"How algorithms wreaked havoc with these workers' schedules and cut their pay,"

For a year and a half, Yves Valerus was working a stable, full time job with a regular weekly schedule, a set hourly rate and benefits. The Haitian Creole-English interpreter helps people bridge language barriers over the phone during people's hospital visits, court proceedings and the like.

But in 2025, Valerus's hours were cut and became fragmented and unpredictable after her employer experienced a business downturn and started using new scheduling software. By the end of the year, her pay was almost 20% less than the prior year...

To try to counter these changes, Valerus and some of her fellow workers are trying to unionize with the Communications Workers of America. Among their other concerns, their company has announced that it's experimenting with using AI to do basic interpretation work...

Valerus and her colleagues are some of the latest workers to encounter the effects of algorithmic scheduling...

Many LanguageLine interpreters said their jobs were intense to begin with. Through the phone line and on video calls, they help people navigate all kinds of life circumstances. On one call, they might translate an insurance policy for someone. On the next call, they could be helping a judge deliver a prison sentence...

There used to be one or two minutes of downtime between calls, but multiple workers told NPR that has disappeared. All that remains is a mandatory 15 seconds between calls...

It was very draining, said Anna Mancino, a Polish-English interpreter who worked for LanguageLine for eight years. "You start losing focus, start making mistakes." For interpreters who work on video calls like Valerus, it also means that they barely have time to stand up and stretch.

LanguageLine responded in a statement that it "absolutely and categorically do not want this for our interpreters" and has a health and safety committee that reviews workplace matters...