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Need some advice on a reasonable rate per character.
Thread poster: James Hodges
James Hodges
James Hodges  Identity Verified
Japan
Local time: 00:57
Japanese to English
Jan 7, 2013

Potential client has just come back to me with a change of plan. Up until now I offered them 9 cents per English word, but now they want a price per Japanese character. Any ideas?
 
Alex Farrell (X)
Alex Farrell (X)  Identity Verified
Japan
Local time: 00:57
Japanese to English
Half the per word rate Jan 7, 2013

Generally, the number of Japanese characters will be twice the number of corresponding English words, so you should round up and offer $0.05 if you want to charge roughly the same rate.

By the way, that rate is really low. I'm not privy to all the details concerning the project, but are you sure you can't ask for more?

[Edited at 2013-01-07 07:57 GMT]
 
Peishun CHIANG
Peishun CHIANG  Identity Verified
Japan
Member (2004)
English to Japanese
+ ...
Community rates Jan 7, 2013

Hi,

You can refer to [Tools]>[Community rates] , from your ProZ.com profile.
 
Katalin Horváth McClure
Katalin Horváth McClure  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 11:57
Member (2002)
English to Hungarian
+ ...
Community rates are not "per character"; multiplier and rates Jan 7, 2013

Peishun CHIANG wrote:

Hi,

You can refer to [Tools]>[Community rates] , from your ProZ.com profile.


Except, that the community rates are NOT in per character unit, which is what the OP asked about. It is because it is still impossible to specify "per character" rates in our profiles (I have been asking for it repeatedly for 10 years). Since people sometimes just enter their per character rate into the per word field, the community rates are totally flawed for Japanese-English.

In my experience the multiplier between source character rates and target word rates for Japanese->English translation is more like 2.5, not 2. We have had numerous discussions about this is the past.

9 cents per target word is extremely low, IMHO.
This is what my decent agency clients pay per source character.

Katalin
 
ikeda45
ikeda45  Identity Verified
Local time: 00:57
Member (2007)
English to Japanese
The following site might help. Jan 9, 2013

http://buckeye.way-nifty.com/translator/2009/10/post-d58f.html (EJ)

http://buckeye.way-nifty.com/translator/2009/10/post-308c.html (JE)

By the way, if you live in Japan it is better to switch the currency (USD) to
YEN or E... See more
http://buckeye.way-nifty.com/translator/2009/10/post-d58f.html (EJ)

http://buckeye.way-nifty.com/translator/2009/10/post-308c.html (JE)

By the way, if you live in Japan it is better to switch the currency (USD) to
YEN or EURO or you find customers that offer their rates in these currencies.

[Edited at 2013-01-09 02:31 GMT] ▲ Collapse
 


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Need some advice on a reasonable rate per character.






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