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Rates, rates, rates...

Talking about rates can be a delicate subject for many people in the translation industry. Pricing the services you offer is a very personal (and sometimes difficult) thing, both for freelance translators, and for agencies. Am I bidding too low? Will the client agree to my rates? How low am I ready to go? Per word or per hour?

Before diving in, consider, have you got the same rate for each of your clients? Do you offer discounts and surcharges on specific projects? Do you offer a different rate for each subject matter which you translate? Do you offer a customised rate for each project?


End clients set a yearly budget to spend on translation services. This starts what could feel like a race to find the supplier with the cheapest rates. Translators working with both end clients and translation agencies might see the difference between the rates paid. Translation agencies will use a fraction of the total paid by the client to cover the supplier's costs.

However, this doesn't always mean that the agencies will choose the cheapest supplier to work on their projects. Translation agencies will research the market rate for each language combination and assign a budget to cover the suppliers' costs for each project.

The Project Manager's responsibility is to deliver the project on time and stay within budget, while achieving the company's quality standards. Translation agencies not only consider suppliers based on their rate, but also on their communication skills, translation quality, and reliability, among other factors.

Translation agencies will ask you for a default or standard rate to add to your profile on their database. This rate is sometimes flexible and will position your profile within a pool of translators with similar skills. The order in the pool will change with every job, as Project Managers will weigh all the different factors, and prioritise accordingly.

Rates are important, but they are not the only thing translation agencies should focus on when assigning projects to translators. Thankfully, some don't. In fact, some translators are offered booking fees when there is an important job in the pipeline, retainer fees, and other privileges such as earlier payment or slightly higher rates.

What rate should I be charging? What rate is the best rate? Unfortunately, there is not right or wrong answer to those questions, but I hope this short article helped you considering that the value of your services is more than just your rate.
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