Churches
A service is run by whoever turned up early, not by a technician. One person starts the translation before the first song, the congregation reads along in the language each family speaks, and the headphone system you already own can carry the spoken voice. The same routine every week, whoever is on the roster.
Church translation has to survive the roster. The person on the desk this week may have done it twice before, and the service starts whether or not they remember every step. So the start is short: open the desk app or the browser page, pick the microphone feed, press start. The listening link on the screen is the same one as last week, and the QR code in the bulletin still works.
From then on the volunteer runs the mixer as usual. There is no second screen to watch and nothing to type during the sermon. If a guest preacher speaks another language, the volunteer taps that language in the app, or sets it to any language beforehand. When the service ends, they press stop, and that is the whole shift.
The services and gatherings a congregation runs in a year, and what the translation does at each.
The sermon in the pastor’s language, read on phones in the language each family speaks, with the room screen carrying the one most of the hall needs.
Switch the spoken language for the sermon and the congregation reads it in theirs; switch back for the notices. Nobody arranges an interpreter.
Parents listen in the language of the church; their children read the same sermon in English on a phone, in the same pew, without a youth room.
Three days, two languages, the same volunteer at the desk. Run it as the service is run, for as many sessions as the weekend has.
The extended family that comes once a year follows the whole service in the language they brought, from a card at the door.
A phone in a browser on the table is enough for a small room. The glossary keeps the names of books and people spelt the way your church spells them.
How it is done, every week
The person on the desk sees it once.
Nothing else changes about the service.
Open the desk app or the browser page on the computer that runs the screen, pick the microphone feed, press start.
On the screen before the service, in the bulletin, on a card at the door. It is the same link every week.
Press stop. The hours the service ran, in the languages people chose, are what the church pays for.
A church is not a conference. The room is fixed, the people come back every week, and the budget is a line in the offering.
A spare output from the mixer, or the same laptop that runs the lyrics. A pulpit microphone that is already mixed is the cleanest source there is.
On the screen before the service, in the bulletin, on a card at the door. Families who come every week will have it saved after the first Sunday.
A spare phone or tablet opens the listening link in the translated language, and a cable from its headphone socket goes into the transmitter you already use. The people wearing your receivers hear it as before.
The pastor’s name, the name of the church, the words your congregation uses for its own things. Entered once in the venue’s glossary and used every week after.
Before the service: computer on, app open, start. Check the screen shows the link and the first line of captions appears when someone tests the microphone. During the service: nothing. After: stop. The person next on the roster watches once and can do it the following week.
Lyrics belong on the lyrics screen you already run. Stop the captions when the singing starts and start them again when the speaker does; the gap is not charged. Announcements, prayers, the sermon and the notices are all captioned as they are spoken, in the language each person chose.
Why SpanVoice
Usually a monthly or annual plan, charged whether or not a service ran that month.
The hours each service runs, per language. A quiet month costs nothing.
Often a monthly allowance that resets; annual hour banks that lapse at twelve months.
Credit never expires. What the church paid for stays until it is used.
Often one language included and a monthly charge for each one added.
Any of the sixty, charged only while somebody in the pew is reading it.
Often tiers by audience size, or a cap on listeners per plan.
Fifty or five hundred, the same price. Nothing per person.
Sometimes English in, other languages out.
Preach in any of the sixty. Switch for a guest speaker and switch back.
Often an onboarding call, a setup fee, or a device to buy for the sound desk.
Sign up, start a session, read the first line on a phone. Nothing to buy.
Usually a browser page, sometimes an app built for a different kind of room.
A Windows desk app and a browser page, built and used weekly by people who run a church sound desk.
Rarely stated.
Servers in Australia, Europe and the United States, so the captions keep pace in your part of the world.
Compare it yourself: price your Sunday with any service you like.
If you find a similar service for less, tell us and we will look into it.
Worked out the way a treasurer would. Captions are A$1.05 per hour, per language, at today’s rate in AUD. A language is only charged while somebody is listening in it.
One language for the families who need it. 1.5 hours, 1 language — A$1.58.
Two communities in one congregation. 1.5 hours, 2 languages — A$3.15.
Four services of ninety minutes each. 6 hours, 1 language — A$6.30.
Friday night to Sunday afternoon, two languages. 10 hours, 2 languages — A$21.00.
Before Sunday
Run a service with a headphone system or a particular desk? Tell us what you have.
Talk to usStart it before the first song, put the link on the screen, and let the congregation read along.
A$10 of free credit when you sign up, no credit card needed. Credit never expires — use it this week or next year.