實作 Chinese for virtual assistants: Taiwan Mandarin for client work

Who it is for

• Virtual assistants with clients in Taiwan. You keep calendars, answer customers and handle orders, and your client writes to you in Chinese.
• Remote workers on Taiwan teams. You need the working Mandarin of a Taipei office: times, orders, policies and polite confirmations.
• TOCFL candidates. You want a certificate for a client or an employer, and practice laid out to the format of the test.
• Anyone moving to Taiwan. The same course covers daily life, from the MRT to the night market.

The app teaches Taiwan Mandarin (台灣華語), not mainland Mandarin with the characters swapped. Read why on the home page.

Three simulated client tasks

The Dojo’s 實作 “Put Chinese to work” board holds the tasks. Choose the practice goal “Virtual assistant work” and the board builds its plan around the scheduling and customer-support cases. Each case is an original, fictional brief in Traditional Chinese.

Schedule a meeting in Taipei time

Ms Lin (林小姐) asks for a thirty-minute meeting “next Monday afternoon”. She is in Taipei on business, but her account is still on US Pacific time, and “afternoon” is not a time. Ask which time zone and which slot she means, check the calendar for clashes, book the meeting and send her the confirmation. A second case does the same for a morning meeting with a client who gave neither a slot nor a time zone.

Handle a return or a missing parcel

A customer wants to send an item back, or says a parcel has not arrived, and gives no order number. Ask for the order number and, for a return, whether the item is still sealed. Look up the order, check it against the shop’s practice policy, record what happens next and write the confirmation. Some cases fall outside the return window or leave the item’s condition uncertain, so the right answer is not always yes.

Order drinks for the team

A colleague wants two bubble teas (珍珠奶茶), medium or large, with little ice, for no more than NT$160, and only says “not too sweet”. Confirm the sweetness, read the menu, build the order, check the total for both cups against the budget and tell your colleague what you ordered. A second case changes the facts: three cups, no ice and a new budget.

How a task works

1. Read the brief. The request comes as a text preview in Chinese.
2. Learn the phrases. Phrase cards show the Chinese for each step (ask, check, confirm) with an English gloss.
3. Practise with support. Ask the client, use the calendar, the menu or the order records, and make each decision.
4. Try the task. Do it on your own. Asking for a hint is allowed, and the attempt is marked as assisted.
5. Repair and retry, then try new facts. Go back over a step you got wrong, then do a fresh case with different details.

You write the confirmation to the client yourself, in Chinese. The app checks your decisions and the facts in your message, such as the date, time zone and total. It does not grade your Chinese writing or pronunciation in these tasks. You can pick Strict, Supportive or Fluency feedback, and a 5, 15 or 30-minute practice plan.

The Chinese you practise

These lines come from the tasks: what you ask, what the client answers, and how you close. Each is shown here with pinyin, zhuyin and a translation. In the app, the task briefs are Chinese text; the words you study around them show their reading in the script you chose.

• Ask the client the time zone and slot
  請問，您說的是臺北時間嗎？哪個時段方便？
  Qǐngwèn, nín shuō de shì Táiběi shíjiān ma? Nǎge shíduàn fāngbiàn?
  ㄑㄧㄥˇ ㄨㄣˋ，ㄋㄧㄣˊ ㄕㄨㄛ ˙ㄉㄜ ㄕˋ ㄊㄞˊ ㄅㄟˇ ㄕˊ ㄐㄧㄢ ˙ㄇㄚ？ㄋㄚˇ ˙ㄍㄜ ㄕˊ ㄉㄨㄢˋ ㄈㄤ ㄅㄧㄢˋ？
  Do you mean Taipei time? Which time slot works for you?
• The client’s answer
  我這次人在臺北，請用臺北時間安排。
  Wǒ zhè cì rén zài Táiběi, qǐng yòng Táiběi shíjiān ānpái.
  ㄨㄛˇ ㄓㄜˋ ㄘˋ ㄖㄣˊ ㄗㄞˋ ㄊㄞˊ ㄅㄟˇ，ㄑㄧㄥˇ ㄩㄥˋ ㄊㄞˊ ㄅㄟˇ ㄕˊ ㄐㄧㄢ ㄢ ㄆㄞˊ。
  I’m in Taipei this time, so please schedule it in Taipei time.
• Ask a customer for the order number
  方便提供訂單編號嗎？
  Fāngbiàn tígōng dìngdān biānhào ma?
  ㄈㄤ ㄅㄧㄢˋ ㄊㄧˊ ㄍㄨㄥ ㄉㄧㄥˋ ㄉㄢ ㄅㄧㄢ ㄏㄠˋ ˙ㄇㄚ？
  Could you give me the order number?
• The customer’s answer about the item
  商品還沒拆封。
  Shāngpǐn hái méi chāifēng.
  ㄕㄤ ㄆㄧㄣˇ ㄏㄞˊ ㄇㄟˊ ㄔㄞ ㄈㄥ。
  The item hasn’t been opened yet.
• Ask a colleague how sweet
  請問，甜度要無糖、微糖、半糖，還是全糖？
  Qǐngwèn, tiándù yào wútáng, wéitáng, bàntáng, háishì quántáng?
  ㄑㄧㄥˇ ㄨㄣˋ，ㄊㄧㄢˊ ㄉㄨˋ ㄧㄠˋ ㄨˊ ㄊㄤˊ、ㄨㄟˊ ㄊㄤˊ、ㄅㄢˋ ㄊㄤˊ，ㄏㄞˊ ㄕˋ ㄑㄩㄢˊ ㄊㄤˊ？
  Would you like no sugar, a little sugar, half sugar or full sugar?
• The colleague’s answer
  我要微糖，兩杯都一樣。
  Wǒ yào wéitáng, liǎng bēi dōu yíyàng.
  ㄨㄛˇ ㄧㄠˋ ㄨㄟˊ ㄊㄤˊ，ㄌㄧㄤˇ ㄅㄟ ㄉㄡ ㄧˊ ㄧㄤˋ。
  A little sugar, please, the same for both cups.
• Close every task
  請您確認。
  Qǐng nín quèrèn.
  ㄑㄧㄥˇ ㄋㄧㄣˊ ㄑㄩㄝˋ ㄖㄣˋ。
  Please confirm.

Building the vocabulary for client work

The words of client work are spread across the app’s own graded list of 14,300 words, from white belt to black. 時間 (time) is a white-belt word and 珍珠奶茶 a yellow-belt one; 會議 (meeting) arrives at green belt, 確認 (to confirm), 包裹 (parcel) and 菜單 (menu) at red, and 訂單 (order), 客戶 (client), 退貨 (to return goods), 預算 (budget) and 安排 (to arrange) at black.

• Form One flashcards teach each word and feed your reviews.
• Listening Dojo lets you play a line, tap any word and shadow it into the microphone.
• Sparring and Scenarios score your tones on the device as you speak.
• Memory brings each word back with FSRS spaced repetition just before you would forget it. From a task, “Review saved words” opens that review queue.

Read with zhuyin or pinyin; every word in the list has both, and you can switch any time.

The TOCFL, if you need a certificate

Some clients and employers ask for a TOCFL certificate. The app’s TOCFL track has a 45-item placement test, 100 listening items, 24 writing tasks with model answers and rubrics, and mock listening and reading papers laid out to the format tocfl.edu.tw publishes. A mock paper reports the share you got right and the level that suggests.

No practice app can turn that into an official TOCFL score, and none can guarantee a pass. Wu Ji Bi Fan is independent and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the TOCFL organisers. For dates, bands and levels, read the TOCFL practice page and the TOCFL score chart.

Free and Pro

White and yellow belts are free, with every discipline, the dictionary, reviews and the TOCFL placement test. Reviews of words you have learnt are always free.

Pro opens green, red and black belts, the legends and scenarios above yellow, and the TOCFL mock papers and writing tasks. It is US$4.99 a month or US$39.99 a year. Apple Accounts eligible for the introductory offer get a 3-day free trial on the yearly plan, which renews at US$39.99 a year unless you cancel at least 24 hours before the trial ends. Apple shows your local price before purchase. See pricing and the terms.

Simulated, offline and private

Every client, calendar, order, policy and message in the tasks is simulated on your iPhone. Nothing is sent, booked, ordered or paid for, and no real client sees what you write. The whole course works offline with no account, and tone scoring and speech recognition run on the device. Read the privacy policy.

Who makes the app and what else it does is on the About page.