Making Your Client & the Law Content With its Form

It is time for us to talk about how to satisfy both your client and the law with your services.

By now, a very specific question should have sprung to mind: Are translators obligated by law to write a cost estimate for each of my orders?

The short answer is: it depends on where you live. In France, for instance, translators are not obligated to draft one for each and every order. They do, however, have to write an estimate if their clients require it. And when an estimate is to be written, some obligations apply.

Translators, as the intellectual service providers they are, are obligated by law to disclose information that is relevant to the potential contract. This includes: what type of services they are providing, their price and how said price is calculated, how long it would take them, essential information about themselves and their company, etc.

While not all translators actually make use of cost estimates, it is a lot of information to disclose, and it is only natural that both the translators and their clients opt for a format that makes negotiations more efficient and helps them save both time and money.

This is precisely where cost estimates come in, as their compact yet elegant form allows clients to find all the information that they need summed up in a single well-organised document.

Speaking of the devil, here is what you have been dreading ever since we started talking law: the structure. What should you include in your estimate, and how should you organise it?

A hint: it works just like LEGO®.

You want to indicate:

• The nature of the document (a cost estimate)
• Your full contact information (leave nothing out)
• Whether you are a company and in which case what kind + your capital amount
• The date the document was written and its expiration date
• The name of the document you will be translating
• The service details in terms of quantity and price
• How long you believe it will take you to translate the document
• Your price, both tax inclusive and exclusive
• Your client’s contact information
• Both parties’ signature

Remember that the secondary purpose of your cost estimate is to be the most exquisite and irresistible bait for your clients, so it needs to be persuasive.

The rules of thumb are:

• Keeping it brief by only including the essentials instead of going on tangents that make your client waste time
• Making it transparent so that your clients know what they are getting into
• Making it look professional by making it squeaky clean in terms of grammatical mistakes, formatting, etc.
• Including clauses that protect both you and the client (even if it might feel overkill for a pre-contractual document)

Once you have all of that laid out, here comes the building part. You would be very surprised to know that quite a few different templates are available online for you to get started, which you may customise according to your marketing strategy.

If you want to do it on your own, however, here are some tips when it comes to making your own template (the order can be swapped around a bit):

• Start by typing your contact information and that of your client
• Get a logo and put it in the corner of your document (it portrays you as a professional)
• Add the details of your services next (once again, briefly yet precisely)
• Add the estimated time of delivery (and do remember that time zones exist)
• Add clear payment terms (you may try to cater to your client by converting currencies, too)
• Write down the clauses (specifying what extra-work is and how it should be addressed or charged)
• Do not forget to put a time validity for your quote in case you raise or lower your prices in the future
• Sign your document
• And send your client the quote as a PDF file

Now, before we start talking about choosing the right price for your services, should you charge money for going out of your way to send a document to your client?

This is up to you. The real question is: do you really want to charge people money when most companies boast offering translation quotes free of charge, and especially when clients will ultimately be comparing several offers before settling for the chosen one? 

Think on it.

Jason Gillier de Lavilledieu