Translation Quote per Word
In this highly competitive global environment, Trusted Translations understands your need to have projects stay within budget. Thus, we have implemented a quote process that is designed to provide you with the greatest amount of accuracy and precision regarding pricing prior to starting any translation project. One way we accomplish this precision is to quote using a price-per-word methodology. This, in our opinion, is the fairest pricing method and provides our clients with lower costs and more transparency.
Quotes per Source Word Count
Nearly all translation projects start with a set of source documents (i.e., the original documents) that need to be translated into another language (target). As only the source documents are available at the start of a project, we firmly believe the most transparent and fair way to price a document is using a source-based word count. Our sophisticated tools are equipped to determine exact word counts of source documents, providing you with the most accurate quote prior to starting a project.
Using a source word count will avoid the hassle and confusion of having only an estimated word count of final translation (target) and eliminate any unpleasant surprises at the time of invoicing. Furthermore, our experience has shown that clients save money when using our pricing methodology as the source documents tend to have fewer words than the final (target) translated documents. Clients can save between 20-30% under our pricing methodology.
Free Quote
Trusted Translations will provide you with a free quote at the budgeting phase to provide you with clear numbers prior to commencing a project and help you assess whether a certain translation project is right for you at this time.
Advantages of Quote per Source Word Count
The following are some advantages of using a Source Word Count pricing methodology:
- Since pricing is based on the source documents (which are available at the beginning of the project), it is firm and will not change based on the number of words of the translated text.
- You will save money. Given the natural text expansion of translated text, you will save up to 30% depending on the language pair.
- No surprises. As the source word count does not change, you will be sure to stay within budget.
Drawbacks of Quote per Target Word Count
The following are some of the drawbacks of using a target-based quoting methodology:
- Target-based quotes are only estimates as no translation company can accurately predict the word count of a translated document.
- You pay more. Target word counts tend to be 20% higher due to text expansion of translated materials.
- The actual price to be invoiced is not known until the end of the process. You will need to wait until all the work is complete to get a final price for your project. This can lead to unpleasant surprises at the time of invoicing.
Quotes per Target Word Count
There are some notable exceptions to the criteria of using the source word count when pricing a translation. There are some cases where the better choice is to set the prices according to the word count of the target language:
- Translation of an audio file without a word count;
- When the source material is not available in an editable electronic format (paper format);
- Translation from an Asian language;
- Proofreading services.
In these instances, we have found that pricing is more accurate when using the target language word count versus the source word count.
Text Contraction and Expansion for Different Language Pairs
Based on statistical industry-wide evidence and our own experience from translating millions of words annually, translating to and from certain languages will result in either text expansion or text contraction. This can have an impact on costs as well as the formatting of the translated document. Translated documents with text expansion may need to be modified to accommodate more text. In the case of legal documents or documents regulated by a government agency, desktop publishing or recreation services may be necessary to ensure that the final document complies with the legal text size and page number requirement.
The following are industry-wide benchmarks with respect to text expansion or contraction.
- English to Spanish: 20% expansion
- English to Portuguese (Brazil): 20 to 30% expansion
- Portuguese (Brazil) to English (U.S.): 10 to 15% contraction
- Spanish to English: 15% contraction
- English to French: 15 to 20% expansion
- English to German: 5 to 20% contraction
- English to Italian: 15% expansion
- English to Portuguese (Eur.): 20 to 30% expansion
- French to English: 10 to 15% contraction
- German to English: 5 to 40% expansion
- Italian to English: 15% contraction
- Portuguese (Eur.) to English: 10 to 15% contraction
- Spanish to English: 15% contraction
Translation Price per Word
At Trusted Translations, we provide our client with the most competitive pricing and the highest quality in the industry. We are proud of our ability to provide high-quality translations while saving your organization money on every project. To take advantage of our free quote tools, please send us the documents you plan to translate. If the project involves a large amount of words and is format sensitive, we will provide you with a free translation test to determine the impact that any potential contraction or expansion may have on the final output.