Upside And Downside Of Charging By The Hour In Translation Industry

Customarily, translation industries charge the translation buyer on the basis of source word. Here both the parties, the translation service provider and the translation buyer know the amount they will be paid or charged respectively. Transparency involved in this charging method is preferable and the favoured one.

Hayder Al-Ani reviews a new model that would charge the buyer on a per-hour basis instead of per-word. Hayder Al-Ani discusses the upside and downside of this model to enhance our knowledge.

Upsides of Charging by the Hour

• Straightforward and Uncomplicated: Before assigning the translation job to the service providers, clients only have a basic idea of the words required in a document. Although, MS Word features word counting, it is more complicated for a PDF or website content. Thus, charging on an hourly basis would be an easy and uncomplicated task.

• Esteem: Legal counsellors and medical professionals charge their clients on an hourly basis or a fixed sum for the case, instead of charging them on every law proceeding or every operation conducted. Translation companies adopting this strategy can then operate in an equal manner.

• Favourable for intricate tasks: While translating a tabularized content to text format, it is very difficult to estimate a word count in advance. Thus, it becomes tricky for translators to persuade clients to pay on per word basis. Furthermore, formatting such documents takes far longer and thus a per-word payment is not an equitable charge. Adopting hourly system is thus much more favourable in such complicated situations.

Downside of Charging by the Hour

• Inaccurate quoting: Billing the client $1 per word for a 500 words text is a rather direct method of costing a piece of work. Initially, it will be difficult to accurately quote the amount of time needed for each task, however with time and experience, this will become easier. Hayder Al-Ani suggests that the suppliers should over-estimate their quote as then, the subsequent smaller bill would be a pleasant surprise for the client.

• Negotiability: Translation being an aggressive industry, there is a scope for negotiation of the price quoted for hourly work by the client, which can then affect the business earnings negatively. How much of an impact will this have on the business overall.

When working out charging methods, it is advisable to consider the advantages and disadvantages. In the translation industry, every method has its downfalls, therefore Hayder Al-Ani suggests working with the one that is the fit best for the resources your business has available and the expectations of your customer.