Inst ran sBreak down language barriers

How it works Despite the enormous efforts of making English the most common language in the world, a lot of foreign tourists, especially the elderly, are struggling with communicating simple conversational sentences whenever they travel to the US. Hence, they don’t often travel oversea.

So at Instrans we provide a solution to resolve this problem – interpretation over phone call. Whenever a foreign tourist having problem with language communication at your hotel, simply open the app and select the languages you need an interpreter for and press call. We will connect you to a freelance interpreter to help you with the process. Below is the basic layout of the app.

Credit bar showing the number of minutes you have in your balance

Select the languages that you need an interpreter for

Press call to get connected instantly

Current Stage

As of now we just completed the prototype of the app and we are rolling onto the beta testing stage. After thoroughly market surveying several hotels in New York State, we realized none of them have a systematic way to handle miscommunications with foreign tourists. We anticipate that by displaying a sign, either on hotel website or front desk, stating that the hotels are capable of communicating in all of the popular languages, number of foreign customers would increase significantly, as right now not a single hotel can do this.

In long term run, we want our app to be installed on all tourists’ smartphones. So they can use our service themselves outside of hotel areas – restaurants, shopping malls, amusement parks, etc. As the number of app users increases, hotels will no longer need to pay for our service.

The prototype is completed on Android platform to be downloaded and used. One can select the languages they need and call the interpreters. For beta testing we will offer the service free of charge. However, our service is only available at a certain time during the day and for a few days during a week. So we are working with several hotels in the area to find the optimal time ranges for the service. We’ll start off with Spanish as our main language for the beta test. He will be available most of the time during weekdays. In addition, we also have Chinese and Vietnamese interpreters available as well at certain hours.

In return, we expect nothing but honest feedbacks on our service after a month of trial.

Team Formation

Market Research

Prototype Developing

Beta Testing

Interpreter Recruiting

Launching

Jan 2015 Oct April

Future Development If everything goes well, we expect to launch officially in October this year 2015. Beside expanding our language pool and making our service available 24/7, we also want to maintain a good relationship with hotels, no matter whether they want to use our service or not. By knowing that hotel staff can communicate in their language, foreign tourists would feel more comfortable staying inside the area and using other services. A family from China would no longer need to go outside to a Chinese restaurant to get the food they want, or a Russian guy would use the hotel spa to relax, etc. There are endless possibilities.

In case you want to use our services in the future, here is our (intended) price chart:

- 99 cents per minute, pay as you go. - $7.99 for a 10 minute package, pre-paid. - $14.99 for a 30 minute package, pre-paid. - $24.99 for a 60 minute package, pre-paid.

Users can make as many calls as they wish in their balance. The credits stay on their phone indefinitely so they can use them for the next trip. Purchased credits are non-refundable however.

Once the official app is available on the market, hotel managers will able to register multiple smartphones under 1 banking account for their staffs. For instance, a receptionist can use her phone to communicate with a new foreign guest coming into the hotel, a janitor can understand guests request on how to clean their room properly. Since all phones are registered under 1 account, all call services will be counted toward one balance and all charges will be applied upon 1 bank account.

If it’s necessary, we will add a feature that restricts the app usage under hotel Wi-Fi range only for each account. This way staffs won’t be able to use our service outside of work. The app will also record time and duration of what phones are being used and report it to the manager email daily/weekly. This makes it easier for hotel managers to monitor how the service is being used.

For the first few months of our contract we will charge hotel accounts just like any regular account. After that we will work out a better way that benefits both parties.

One account for multiple staffs