I am a native speaker of Arabic and I work as a translator from English to Arabicand vice versa. I was contacted by one of my clients who told me about a Mr. Mwho saw some documents I translated for her and liked the translation. Mr. Mcontacted me later and asked me to translate a book from Arabic to English andI agreed. He then gave me a copy of the book and asked me to translate a chapteras a sample, and I did so.

Hethen sent me an email telling me that my translation was too literal and that heassigned the job to someone else who, he believed, did the job better than Idid. He offered me to pay me half the agreed fee for the chapter I translated.

Sincehe, like me,  is a native speaker ofArabic, I am not sure he is in position to judge the quality of the text Iproduced in English. I know the chapter he sent me was a “sample” but since hehas already seen my translation, I took for granted that he would assign thejob to me. Now that he did not. I feel that it was unfair to ask me to do such alarge sample and then to pay me half the agreed. Do you think I should accept half the agreed rate or insist on being paid at the full rate for the chapter I translated?