Your Agency Picked Its Software. You Get to Pick Yours.

I hear this one more than any other question.

"I like the idea. But none of my agencies use OneTerp. So what is the point?"

It is a fair question. Most of what you have heard about OneTerp sounds like it depends on your agency being there. One calendar across every agency. Offers you accept with one tap. Jobs that land on your schedule by themselves.

So let me answer it straight, the way I would if we were sitting in a parking lot between jobs.

Your agency's software was built to run the agency

Whatever platform your agency uses, it is doing its job. It gets you the offer. It confirms the coverage. It collects your closeout so the agency can bill the customer. Keep using it. Nothing in this post asks you to stop.

But look at what it does not do.

It does not know about your other three agencies. It does not know about the wedding you are doing for a direct client next month. It does not track your mileage. It does not count your CEUs. It does not help you at tax time. It does not give you a professional profile you can hand to somebody.

It was never supposed to. That is not a flaw in their software. It is just not their business.

Their business is the agency. Your business is you.

And right now, you are probably running your business on a paper calendar, a notes app, a spreadsheet from 2019, and a glove box full of receipts.

OneTerp is not a replacement. It is the other half.

Here is the simplest way I can put it.

Your agency's platform is where the work comes from. OneTerp is where your work lives.

You do not have to choose between them. You do not have to talk your agency into anything. You do not need a single agency on OneTerp for it to be useful to you on day one.

The honest part: you log those jobs yourself

I am not going to pretend otherwise. When a job comes from an agency that uses a different platform, it does not flow into OneTerp on its own. You add it.

That takes about ten seconds. There is a Log Job button that floats on every screen, and a shortcut on your phone. Date, time, where, who it is for, the rate. Done. The habit that works best is simple: the moment you accept a job anywhere, log it.

Here is what those ten seconds buy you.

What you get with zero agencies on OneTerp

One calendar that tells the truth

Every job from every agency, plus your direct clients, in one place. Your Tuesday is finally your Tuesday. When someone asks if you are free Friday, you check one screen and you answer honestly.

It syncs to Google, Apple, or Outlook calendar on your phone, so it rides along wherever you go. Free.

Every dollar in one place

The earnings dashboard adds up your income across every source you log. Agency A, Agency B, the private client, the conference. You finally see what you actually made this month, and which agency is actually carrying your year. Free.

Invoices for the work nobody else bills

For your direct clients, you build a clean PDF invoice from the job you already logged, and you track what is paid and what is still out. No more rebuilding the same invoice every Sunday. No more forgetting the one from two months ago. Premium.

Tax season without the shoebox

Log mileage and expenses as they happen. At tax time, export a Schedule C summary for your accountant instead of reconstructing a year of driving from memory. Premium.

CEUs you can actually see

Track your continuing education toward your RID cycle with progress rings and a breakdown by category. No more panic in the last six months of a cycle. Premium.

A profile that belongs to you

Build a professional portfolio page with your own link, your specialties, your experience, and a one page résumé you can download. It is yours. It does not live inside any agency's system, and it does not disappear when an agency changes vendors. The page itself is free to have; building and editing it is part of Premium.

Mentoring with the mentor you already trust

Most of us had someone. A teacher from our program, a senior colleague, a team interpreter who told us the truth. And most of that mentoring happened over text threads, emailed video links, and notes like "somewhere around two minutes in" that nobody could find a week later.

Mentoring puts it in one place. Invite the mentor you already trust with one link. They send you a Practice. You record the way you already do, upload it to YouTube as Unlisted, and paste the link. They leave feedback pinned to the exact second it matters, tagged by skill, and you click the timestamp to jump right there.

Hours you both confirm can be exported as a clean log for your own independent study paperwork. It stays between the two of you. Your agency never sees it, and no agency platform is involved at all.

It is included with Premium, and only one of you needs it. So a mentor with Premium can bring a brand new interpreter in on day one.

What Premium costs

The free side stays free. Your calendar, your earnings, your job log, and your profile page never cost you anything.

Premium is where the business tools and Mentoring live. Your first month of Premium is free, so you can try all of it before you pay a cent.

One important detail: the FIRSTYEAR code only works when you sign up on the web at oneterpsched.com, not through the app store. Sign up on the web, enter the code, then use the app on your phone as normal.

Put that next to what a missed invoice, a forgotten mileage log, or a scramble for CEUs costs you in a year, and the math is not close.

And if one of your agencies joins someday

This is the part I love.

If an agency you work for moves to OneTerp, you are already there. You do not start over. Your calendar, your history, your earnings, and your profile are already in place. Their jobs simply start landing on your schedule by themselves, and the ten second log step disappears for that agency.

You do not have to lobby anybody. But if you ever want to make the case to an agency, I wrote the whole argument out in The Interpreter Was Never the Customer. Feel free to send it to them.

Try it for one week

Here is my ask. It is a small one.

Sign up free, and turn on your free month of Premium while you are at it. Log every job you accept for one week, from every agency and every direct client. Then look at your calendar on Friday.

One calendar. One number for what you earned. One place your work lives.

Your agency picked its software. You get to pick yours.