In the increasingly globalized world of legal practice, language barriers can often present complex challenges. The need for accurate translation and interpretation services is paramount, and you need to manage the costs associated with these services. This is particularly true when the scope of the translation work varies from case to case and when the client’s proficiency in English is a variable factor.

In this blog, Ru-Wang Jackson, Welocalize Business Development Director (Patent and Legal Services), shares her insights and experiences as an attorney and sheds light on the significance of accurate translation and interpretation services by exploring a real-life case, Litkraft vs. GWS.

 

Navigating the Budgetary Challenges of Translation Projects

In my experience as an attorney, I found that managing the budget of a translation project could be notoriously difficult. It is challenging to know the complexity of a given document if it’s in a foreign language. Or, if you’re interpreting a foreign language document for a client, can you charge for that if the client is relatively fluent in English already?

In a case in the UK courts, a firm of solicitors found themselves in a situation where translation fees were uncertain. In this article, I delve into the case of Litkraft Limited v (1) Simon Cottrell, (2) Christopher Williams, and (3) Edward Goldsmith [2023] EWHC 465 (Comm) and suggest some tips for best practice in managing the budget for translation projects.

 

Case Summary

Litkraft Limited (‘Litkraft’) was a Claims Management Company. It was founded by Mr. Arturas Janavicius, who is a qualified lawyer and Lithuanian by birth. Mr. Janavicius had good connections in Eastern European communities (especially Lithuania) because he has the ability to translate to and from English, particularly in the context of litigation. He was able to introduce English law firms to potential clients through his own connections.

The defendants were solicitors who traded as Goldsmith Williams Solicitors (‘GWS’). Litkraft introduced GWS to a number of Eastern European clients.

In this case, Litkraft sued the defendants for unpaid fees under their contract. A proportion of the £569,446 ($707,109) that Litkraft claimed comprised translation fees.

 

Issues With the Translation Budget

GWS lacked the language capability to deal with Lithuanian clients (and other clients from Eastern Europe). They needed help from Litkraft to communicate with the clients about important matters like the progress of the case and attending hearings. In fact, these ‘ancillary’ services ranged from:

• Taking instructions from clients
• Providing clients with detailed explanations as to the contents of letters
• Relaying advice from GSW
• Arranging meetings, hearings, conference calls, and medical appointments with clients
• Taking/ making calls and messages (national and international)
• Replying to emails from and to clients and solicitors
• Chasing and gathering documentation and signatures
• Monitoring and providing updates

It was never clear whether these ad hoc interpretation services were covered by the contract. One of the reasons that it was so hard to define and pin down in a contract was that the translation and ancillary services they provided varied from case to case. In some cases, the client had sufficient English to understand all but most technical communications. In others, clients needed regular interpretation and translation to be able to comply with requests from solicitors and keep up to date with their cases.

The defendants understood the arrangement to be as follows:

“A lot of Litkraft’s clients didn’t speak English (or good English). We said that if Litkraft had given genuine translation services to the client to help us over the course of this claim, then please submit a translation invoice, and we will submit it with our fees when we send details of our fees to the third-party insurers. If we recovered it, then obviously, it would be passed onto Litkraft as a service that they provided. We made it clear to Litkraft (and other claims management companies) that (a) if the client spoke good English that they shouldn’t try and submit a translation invoice, and (b) if the other side refused to pay the translation invoice, it certainly wasn’t a liability of ourselves within the proceedings.” 

As you might imagine, quantifying these translation and interpretation services became complex. Litkraft felt they weren’t remunerated for the translation services rendered, but it was never entirely clear what they provided.

 

Tips for Managing the Budget of a Translation Project

As you can see from this case, it can be tricky to manage the budget of a translation project.

As a first port of call for work in a foreign language, lawyers will typically ask bilingual counsel for assistance. They ask a colleague who happens to be fluent in the foreign language. Or they collaborate with foreign lawyers in their international offices or within their network of preferred firms overseas.

For the occasional, one-off foreign document, the cost of using foreign associates may be absorbed into the rest of the project.

But when your project includes reems of foreign documents, frequent ad hoc services, and more than one language, the cost of using external counsel will quickly escalate.

Instead, you can try these strategies to keep a handle on your budget:

• Use machine translation (MT) where appropriate: For large-scale document reviews, MT will give you an instant translation of foreign documents so that first-pass reviewers can quickly establish their relevance. The translation tools also include functionality to indicate the number of documents in foreign languages, which will inform your estimated budget.

• Collaborate with qualified human translators: Qualified human translators capture the legal nuances in translation and interpretation. Their translations are precise not just in the language but in the legal implications of the document as a whole. Legal translators are usually lower cost than foreign lawyers.

• Centralize the process: When you send batches of foreign language documents to multiple law firms for translation, you need complicated spreadsheets to keep track of the project. But with software that manages the entire process, you spend a fraction of the time managing the translations. You have a greater level of control over the consistency of the translations by creating a centralized glossary of terms and a summary of the relevant points in your matter for each translator to access. The translation management system (TMS) gives you estimates for each stage of the translation process so you can keep your client up-to-date with a simple glance at your dashboard.

At Welocalize, we have extensive experience managing legal translation and interpreting projects. Contact us today if you would like to discuss your multilingual projects.

Based in London, England, Ru-Wang Jackson works at Welocalize and supports global corporations and law firms with their legal translation and global patent processes.