To accommodate the influx of visitors during the Olympic Games, the SNCF thought big, presenting a new instant translation tool this Thursday in Paris. It will equip all its station reception agents, allowing them to converse in one of the 130 languages offered.
“It is an innovation which will embody what the SNCF group is capable of doing in terms of hospitality service
,” indicated Christophe Fanichet, CEO of SNCF Voyageurs, during the presentation of the application.
Launched on April 4, the tool has already been adopted by 4,500 agents. The objective is that 50,000 of them in direct contact with travelers will be connected to TradSNCF by July 26, the date of the 2024 Olympic Games. The development of the application cost
“a few hundred thousand euros »
explained Christophe Fanichet. A beta version was tested during the Rugby World Cup
“but we realized that in certain cases, the translation made errors, so that added even more stress”
for passengers already lost, explained the boss of the railway company.
The application has therefore been perfected to integrate the language specific to the railway and transport world.
“It is a brand of hospitality that we wish to develop in all stations
,” said the director of regional and Parisian stations, Eliane Barbosa.
TradSNCF the “games heritage” tool
Announcements at the station will also be made in French and English and sometimes in other European languages German, Italian, Spanish depending on the location. But nothing will prevent, in the event of abandoned luggage, using “
TradSNCF
” to broadcast a message in the language of the person who forgot their suitcase, if it is possible to identify their country of origin, underlined Christophe Fanichet.
TradSNCF is a tool that will remain as a
“legacy of the Games”
, he continued, particularly in Paris, the leading tourist destination in the world. RATP has also developed an instant translation application for its agents in the run-up to the Olympics. It is capable of translating into 16 languages and cost 2 million euros.
Around 15 million travelers are expected in Ile-de-France for the Olympic and Paralympic Games. In March, the president of the Ile-de-France region Valérie Pécresse indicated that among them, a good third would be foreigners, first British, then Americans then non-English-speaking Europeans.