Why Would Chasing Rays Refuse Work or Return Work?
Whilst I will do everything I can to avoid this ever happening, it’s important to understand when I might return your work incomplete. There are two circumstances where I might be forced to take one of these options:
Work is Extremely Close to the Requested Deadline
I quite frequently receive work that needs to be completed extremely quickly due to a very close deadline. Whilst this is quite a normal set of circumstances for me, and in the vast majority of cases I able to meet short deadlines, there are times when this is completely impossible (for instance, I can’t read a complete the proofreading of a PhD thesis in a few hours, or a student project in a few minutes).
In this regard, then, it’s important to be realistic about what I might be able to achieve in the time available. Also note that for emergency work, I do not necessarily guarantee being able to complete your work before your deadline anyway – you can find details about this in my post about last-minute and emergency work.
Work is of such Poor Quality it’s not Worthwhile Starting or Completing
Sometimes it becomes evident, either before starting or during the proofreading of a piece of work, that there are so many problems with it that it would be doing you a disservice to complete the work (and therefore charge for it).
Such instances include work where the English is of extremely poor quality and needs extensive restructuring, or where a document has been generated via a translation service such as Google Translate. In both cases, the document tends to be so incomprehensible that any typical native English speaker would struggle to get even a basic understanding of the material presented.
Should such restructuring be needed, I will advise in as much detail as possible as to what you need to do; however, this kind of work goes well beyond what can be expected of any proofreading or proof-editing effort, and I will not complete it. Where it is clear that Google Translate has been used, I will return the work with a note not to use such services for purposes for which they are not intended.
How Do You Judge Worthwhile?
From random spot checks I can usually tell if a piece of work is worthwhile starting, or if it needs further work before proofreading becomes appropriate.
In those instances where I’ve started work already, I judge whether it’s worth continuing on the basis of whether the work is taking more than three times longer than I’d normally expect. For instance, 1500 words of proofreading should normally take me about an hour; if the same takes longer than three hours, I would generally consider returning the work incomplete (unless there were mitigating circumstances, e.g., we have come to some prior arrangement).
Will This Happen To Me?
It’s Not Very Likely
Fortunately, the number of times I’ve had to return work started but incomplete is extremely low and has maybe only been necessary once or twice per year to date, so it’s extremely unlikely that this will happen to you.
I usually catch any problems in advance as I do quality control checks on random parts of each document I receive before starting (note: one ‘trick’ used here is that I am sent a document that starts with reasonable or good-quality English, which does sometimes catch me out – in this instance, you will likely get a set of incomplete corrections back, so please don’t do this).
Worst-case Scenario
The worst case scenario is that I either don’t spot certain problems, or miss them due to the trick described above. If I am forced to return a document with an incomplete set of corrections, I will not of course make a charge, and any corrections I have made are yours to do with as you see fit.
Do You Charge For Incomplete Work?
Generally no, unless I feel there is some very good reason for doing so.; in the many years since I started proofreading, I have yet to do so.
I’m Now/Still Worried You Might Return My Work
If you have any concerns about the standards of your written English, it’s important to contact me in advance of submitting your work to ask for advice. In the vast majority of cases where I’m contacted first, I can give you the guidance you need to send a piece of work I will be able to complete, or otherwise we can arrange for me to proofread a test piece of one to two pages.
Above all, be brutally honest with yourself. If the real reason you’re sending your work to me is to get it translated into English (rather than corrected for English), it’s very likely you will just get a document back with a lot of comments saying parts of, of even full, sentences need to be rephrased. This doesn’t help anyone, least of all you, so again, please don’t do this – get in contact with me for advice.
