Wednesday, 21 April 2010

The right word for "zuzüglich"

"Zuzüglich" is a German word for which my trusty bilingual dictionary gives the English approximation "plus" or "including". But the more you do translation, the more you realise the need to consider context.

In a shorter translation project I recently did with the language pair German to English, I came across the sentence, "Bei Lieferung per Nachnahme außerhalb Deutschlands werden zu der gennanten Versandkostenpauschale, 8,00 DM Bearbeitungsgebühren zuzüglich einer von der Deutschen Post erhobenen Zustellgebühr von 3,00 DM berechnet."

Having been very careful, I translated this into English as, "For cash on delivery payments for deliveries to locations outside of Germany, the delivery fee shall be calculated at 8.00 DM working fee in addition to a German Post Office postage fee of 3.00 DM."

You see, I nearly stated the phrase "including" (i.e. not "in addition to")... which would refer to a concept that is definitely conceivable, but it is just not correct! Because the 3.00 DM postage fee is not a part of the 8.00 DM delivery fee (leaving a 5.00 DM delivery fee not including the 3.00 DM postage fee). Although the original doesn't state so more directly, we are in fact talking about a charge of a total of 11.00 DM: 8.00 DM delivery fee + 3.00 DM postage fee.

So the next time you think of "accuracy" translation, do not think about what you are trying to say as much as what you are suggesting!