Brief overview

You can purchase your tickets in the conference webshop, under the Registration menu (this will be activated as soon as tickets go on sale).  Here you will see all the possible items, sorted in a logical order, with similar items grouped together.

All items, including dinners and workshops, are named ‘BP20 Conference – Module xx’, and will appear as such on your invoice: this means you can claim these as expenses spent on professional development.

Next step: view your cart. Here you will see a number of coupon codes: certain combinations of products may be purchased at some discount. You will also see some recommended additional products you may be interested in.

At this point the grand total amount includes VAT for everyone.  Once you’re on the Checkout page, and you purchase your items as a business with a valid VAT ID, the VAT disappears from the grand total amount.

When entering you VAT ID, make sure you do it without entering a space (e.g. NL123456789).

You can choose from three possible payment methods: bank transfer, TransferWise, as well as bank card / PayPal.

You will receive your invoice by email, together with a link where you can create your attendee profile.

Now you’re all set – but please don’t forget to make your travel and hotel arrangements.

Products and coupon codes

Conference tickets and dinners

You’ll find 4 kinds of tickets. The ‘plain’ ones cover the actual conference attendance, ‘full package’ tickets include two dinners (23 April, 24 April).  Most people will pick tickets for freelancers, but for an additional 100€ you can buy LSP tickets: these give you more visibility at the conference and in the mobile app.

Coupon codes

Multiple coupon codes may be used with each purchase, as applicable.  As a reminder, the codes are also displayed on the ‘Cart’ page of our web store.

For example if you attend the conference AND a masterclass (or two), you’ll be eligible for a 40€ discount with the ‘mc40’ coupon code.

Don’t forget to include the item for which you wish to apply the coupon, otherwise it will not work.

We deserve the right to cancel or modify any coupon code at any time without prior notice.

The shopping and registration process

Select your items in the webshop

You can purchase your tickets in the conference webshop, under the Registration menu (bpconf.com/shop). Here you will see all the possible items, sorted in a logical order, with similar items grouped together and colour coded, as seen above.

All items, including dinners, walking tours and day trips are named ‘BP20 Conference – Module xx’, and will appear as such on your invoice: this means you can claim these as expenses spent on professional development.

You will see a detailed description of each item by clicking on it.  Once you’re happy with the range of selected items, you proceed to the next step: View your cart.  You can click on a ‘View Cart‘ link right next to the item most recently added, and there’s also a ‘View Cart’ link at the top of the webshop.

View your cart and apply your coupons

In this step you can have an overview of what items you selected for purchase.  You can still return to the webshop by clicking on ‘Continue shopping’ at the top.

You will see a reminder of all possible coupon codes here. Apply any coupon code on this page.

At the bottom left corner of the page you will see some additional items you might be interested in. You can still add these at this point.

At this point the grand total includes VAT for everyone.  Once you’re on the Checkout page, and you purchase your items as a business with a valid VAT ID, the VAT disappears from the grand total amount.

Once you’re happy with the content of your cart, click on ‘Proceed to checkout‘.

Checkout page and your billing details

You’ll need to provide your billing details on this page.  If you purchase your items as a business, you will not be charged VAT.  If you have a business registered in the European Union (except for Italy), and you provide a valid VAT number, the VAT amount will be zero. The system checks your VAT number against the VIES directory.  Make sure you enter your VAT number without any spaces.

If your business is registered outside the European Union, there’s no validity check.

If you are based in Germany, whether as an individual or a registered business, you’ll need to pay VAT – obviously you can claim back the VAT amount if you purchase the items as a business.

Payment and invoices

You can choose one of three payment options.  Each of these are described below in detail.

Bank transfer

Shortly after you place your order, you will receive an ‘order receipt’ by email to confirm your purchase. You will also receive your pro forma invoice in a separate email.  The necessary banking details will be shown on the payment page, as well as on the pro forma invoice.  You will have 5 days to send your payment by bank transfer.  If you’re based outside Hungary, you’ll transfer the amount to a EUR account.

If you’re based in Hungary and you pay from a local bank account, you’ll see the invoice amount converted to HUF in small print: please transfer this HUF amount to our HUF bank account. (You’ll see this on the payment page.)

Once the transferred funds arrive, you’ll receive a ‘deposit invoice‘ by email.  This one still shows a payment date, but the small print at the bottom of the invoice says ‘Invoice already paid’.

Since the conference takes place only on 24-25 April, but you paid for the services in advance, we’ll have to issue a separate ‘final invoice’ as well, dated 25 April or later.  This ‘final invoice‘ will list all the items purchased, as well as the amount already paid with a negative sign, leaving you a payable balance of zero.  This may sound complicated, but we’ll have comply with taxation regulations.

This option will be available only until Friday, 10 April.

TransferWise

TransferWise is a low-cost alternative to traditional bank transfers.  The only trick is that the originating currency must be different from the target currency.  For practical purposes you’ll transfer funds to a HUF account, which means you’ll be able to use TransferWise if your country has EUR, USD, GBP, CZK, PLN, DKK, and several other currencies.

Shortly after you place your order, you will receive an ‘order receipt’ by email to confirm your purchase. You will also receive your pro forma invoice in a separate email.  The necessary banking details will be shown on the payment page, as well as on the pro forma invoice.  You will have 5 days to send your payment by TransferWise.  If you’re based outside Hungary, you’ll transfer the amount to a EUR account.

If you’re based in Hungary and you pay from a local bank account, you’ll see the invoice amount converted to HUF in small print: please transfer this HUF amount to our HUF bank account.

Once the transferred funds arrive, you’ll receive a ‘deposit invoice‘ by email.  This one still shows a payment date, but the small print at the bottom of the invoice says ‘Invoice already paid’.

Since the conference takes place only on 24-25 April, but you paid for the services in advance, we’ll have to issue a separate ‘final invoice’ as well, dated 25 April or later.  This ‘final invoice‘ will list all the items purchased, as well as the amount already paid with a negative sign, leaving you a payable balance of zero.  This may sound complicated, but we’ll have comply with taxation regulations.

This option will be available only until Friday, 10 April.

Paypal / Visa / Mastercard

The process with payment option is different from the above, since your payment arrives immediately. Please note that a 4.5% surcharge applies in this case as a compensation for PayPal charging BP Translation Conferences for using their services.

Once you choose this option, you’ll be taken to PayPal’s website where you can choose whether you pay from your PayPal account or your bank card. This means you don’t need to have a PayPal account.

Once you paid, first you receive a pro forma invoice.  This shows a payment date 5 days from the current date, but don’t bother about it.  You will receive your ‘deposit invoice‘ within 24 hours, most probably within 6 – this one has to be sent out manually. This deposit invoice still shows a payment date, but the small print at the bottom of the invoice says ‘Invoice already paid’.

Since the conference takes place only on 24-25 April, but you paid for the services in advance, we’ll have to issue a separate ‘final invoice’ as well, dated 25 April.  This ‘final invoice‘ will list all the items purchased, as well as the amount already paid with a negative sign, leaving you a payable balance of zero.  This may sound complicated, but we’ll have comply with taxation regulations.

Invoice comments

You may see three different types of comments in small print at the bottom of the invoice.

‘Megjegyzés’ – this means ‘Comment’ or ‘Remark’

‘Invoice already paid’ – well, this one doesn’t need any explanation.

‘Áfa-törvény területi hatályán kívül eső szolgáltatás’ – ‘Service outside the scope of the VAT law’: this is displayed when you purchase your items as a business.  This remark is necessary for us in the event of any tax audit in Hungary.

Registration

Now that you have paid for the conference, you can set up your attendee profile.  In the confirmation email you will receive a link where you do this.  Basically you’ll have a user account on this website: in this user account you can upload a profile photo, you can write a short bio about yourself, as well as publish some links to your website and social media accounts.

Some information will be used to create your conference badge.  You’ll see above each section whether the information you provide there will be published on the website, under the Attendees tab, or printed on your badge.

You can also specify any special diet here (not published anywhere).

We’ll ask for your permission to publish your profile – you may opt out if you like.   By default you’ll receive a 1-year digital subscription to the MultiLingual magazine, our media sponsor – again, you may opt out of this offer.

Event app

For the second time in BPconf history we will have our event app, provided by Whova, available from late January.  Sadly, the app cannot be synchronized with the website, which means technically you will have two separate profiles – one on this website, one on the app.  It should be possible to upload bios and photos to the event app in a single Excel file, so if you submit a bio and a photo for the website’s Attendee page, you wouldn’t have to do it again — but this hasn’t been tested yet.  In the worst case you’ll need to upload your text and photo in the app as well.

The app will allow you to network with colleagues more efficiently. You can contact fellow attendees, create forums, set up impromptu groups, see the programme, vote on sessions, and lots of other cool stuff. This is new territory for us as well.

An important different in the profiles on the webiste and the app:  whatever you post on the website’s Attendees page will be visible to Google, so publish only what you would normally publish on your own website. You can always edit the content though.  Information published on the app is visible only to other conference attendees, and is not searchable by Google.

Travel and hotel arrangements

Each conference attendee is responsible to take care of their travel arrangements to and from Nuremberg. Also, this is a good time to book a room at the conference hotel, or perhaps team up with a few colleagues and rent a holiday apartment together.

BP20 attendees have a special rate at the hotel if you book before 31 January.  More details and booking form here.

Prices of tickets and other items are listed without Value Added Tax (VAT).

For events taking place in Germany a 19% VAT is payable on the top of the actual ticket price.

You will need to pay VAT (i) if you purchase your ticket as an individual, no matter where you live; (ii) if you purchase your ticket as a company based in Italy.

You don’t have to pay VAT (iii) if you purchase your ticket as a business based in any other member state of the European Union outisde Germany AND you have a valid VAT ID that exists in the EU’s VIES database; (iv) if you purchase your ticket as a business based outside the European Union. In this case it’s your responsibility to comply with your own country’s tax regulations. In some countries it’s sufficient to state that you’re an individual entrepreneur after your name.

How to make sure no VAT is applied to your purchase

If you’re eligible not to pay VAT according to the above, on the Checkout page click on the dropdown list under ‘I pay as…’, then select ‘business’.  (You’ll find the Checkout page during the shopping process after selecting your items.)

You’ll be able to enter your VAT ID below this field; make sure you enter it without a space (e.g. NL12345678).  Your ID’s validity will be checked against the EU’s VIES database.  This database in turn checks the validity in the national databases of individual member states. At certain such national databases may be down, just like any other website, for a few seconds, or, occasionally, for longer periods of time. We do not bear any responsibility for such events, as this is beyond our control.  Please check back after a little while.

Once your VAT ID is verified, the VAT amount will be deducted from the total, i.e. the VAT amount will be set to zero at the bottom of the page.  Don’t forget to tick off ‘I have read the conditions’.

How to make sure you receive an invoice with your VAT number on it

If you have an EU VAT number (e.g. IT12345678), you qualify as a ‘business’.  Simply select ‘business’ as explained above and enter your VAT number.

Soon after you submit your order, you’ll receive a pro forma invoice with your invoicing details.  As soon as your payment arrives, you’ll receive a ‘deposit invoice’ that you can use for accounting purposes.   Finally, after the conference you’ll receive a ‘final invoice’ that indicates your payment with a negative sign and the invoice amount with a positive sign, so you’ll end up with an invoice with a zero final amount.  This may seem redundant, but Hungarian accounting regulations require this distinction between a deposit invoice and a final invoice.

Read the full text of our Terms & Conditions here

You can register for the event by purchasing the ticket under the Registration tab (this will be activated as soon as tickets are on sale).

Registration for the Event is completed once the ticket price is paid in full.

As a payment option, you may choose between direct bank transfer, TransferWise, and PayPal / bank card.  If you live in the EU, a direct bank transfer (SEPA transfer) may be the easiest/cheapest option.  TransferWise is a cheaper alternative, but this option works only between currencies; i.e. only if your bank account is denominated in a currency other than Hungarian Forint.  If you live outside the EU, PayPal / bank card may turn out to be cheaper. Please note that a 4.5% surcharge is applied to such payments to compensate for the service charges deducted by PayPal – but this is often less than what your bank would charge for a wire transfer.

To be honest, we prefer direct bank transfer.

If you choose to pay using your bank card (MasterCard or Visa), choose the PayPal option. In this case PayPal acts as a card processor intermediary, i.e. you don’t need to have a PayPal account to effect payment.

Bank details and other information to perform the wire transfer or TransferWise transfer will be provided in a confirmation email once you submit your order.

If you are based in Hungary, you can pay in HUF to our HUF bank account. The amount will be indicated in small print on the invoice.

In all three cases you will find detailed instructions during the ticket purchase process.

You can read the full text of our Terms & Conditions here

Tickets purchased are eligible for a refund. The amount of refund is calculated on the basis of the amount actually paid for the services. A 100% refund (minus 35€ processing fee) is paid if the registration is cancelled before midnight on Monday, 16 March 2020. A 50% refund  is paid if the registration is cancelled before midnight on Friday, 10 April 2020. No refund is paid after this date.

If you have to cancel your attendance due to an ungranted visa, you’ll get a full refund (minus 35€ processing fee) if you cancel your registration before midnight on Friday, 10 April 2020.

No refund is paid on video purchases.

Allow up to 7 days to process refunds.

Read the full text of our Terms & Conditions here

Group discounts

If at least 2 people buy tickets on the same invoice, you’ll be able to buy conference tickets at the Early Bird rate. Use the ‘groupconf‘ code for a 20€ discount for each person when 2 or more people buy 2-day conference tickets for freelancers (279€ instead of 299€). Use the ‘groupfull‘ code for a 10€ discount for each person when 2 or more people buy full package tickets for freelancers (379€ instead of 389€).  For best results it’s a good idea to find a colleague who has a VAT number in an EU member state (outside Germany) to avoid paying VAT.

We also have a group discount for LSPs: use the ‘grouplsp‘ code for a 30€ discount for each person when 3 or more people buy any type of LSP ticket on the same invoice.

Masterclasses

When you add a masterclass at the time of purchasing your conference ticket, you’ll be eligible to a 40€ discount, using the ‘mc40‘ coupon code.  If you wish to attend two masterclasses, the 40€ discount applies to both (i.e. 80€ in total).

If you wish to add a masterclass after you purchased your conference ticket, send us an email (info@bpconf.com), and you’ll get another coupon code worth 40€.

Students and faculty members

Students and faculty members are eligible to a 40% discount off certain types of conference tickets.  Details here.

BP Video Library

You can add a 1-year access to BP Video Library for just 29€ (instead of the regular 75€) at the time of purchasing your conference ticket. To do so, use the ‘video1y’ coupon code.

Using multiple coupon codes

In most cases you can apply several coupon codes for a single purchase.  In this case apply one coupon at a time, waiting each time until the system recalculates the total.

At BP, we do not have ‘job fairs’, but we do welcome LSPs.  Our special LSP tickets allow more visibility in the conference crowd, offering three advantages over freelancer tickets:

• Badges in different design to stand out from the crowd
• Logo shown during breaks on the screens
• ‘LSP’ tag in the app so freelancers can identify you easily

These distinctive features allow you to stand out and become easily identifiable by the freelancer majority, potentially leading to meaningful business contacts.

Students and faculty members of translation, interpreting, terminology, or related subjects are eligible to a 40% discount off certain types conference tickets.  The discount is available for ‘BP20 Conference: Freelancer ticket’, as well as up to one workshop (if  bought together with a conference ticket).  The discount does not apply to dinners.

The offer is valid for students who are (i) enrolled in the current academic year (2019/20) or were enrolled in any of the 2 previous academic years (2017/18 or 2018/19), and are (ii) below 30, i.e who were born after 25 April 1990.

Send a scanned copy of a certificate of enrollment and your ID card that shows your name and birth date to info@bpconf.com, and you’ll receive your discount code in return.  Allow up to 24 hours.

Faculty members (teachers/professors at an insitution of higher education, teaching translation or similar studies) need to send a scanned proof of their status to the same email address.

The number of attendees with student/faculty discount is limited to 10% of all tickets sold.

Probably yes, but available only from early March.

The price will depend on how many regular (2-day) tickets are sold by 29 February.   As a rough estimate, count on 65% of the 2-day ticket.

If and when day tickets become available, the price of the ticket for Saturday will be higher than for Friday. (Due to additional catering.)

Sign up to our mailing list if you wish to receive a notification about day tickets.

If you placed your order selecting bank transfer or Transferwise, and you haven’t actually paid yet, and you realize that you’d like to change your method payment, don’t panic.

Simply ignore your existing order and existing pro forma invoice, and place a new order, this time with your preferred method of payment.

If you selected bank card / Paypal, and you already paid, and you wish to change your order or realize that something has gone wrong, don’t panic either — this is a bit trickier to fix, but we’ll find a solution.  Drop us a line explaining what happened.

We’ll have two netwoking dinners outside the conference hotel.

Thursday, 23 April, 19:30:  Literaturhaus

Our welcome dinner takes place at Literaturhaus, a spacious café in the old town, about 5 minutes on foot from the conference venue.  The café is laid out on two floors, and we’ll have buffet tables on both floor. There’s a wide staircase between the floors, so it’s easy to walk up and down to mingle with the other hald of the crowd.

Due to capacity restrictions, this dinner is only available as part of ‘full package’ tickets.  If there are places left around early March, you’ll be able to book, probably at 45€ (+VAT).

Friday, 24 April, 19:30:  Bratwurst Röslein

The restaurant dates back to the 15th century, with early regulars including the likes of Albrecht Dürer who lived just a few blocks away. The restaurant is just off the main square in the heart of the old town, a 15-minute walk from the hotel.

There’s no restriction here, tickets are available at 65€ (+VAT).  This includes a welcome drink + 3 more glasses of drinks + a 3-course menu.   You can also bring guests if you like.

Saturday, 25 April, around 18:00:  Hotel Maritim

The farewell reception takes place in the hotel itself, just like last year in Bologna.   This will be covered in your conference ticket, so no need to book it separately.  You can also bring guests if you like, for 25€ (+ VAT).

We may do this reception either after the closing session (in which case it will probably last between 18:00 and 19:15),  or we’ll do this instead of a late afternoon coffee break, followed by a short wrap-up talk. In this case the reception will probbaly take place between 17:00 and 18:00, with the wrap-up talk finishing around 18:30.   The schedule will be finalized in February.

Special diets

There will be pork-free / vegetarian / vegan / lactose-free /gluten-free options at both restaurants and in the hotel.    You’ll be able to mark your diet preferences in a form before the conference.

Dress code

There’s no specific dress code at BP dinners.  If you insist on a categorization, you can’t go wrong with ‘smart casual’.  Needless to say, all venues are non-smoking.  If you must smoke, please do that on the street.

We’ll have walking tours in the old town, and probably also on the former Nazi grounds/buildings as well.

At least 2 visits are planned to the courtroom where the Nuremberg trials took place.

In all cases we’ll have an English-speaking professional guide.

Details will be published as soon as available, most probably before the end of January.

What seems probable now that BPconf will not handle payments, i.e. you’ll have to pay in cash directly to the guide.

This is the new concept, starting in 2020.  Realizing that many regular BP attendees have spread the word already, now it’s time to measure this type of help… and give these people (‘brand advocates’, to use the marketing buzzword) something in return.

Basically for each new person you bring into the BP fold, you’ll receive a credit. You can use these as a discount for next year’s event, or, in certain cases, you can request a payout.

For now the referral program is open for BP20 attendees, but later it may be open to anyone.

BP Video Library referral programme

Convince your colleagues to buy access to the BP Video Library.  When they go through the registration process, at the bottom of the checkout page they’ll see a field called ‘Referrer’s email (optional)’.  Ask them to enter YOUR email address there.  Make sure this is the same email you normally use to interact with BPconf.

The purchase will be registered to your credit.  If two people purchase the 1-year access and enter your email as the referrer, you’ll also receive a 1-year access to BP Video Library.

From the 3rd person, you’ll receive a 1 credit after each person.  For each credit you’ll receive a 10€ discount off one of our future BP conferences.  Alternatively, if you collect at least 10 credits, you can request a payout. In this case 1 credit is worth 8 euros.  For example if 12 people buy videos using your email, you’ll receive a 1-year access to the videos for the first 2 people, and a 100€ discount off a future BP conference or 80€ transferred to your bank account.   For such transfers you’ll need to issue an invoice.

Within the referral programme you can tell your followers / colleagues that they can buy a 1-year access to the videos at 29€ (+VAT, if applicable) instead of the usual 75€.  They’ll need to enter the coupon ‘bpvl1y’ during the shopping process.  All such purchases must be concluded by 15 April 2020.  (We’ll need to pay for video production services before the conference.)

BP20 videos will be available from June 2020, so as part of the 1-year access they’ll be able to watch those as well.  The 1-year period starts on the date of activating the unique URL that they’ll receive after their purchase is confirmed.

More details on the videos here. (BPconf.com/Videos)

Sponsor referral programme

If you manage to convince companies to become sponsors / exhibitors / advertisers, you’ll be rewarded in a similar way.  For each Silver level sponsor you’ll receive a 40€ discount, for each Gold level sponsor a 70€ discount, or for a Platinum level sponsor, a 110€ discount off a future BP conference.  The offer is valid only for companies that have never been sponsors of BP Translation Conferences.

It is not enough to recommend a company to us.  To be eligible for the discount, you’ll need to tell them about BP20 Translation Conference, they should familiarize themselves with the event, and they should be ready to become sponsors.

Contact us directly for any further details. (info@BPconf.com)

Offer for associations / bloggers / communities

If you have many members or followers, you can earn BP credits as mentioned above.  Tell your audience about BP Video Library, and they can buy a 1-year access for 29€ (instead of the regular 75€). The process is pretty much the same as above under ‘BP Video Library referral programme’.

Why there’s no credit for conference ticket pruchases

We’re fully aware that the single most efficient way of advertising for BP events is word-of-mouth.  Any such help is greatly appreciated.  There’s no referral programme for such purchases for two reasons.  First, it’s much harder to keep track of eligible purchases.  Now we have over 2000 people on our mailing list, and it’s hard to tell who convinced whom.  Most probably in most people’s case it’s a combined effect: they heard about BPconf from several sources.   Second, an overwhelming portion of the ticket revenue is used to cover expenses — in fact, the largest part covers variable expenses such as catering.

If you need a visa to visit Germany, you’ll need to go through a visa application process in the country of your residence.  Read the information below AND inquire at your local embassy or consulate as well.

In addition to submitting the visa application form itself, you’ll need to submit a host of other documents as well.

If you attend a conference (which will be the case), you’ll need to submit yet several more documents, such an invitation letter from the organizing company, a proof that you paid for your attendance, a proof that that organizing company fulfils the necessary requirements to organize the event, as well as a proof that you’re eligible in your home country to attend the event (i.e. some kind of proof that you work as a translator).

BP Translation Conferences are organized by a company registered in Hungary, which is part of the Schengen zone, and is also registered in Germany for taxation purposes.  We’ll send you the necessary documents together with your invitation letter as pdf files that you can print, then submit together with your visa application form.

Please fill in the form below with your details so that we can issue the invitation letter.

The website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Germany states that about 8-9% of all visa applications have been rejected last year.  The conference organizer bears no responsibility for any visa rejection.  What we can do is send you a full refund of your conference fee payment if you can prove you have to cancel your attendance because of a rejected visa application (i.e. even after the regular cancellation deadlines).

Make sure you apply for the visa well in advance, as the decision may take several weeks.

List of countries whose citizens need a visa to Germany

Visa application requirements

F.A.Q. on visa applications to Germany

Visa requirements for business purposes