History

In the Beginning: Back Up Line S.C.P.

After having worked for 17 years as an English teacher in Barcelona, Willem Koper founded his own language service company, Back Up Line S.C.P., in July 1995. Koper: “I realized I wanted to do something different after years of working part time in classrooms for various employers. I decided to set up my own company and serve, together with a team of specialists, as BackUp for distance learning using my own methodology of LEARNING BY DOING, giving complete support to companies with language needs.”

This BackUp was provided in several forms: We translated documents, offered interpreting services to local firms, even helped small companies to internationalize with web design/mastering and email account creation.

The company grew and in 2009 changed to BacUplines S.L

A new methodology of Learning by Doing: 25 minutes language sessions over the telephone.

An innovative method of providing language courses began in the form of telephone courses: intensive, individual lessons over the phone. Koper: ¨I had noticed that people often knew the grammatical rules very well, but in a classroom they had difficulty expressing themselves in a foreign language. I wanted to improve the oral skills of my students by creating a more natural context.¨ The telephone classes were initially focused on business communication: this way, businessmen and businesswomen who had to make phone calls in a foreign language achieved a higher level of competence and gained more self-confidence by means of role-playing real situations. Today, the focus still lies on business communications, but there are also non-business students who wish to improve their oral skills in a comfortable way and who appreciate the chance to save time and money on travel.

Written BackUp & Verbal BackUp: translation & interpreting services

Over the years, BackUplines has provided support to numerous companies. This BackUp has taken the form of both Written BackUp and Verbal BackUp: documents have been translated from and into a wide range of languages, and BackUplines has also acted regularly as an interpreter at congresses or presentations.

Help desk

In 1999, publishing house Salvat S.A. entrusted BackUplines to run their help desk services for all BBC English students (via e-mail and telephone). In 2007, this help desk service was extended to publishing house Océano. Because of the expertise of our tutors, experienced all-round qualified teachers, Backuplines foresees a huge market for this type of Distance outsourcing