There are two types of translation vendors today. The first type has a traditional view on quality. They advertise the quality level of their services with superlatives. They make sure that you know they always provide top quality translations and their services conform to all existing quality standards. They are like the flower shop selling only the biggest and most expensive bulbs. There is now a second, emerging group of translation service providers offering a progressive view on quality. They provide multiple levels or types of quality and related pricing. Very often, they use various processes and even different personnel to ensure that the targeted quality is reached in the most effective way and, consequently, within the budgetary restrictions of the client. Translations are just like tulip bulbs, aren’t they? The problem is, common standards for measuring translation quality in a reliable way are missing. There are no international metrics or benchmarks to compare different levels of quality. However, the Dynamic Quality Framework (DQF) industry standard, launched in 2011 by TAUS and co-created with over 50 companies and organizations, is definitely a candidate for becoming an international standard. Chances are that this initiative will be internationally recognized in the near future. More.

See: Multilingual

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