[Jugurtha]

Hi, Laila. Congratulations on the launch. I'll share this (Algiers, Algeria).

One of the problems people here have is getting paid from companies abroad. I think it would be good to conduct interviews with people who may be having the same problem, and either offer a solution or explain it on the website. Many people work as freelancers, and the way they get their money is Herculean.

Also, many, especially here, neither are Arab nor identify as such [native population and ethnicity before 7th century invasions]. Many also do not share the language or other common attributes. Therefore, if you're not ethnicity based, but based on the "region", I guess North Africa, and Middle East are the terms that would work better.

Again, congratulations. There a lot of very talented people in these countries who will not work abroad for different reasons. Staying not to leave family behind is a very, very, common reason. Making remote work easier for them, whether positions or ease of payment, is huge.

This is encouraging even for those who are willing to move but aren't invited to because they haven't reached the skill level required for an employer to incur that cost, and they haven't reached the financial level to incur that cost themselves. I guess your product hits that niche as well.

[laila90]

Hi! Ahlan! Azul! Really appreciate your bringing these issues up.

Regarding payments, this has been coming up and we’ll need to pick your brain as we develop solutions. For now we are managing payments for companies that hire remotely by wire transferring the funds ourselves. In other words, the companies send the money to our US entity and then we do the transfer. We’ve also been looking at https://pilot.co/ https://www.boundlesshq.com/ and https://www.letsdeel.com/. Are you familiar with those? What do you think? Btw Pilot is also a YC company that initially planned to be a full-time remote work marketplace, but switched to facilitating payments because there was such a big need there.

You’re right of course that in North Africa (the Maghreb) many don’t speak Arabic nor identify as Arab. When we call it “the Middle East and North Africa,” we also get feedback that it’s inaccurate. I wish there were a better word! We’ll keep iterating until we get it right.

PS: My co-founder Iliana has spent lots of time in Morocco and some in Algeria… and can’t wait to go back! She speaks some darija… and picked up a few words of Berber. :)

[Jugurtha]

>Regarding payments, this has been coming up and we’ll need to pick your brain as we develop solutions.

My contact information is in my profile. I'll forward to some people I know who had several problems with that. The last one I talked with worked with a company in the U.K. with the restriction the "worker" had to have a bank account in their country of residence, not in any other country. Explanations on exchange rates below. They know more about this, and know more people in that situation.

>We’ve also been looking at https://pilot.co/ https://www.boundlesshq.com/ and https://www.letsdeel.com/. Are you familiar with those?

Unfortunately, no.

What I also meant by payment problems is the disparity between the conversion rates in banks and on the streets. The disparity can be huge, so if you wire X euros to someone's bank account, it is automatically converted to the local currency at rate X and they get Y, when they could get 1.6Y or 1.7Y (60% or 70%) more on the streets. A 70% delta is a lot.

Some networks have developed to enable people to get the full "street value" of their money.

>When we call it “the Middle East and North Africa,” we also get feedback that it’s inaccurate.

Well, as someone in Algeria, if I were looking for work and visited the site and it said: "You're in North Africa", that's a fact of geography. It said "Hire the best Arab software engineers", I'll think "I'll forward the link to Arab software engineers I know since they're specific".

There are a lot of competitions, hackathons, or events that use this terminology, and I know many very talented people who do not participate because it's not for them. They'd rather go to another continent, and they do, where their ethnicity is acknowledged than submit a form that contains an inaccuracy that perpetuates a denial they've been facing for a long time. You are trying to optimize for brevity and clarity and you have to put something on the page, and I get that. I'm just saying and I think that you have lived through enough exclusion and non representativity that you understand that a message on a landing page that excludes you defacto kind of stings.

>PS: My co-founder Iliana has spent lots of time in Morocco and some in Algeria… and can’t wait to go back! She speaks some darija… and picked up a few words of Berber. :)

Well, I don't need to tell you that you are welcome. Hit me up if you are around. You might find the students groups to be interesting. In the meantime, I'll float the site around.

EDIT0: I sent it to someone who has a group. They sent the following:

> Them: Too bad, I'm an infrastructure engineer.

They're specialized in "Microsoft, VMware, IT infrastructures, etc."

EDIT1: Sent it to the admin of a group of around 7.4K engineers and technicians (not just software). Some might be interested and share it to their networks.

[ilianam]

Hi, Iliana responding this time. I can’t emphasize how much we appreciate your feedback! You’re totally correct about the word “Arab” - we should’ve caught that and am glad you brought it to our attention.

The situation with the exchange rate in Algeria is a real problem. Like you said, the banks’ exchange rate is much lower than it should be. When I was there I spent a day with a friend’s friend who runs a side business exchanging money, so I saw some of what this looks like on the ground. I’ll reach out now to pick your brain more on this topic.

Thank you again for your feedback & for spreading the word! So grateful.

[Jugurtha]

You're welcome. I just sent the link to someone who can be very useful: he has experience working in freelance and probably can share many problems from the field. He also has lead a youth organization here and placed many people in internships and positions in companies all over the world, has been around, and has a deeper understanding of the several hurdles, from visas to payment problems.

[ilianam]

Sweet! Thank you

[filleduchaos]

> What I also meant by payment problems is the disparity between the conversion rates in banks and on the streets.

This is also a problem where I live (Nigeria).

It's exhausting explaining black/parallel currency markets to clients/employers in countries with more stable currencies. Way too often I get the knee-jerk reaction that I'm doing something shady/illegal.

[kaladin_1]

Hi @filleduchaos, a Nigerian here, pls, if you don't mind could give few pointers on how you scored your first few foreign jobs. I've sent out so many resumes and cold emails, I have as many rejection letters to prove so. I know there's sth I'm not doing well. Currently studying all sorts of Algo books. Thank you

[dang]

Don't miss the "Who Wants to Be Hired" and "Freelancer" threads that get posted each month by this auto account: https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=whoishiring.

The Jan threads are now closed (HN threads close to new comments after 2 weeks) but there will be another one on Feb 1. No guarantees, of course, but people definitely get work that way.

Good luck! I hope you find something soon.

[ilianam]

This is what Manara candidates often have experienced too, even when they're excellent. It can be very hard to get the attention of tech companies if you're applying from a country they don't usually work with, especially as a junior engineer. Some companies get 2k applications/role so the resumes go into an automated system to be processed.

Manara solves this problem by setting up partnerships with companies for our candidates. Have you thought about joining Andela?

[ilianam]

I know, right?! People who haven't experienced it don't get it. I think the knee-jerk reaction impacts Nigerians especially unfortunately. (My parents used to live in Nigeria and when my dad tried to buy something on eBay, they froze his account. Later when he lived in Venezuela, people were more sympathetic.)

So are there any solutions we should be looking into beyond cash transfers / Western Union? Are any startups working on this problem?

[filleduchaos]

There's https://sendcash.africa - it uses cryptocurrency to facilitate transfers to (Nigerian and Ghanaian, but there are plans to expand throughout West Africa and beyond) bank accounts from anywhere. It's powered by Buycoins (YC S18) - maybe you could look into working with them?

[ilianam]

Thank you! Will check in with them when we're exploring more robust payment solutions. Hopefully by then they'll have solved this problem & expanded to North Africa etc...

[Jugurtha]

filleduchaos, that's a badass handle.

>It's exhausting explaining black/parallel currency markets to clients/employers

What's the delta like there between parallel/official rates?

[filleduchaos]

It fluctuates depending on how far up its own behind the central bank has its head, but usually isn't too bad - it can stretch out to ~1.5x while the official "market" is in denial, but usually stabilises at about 1.2x to 1.3x depending on currency and source.

I've settled on maintaining a domiciliary bank account (denominated in USD) - SWIFT transfers take a few business days, but that's not a problem for steady income and clients can usually be persuaded to eat or split the fees. Plus it's easier to tell people I prefer to receive and hold USD than to explain the state of the economy. Also WorldRemit recently added same-day direct-to-bank deposits of USD in Nigeria-based USD-denominated accounts; I've only received money that way a couple of times though.

[rebyn]

I appreciate these public comments on logistics issues like exchange rate and the sharing of service providers very much. As a freelancer in Viet Nam, this came up multiple times whilst I started out and even though my rate delta was only about 20-25%, that was already something.

Best of luck to you two.

[EamonLeonard]

Hey! I'm co-founder of Boundless, thanks for the mention :) Happy to chat more if you need - [e-mail].

Congratulations on getting Manara up and running!

[ilianam]

Thanks so much! Claire McHugh of Axonista was the first person who mentioned you to us. You've got a strong reputation! We'll reach out :)

[EamonLeonard]

Ah, good stuff!

[laila90]

Would diffidently reach out :)

[estsauver]

CurrencyCloud might be another good option. https://www.currencycloud.com/

Disclosure: We (Apollo Agriculture) share an investor with them, so I've met a couple of their folks at social events.

[ilianam]

Thanks for flagging them - hadn't heard of them previously.

[mtalantikite]

"Also, many, especially here, neither are Arab nor identify as such."

Came here to say the same -- I grew up in the US, but my family is Kabyle and you definitely don't want to call my father Arab!

[laila90]

Totally - really appreciate you guys for flagging this.

Edit: edited this now in the text above!

[mtalantikite]

The whole thing looks great though, really happy you're working on this!

[laila90]

Aww thank you! It makes us happy to work on this too. Interacting with talent in the region is just so heartwarming.

[orliesaurus]

out of curiosity, how would he define himself?

[Jugurtha]

I believe it would be Kabyle, like myself.

[mtalantikite]

Yeah exactly, my family identifies as Kabyle and the majority of them still live in Béjaïa.

(Also, hey! First time I’ve run into another Kabyle on HN)

[orliesaurus]

cool! thanks