You can’t read German. So how do you know if your German translation is any good?
This is the fundamental challenge of buying translation. You’re purchasing a service you can’t directly evaluate. You can check that the document exists, that it has the right number of pages, that the formatting looks correct. But whether the German actually says what it should say – whether the technical terminology is correct, whether the meaning is preserved, whether the document will work for its intended purpose – you can’t verify directly.
Yet translation quality matters. Poor technical translation creates real costs: customer confusion, support burden, compliance risk, and damage to the professional credibility you’ve built in your home market. You need ways to evaluate quality that don’t require reading the translation yourself.
Qualifications and what they mean
Translation qualifications vary in rigour and relevance. Understanding what different credentials actually indicate helps evaluate translation providers.
University degrees in translation demonstrate academic knowledge of translation theory and practice. They indicate that the translator has studied the discipline formally, but they don’t guarantee subject matter expertise or professional experience.
Professional memberships (ITI, ATA, BDÜ, SFT, and others) indicate that translators have met membership criteria that typically include qualifications, experience, and professional standards commitments. The rigour of membership requirements varies by organisation.
Subject matter qualifications matter for technical translation. A translator with an engineering degree translating engineering content brings understanding that a languages-only background doesn’t provide. Ask whether translators have relevant technical qualifications or documented experience in your industry.
ISO 17100 certification applies to translation service providers and specifies requirements for resources, processes, and quality management. Certified providers have implemented systematic approaches to translation quality. The certification doesn’t guarantee good translations, but it indicates process infrastructure that supports quality.
No qualification guarantees translation quality. Qualifications indicate baseline capability, not guaranteed outcomes. But providers who can’t demonstrate relevant qualifications or certifications should explain how they ensure quality without them.
Process indicators of quality
How translation work is organised affects outcomes more than credentials alone.
Translator selection matters. Is the translator who works on your project selected for relevant expertise, or assigned based on availability? Do translators have documented experience in your subject area? How does the provider match translators to projects?
Review processes catch errors. Professional translation typically includes review by a second linguist (sometimes called editing or revision). This review should be by someone other than the translator, checking both accuracy against the source and quality in the target language. Ask what review is included and who performs it.
Quality assurance processes add systematic checking. This might include terminology consistency checks, formatting verification, and comparison against previous translations. Ask what QA steps are included and what they cover.
Feedback incorporation improves quality over time. When errors are found, how does that information flow back to translators? How does the provider learn from mistakes and prevent recurrence?
Reference material management affects consistency. How does the provider handle glossaries, style guides, and previous translations? Are these assets actively used, or do they sit in folders?
Questions that reveal capability
The questions you ask during procurement reveal what kind of provider you’re dealing with.
“Tell me about your experience in [our industry].” Credible providers can speak specifically about relevant experience. Vague responses about “all industries” or inability to cite relevant projects suggest limited depth.
“Who would translate our work, and what’s their background?” Professional providers should be able to describe the qualifications and experience of the people who would actually do the work. Inability to answer suggests either that they don’t know or that assignment is too ad hoc to predict.
“What happens if we find an error?” The answer reveals how the provider thinks about quality. Defensive responses suggest a transactional mindset. Responses that describe investigation, correction, and prevention suggest a quality-oriented approach.
“How do you handle terminology consistency across documents?” This tests whether the provider thinks about translation as ongoing relationship or one-off transaction. Sophisticated answers about terminology management indicate capability for technical work.
“Can you show us examples of similar work?” Asking to see samples of work for comparable clients (with appropriate confidentiality) lets you evaluate actual output. Inability to provide relevant samples may indicate limited experience.
Red flags in proposals and samples
Certain patterns in proposals and sample work suggest quality risks.
Pricing substantially below market suggests corners being cut somewhere. Translation pricing reflects the time and expertise required to do work properly. When prices are much lower than competitors, understand where savings come from. Sometimes it’s efficiency; often it’s lower-cost (and lower-expertise) resources.
Vague descriptions of process suggest undefined process. If a provider can’t clearly explain how work will be done, they may not have clear processes. Professional providers can describe their workflow, quality steps, and resource allocation.
Generic proposals not tailored to your requirements suggest a transactional approach. If the proposal could apply to any client, it probably wasn’t developed with your specific needs in mind.
No questions about your needs suggests limited engagement. Good providers ask questions: about your audience, your terminology, your quality expectations, your deadlines. Providers who quote without questions are either making assumptions or not thinking about what your project actually requires.
Samples that show inconsistent terminology, awkward phrasing, or obvious errors indicate quality problems. Even if you can’t fully evaluate a translation, you can often spot inconsistencies, formatting problems, or passages that read unnaturally.
Evaluating beyond price
Translation is often bought on price because price is easy to compare. Quality is harder to compare, so procurement processes default to what can be measured.
This produces predictable outcomes. Providers compete on price, which compresses margins, which reduces investment in quality infrastructure, which eventually affects quality. The cheapest translation isn’t the cheapest when errors create downstream costs.
Evaluating beyond price requires defining what quality means for your purposes. What would a quality problem look like? Customer complaints? Audit findings? Support calls? Rework costs? Understanding what quality failure costs helps value quality investment.
It also requires accepting that translation quality is hard to verify directly. You’re buying expertise and trusting process. Evaluating providers means evaluating their capability and credibility, not just their prices.
Questions about process, qualifications, and experience help triangulate quality. References from comparable clients provide social proof. Trial projects with expert review test actual output. Over time, track record becomes the most reliable indicator.
At Bubbles, we welcome questions about quality. We’re confident in our processes, our people, and our track record – and we understand that clients need evidence of quality they can’t verify themselves.
