nicol is the partner of James Canter and the new Director or Strategic Scam Translations
Due to people chasing she's changed her FB profile: https://www.facebook.com/victoria.christina.15?fref=pb&hc_location=friends_tab&pnref=friends.all
Former 'Business Manager' Operations scammer: Stephanie Allardyce: https://www.facebook.com/stephanie.allardyce
Maria Graves Project Manager: https://www.facebook.com/MariaJoseGraves
Senior sales conman Paul Kenny: https://www.facebook.com/paul.p.kenny?lst=[protected]%3A1066791730%3A1497715536
If you want to make life hard for James go after Reaction Group this is his main source of income.
Hi, looks like you've been looking for me? If anyone wants to talk to me, just reach out. I have nothing to hide.
It is disturbing to see how far people will go slandering, defaming and destroying someone's reputation without even a second thought! I was an employee at Worldwide Business for 9 months. If I knew the kind of people they were, I would have never accepted a job with them! Furthermore, I was Project Manager in charge of assigning projects and quality control. Other people were in charge of accounts, finances and payments to linguists, not me. I would happily answer any questions I can answer, if only you ask me. You can reach me at my facebook page, as you well know.
Maria, you now run another agency with Paul Kenny - a previous employee - wertranslations. You were a part of worldwide business and could no doubt have done something to stop the problems. It sounds like you are trying to absolve yourself of blame whilst simultaneously profiting off of experience and resources gained through your time at worldwide business.
Website of the company will be www.mylanguageconnection.com. Facebook site is: https://www.facebook.com/mylanguageconnection. E-mail: victoria@mylanguageconnection.com. Phone: [protected]. Cecilia Macchione is mentioned as a team member under her alias Cecilia Need.
Hi all,
I am also a victim of WW Business (formerly Flow Languages), they owe me about 8, 000 GBP!
They now have a new company — Strategic Translations LTD. with Vicki Nicol as a director. I found their profile on Trustpilot, here it is: https://www.trustpilot.com/review/strategictranslations.co.uk
You are welcome to leave your sincere opinion about their company.
You may only leave a review on trust pilot if you are a customer of Strategic Translations Ltd. If you are not a client, your review will be removed. Please see terms and conditions here: http://uk.legal.trustpilot.com/end-user-terms-and-conditions
The company has renamed itself from Strategic Translations to My Language Connection. Websites www.mylanguageconnection.co.uk and www.mylanguageconnection.com
I can confirm that in January 2018 I was contacted by Cecilia Need of My Language Connection regarding a proofreading job. Luckily I found this website before it was too late. Thanks to all who contributed this valuable information.
This is hilarious! I had a bitter experience with Strategic Translations, now My Language Connection. My initial relationship with the PM as well as payment was hitch free for a few months back in 07. Then I accepted to work on the translation of software strings for them. Turns out there was an issue in getting the exact word count on one of the files. I spontaneously reported the issue, requested a P.O and suggested the about 15k difference. Ion word count be reported to client prior to continuing with the work. PM conveniently ignored these and I was stupid or too trusting enough to continue working without a P.O. The rest is history
· I agreed to translate 2 files ; new word count of 2265 (327 and 1938) for $208. As soon as I noticed an enormous change in word count (17749: being 15811 for file 1 and 1938 for file 2)I notified them and did everything I could for them to notify end client and issue a P.O with the change. They were not forthcoming but I went ahead because I trusted them.
o August 30th, they promised issuing a P.O but never did
o On September 4th, I asked if P.O will be issued for 1st 2 files or if 1 P.O will be issued to cover everything. They never responded to that. I followed up same day and was told the client was on site.
o On September 5th, I asked if they’d heard from client and if work should be halted until we hear from them since there's a huge difference in word count. They responded requesting a discount from me after which a P.O will be issued. I offered a 30% discount same day. They didn't respond.
o On September 7th, I submitted the file and indicated that the P.O is still pending.
o On September 11th, they emailed requesting explanation of my email from the 5th and offering £297 ($391) as payment for both files. I indicated I'd rather not get paid for disputed file than accept that. No response from them
o On September 16th, I emailed requesting a P.O. No response
o September 21st, they issued a P.O with a £297 imposed amount which I disputed.
-09.21.17: I explained why £297 P.O for both files isn’t acceptable and offerered an additional 20% discount
-10.02.17: I sent Follow-up email inquiring way forward. They respond saying they think it’s misunderstanding; thought we had agreed on £297 for both files. I countered and they promised you look into it.
I notified them of scam alert by another translator.
They said they wouldn’t give credibility to Internet forums and promised to look into payment situation
-10.03.17:they promised they will look into it
10.04.17
Cecilia
Mourine/
Victoria
--went over correspondences again & misunderstood what she thought was agreed budget of £297
10.09.17: They imposed £320
10.21.17: I requested follow-up
10.26.17: They told me there’s nothing further to resolve and imposed $208 for both files
-10.26.17: reminded them word count issue was shared responsibility as PM wasn’t able to get correct word count either.
They made a PayPal payment of $405 ($387.04 after $18.13 fees); on November 6th. I have accepted and cashed $178 for the file which was duly submitted on time.
They now owe me $500; being $727(total pending amount for the file in dispute after 50% discount) minus $227 ($405 (payment made) minus $178 (payment for other file).
Yesterday I received the following job offer from MLC My Language Connection, via Proz.com, after reading this, I should certainly not take the job:
Hello...
I hope you don’t mind me contacting you. I have a translation project that I’m wondering if you
would be able to carry out? Details:
Language pair: English to Swedish
Word count: 7425
Task: Translation (linguist needs to work with Trados or
compatible CAT tool, as client wants to start building a TM
to ensure consistency)
Subject matter: Instruction manual for an industrial weeding
machine Deadline: Friday, April 6th, 2pm GMT
Please if you would get back to me at your earliest
convenience.
Many thanks
Cecilia
Cecilia Need
Head of Projects
MY LANGUAGE CONNECTION
A: 22 Montrose Street, Glasgow, G1 1RE
T: [protected]
W: www.mylanguageconnection.com
Well a graphic designer here, chasing payment too outstanding from 30 April and trying to get a PO for another job. Not massive amounts owed but they would make a difference to me and obviously I have done the work. I am concerned I will not get paid although payment has been trouble free previously. They do seem to have a record for not paying which is concerning...
I have asked for this to be removed as delay in payment was not an issue. As far as I know, there are no issues with this agency, whatever may have happened in the past.
Thank you for your comments. They really helped me on my decision to work or not for the told mylanguageconnection.com which is resolutely a scam.
I would like to know if this "so called" Flow Languages has to do with Flow Languages in The Netherlands. Further information would be much appreciated.
Hi Mary, I have seen this Dutch company also. But No, the British Flow Languages has stopped activities after the name change in feb 2015 to MC Holdings Limited. So they got nothing going on with each other. The fraudulent Uk company first named Flow Languages, operating in public as translation agency Worldwide Business. Since their non paying-fraud, they have changed their name to Strategic Translations, and they are now called My Language Connection. https://www.mylanguageconnection.com/
And in the uk as: www.mylanguageconnection.co.uk
No, I do not think so. Flow Languages UK has changed it's name on feb 2015. From that date it was MC Holdings Limited, publicly operating as translation agency Worldwide Business.
Although the Dutch company Flow Languages, flowlanguages.nl has been banned from several platforms, because it is associated with the British one. To my idea this is an error, but ..hey.. who can you trust in this jungle?
Despite a fraudulent history, Flowlanguages UK's Victoria Nicol could get a loan of 10.000 gbp to start up the business. She claims to have 3 full time staff members and that she 'engages with a sub-contracting network that employs 400 linguists'. https://www.scotsman.com/business/30m-boost-for-scots-entrepreneurs-from-british-business-bank-loans-scheme-1-5016897.
What network does she mean? Upwork.com ? I strongly believe these figures are exaggerated for the public. Nice side note is that many of the reviews of My Language Connection on Trustpilot look as if they are fake, which they probably are. Victroria Nicol and Cecilla Need/Macchione, both from Worldwide Business never explained why the company went bankrupt. They just started new companies and left all the translators with a lot of quiestions and empty pockets. They don't have any moral compass.
I have bad experiences with the Dutch company Flow Languages. They don't pay...
I experienced the same situation with Dutch company Flow Languages. I have not seen their good intention till today. So be careful taking jobs from this company (https://www.flowlanguages.nl/) unless you don't want to be paid. They owe to me $1, 800 over than 1 years..
Please see my email and contact me. Thanks!
Please see my email and contact me. Thanks !
Hi, I'm in the same boat, looks like. I did quite a lot of work for them over 3 months (Feb-April 2021) before I realised I might have trouble getting paid. Still haven't received any payment.
Interesting reading the comments here… You accepted jobs without undertaking research. You did no credit checks. You ignored proz.com ratings for this company. And you lost money because of it. You only have yourselves to blame.
The Dutch company and the UK company have no affiliation. If you bothered to research it, you would see it’s not possible. Likewise, My Language Connection has no affiliation with Flow languages, Worldwide Business or MC Holdings Ltd. The director of MLC had a sales job at WWB at one point, but that’s it. Notwithstanding, even if there was a link, there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.
I suggest people stop whining online and spend your time improving your research / credit control skills.
Watch out for this company and scam Cecilia Macchione! Never do business with her in photography or translation! Simply not to be trusted!