Linguana Translations is a full-service language provider, offering customised overall solutions for translation, DTP, language review, proofreading and transcription. We stand for reliability, service and quality, and use a global network of qualified language experts who translate and review over 80 languages. We analyse your needs and engage the most appropriate resources for the assignment: a translator and a reviewer who understand your company’s terminology and jargon. Extensive projects are dealt with quickly and efficiently. Our prices are competitive, and we provide a quality guarantee for all jobs we carry out.

Whether or not an agency is reliable is hard to say if you’re not referred to it through a recommendation. The translation industry is not regulated, which means anyone can adopt the title of translator. There are good agencies and poor ones – and the same applies to translators. Membership of professional organisations such as the ATA (American Translators Association) and the ITI (Institute of Translation and Interpreting) provides a degree of quality assurance, but does not automatically mean the agency is good. The simplest way of forming an opinion is to ask the agency who their customers are and whether they have worked on similar projects.

The price of a translation is chiefly based on language combination, volume, delivery time and subject area. For DTP and all other services we charge by the hour. Other factors that can affect the price are file format, express delivery and whether the customer is recurring or has an agreement with us.

The simplest explanation is supply and demand. The fewer users of a language there are, the harder it is for us to find good translators. Some languages, e.g. Japanese, also take longer to work with as they are inherently more complex, whilst others may completely lack words for certain terms, which means the translator must do time-consuming research in order to find suitable equivalents.

Not necessarily. We always try to deal with the assignment as promptly as possible without charging an express fee. But in urgent cases that the translator has to prioritise, maybe working late into the night, we sometimes charge extra.

No, not usually. Whilst we prefer to recieve texts in Word, Excel, PDF and InDesign, we can handle most formats. Our favoured format is Word, as this program is especially adapted to word processing and to use together with translation tools, but if you prefer another program or would like us to translate straight into your company’s CMS it’s not a problem.

A nice thought, but unfortunately the answer is no. We use a database of freelance translators and linguists, and through them and our collaborating agencies’ contact networks we provide translation to and from all languages.

This is mainly because some languages have a richer vocabulary than others, and because some of them, e.g. Finnish and German, can create long composite words instead of a lot of short ones. But the translator’s writing style and the nature of the text also play a big role.

Absolutely. Our translators and employees are bound by our strict confidentiality policy, and no names, references or descriptions of projects will be discussed with anyone unnecessary to the process without the customer’s consent.

Testing and assessing translators is the core of our job. We work exclusively with translators we have checked and evaluated in accordance with our strict quality procedures. But a good translation requires more from the translator than simply knowing the language well – the translator also has to be communicative, be able to respond analytically to the questions you ask, e.g. why a specific word has been chosen rather than another one, or how a text has been adapted in accordance with cultural nuances. The translator may also ask you questions if something is unclear or ambiguous. This means that nothing is translated until it is fully comprehensible and the context is clear.

Yes, there are actually several things you can do. Giving us as much information as possible will make it easier for us to keep the information and the outcome intact. Is there any reference material? Does your company perhaps have a glossary or compilation of terminology? What is the translation to be used for, and what is your target group? The more information we are given, the easier it will be for us to communicate your message correctly and achieve quality targets concerning terminology, nuance and style.

In the translation industry localisation means adaptation of texts to local circumstances, e.g. conversion of weight and measurement units, formulating the time and date differently and making adjustments in accordance with cultural nuances and linguistic idioms. When we translate your text, localisation is always something we take into consideration.

Translation tools are an efficient means of speeding up the translation process, ensuring consistency and making translations more cost‑effective. Accessing memories created using special software, your assignments are matched with each other, so repeated sections of text do not need translating over and over again. As well as taking repeats into consideration, the programs also help keep terminology, style and register uniform. At Linguana we use SDL Trados, the market-leading software within the industry.