FAQs

1) I have 120 pages, what will it cost?

Send me your final draft and I will send you a quote. I base my quotes on the number of words, not the number of pages. So you do not pay for figures, images, maps, half pages, or double spacing. The number of words in an MS Word document is shown in the bottom left corner of the screen. All editing done with track changes for your final approval.

Clarify comments - R0.03 (3 cents) (USD 0.01 or 1 penny) per word and a maximum of 25 000 per day. I will add comments and suggestions to your text to improve the clarity, grace and style, but you will make the corrections yourself.  

Proofreading - R0.15 (15 cents) (USD 0.02 or 2 pennies) per word and a maximum of 12 000 words per day (excluding weekends). Includes checking citations in text and references, consistent heading levels, table and figure legends, spelling (British (default) or American), check consistency of abbreviations, capitals, numerals, heading styles, and sequential numbering of figures and tables.

Comprehensive editing - R0.30 (30 cents) (USD 0.03 or 3 pennies) per word and a maximum of 6 000 words per day (excluding weekends).  Do all the proofreading and corrections, plus careful reading of each sentence and correct tenses, logic flow, and academic writing style. Correct in-text citations. Add comments where sentences are incomplete or unclear. Free checking of your corrections in the second round of editing.

(See the file "PricesTestimonialsFAQs 20200121.pdf" in the Downloads page for more details.

Formatting -  R0.08 (8 cents) (USD 0.01 or 1 penny) per word maximum of 10 000 words per day (excluding weekends). Formatting as per supervisor's or journals instructions.

2) Do you check for good coherent arguments?
Yes, in comprehensive editing, I read and try to understand your subject matter. I will question what is not clear to me. I will also comment on sweeping statements. I will suggest additional references where necessary.

3) Do you check only for grammar and spelling?
No, grammar and spelling are only the beginning of editing. After grammar and spelling corrections, I follow up by many consistency checks, e.g. abbreviations defined only once, abbreviations not defined, consistent hyphenation of words, either British or American spelling, but not mixed. The author should specify what spelling their supervisor or journal wants. The default is British spelling. I use special editing software to check for over 200 typical grammar and language mistakes. After this, I read every sentence and check for style, clarity and scholarly writing style.

4) Do you check the references?
The "References" section is critical in academic work for two main reasons.

a) Journal editors frequently select peer reviewers from your list of references. These editors assume that the most frequently cited references in your document are the experts in the field.

b) Post-graduate committees also prefer to see that your most frequently cited authors are your external examiners. 

So, yes, I will check that the citations in the text are listed in the "References" section and that all the references in the "References" are cited in the text. I do this for citations in the Harvard style, e.g. Pyramids have five sides (Smith et al., 2017). I cannot check the Vancouver citation style, e.g. Pyramids have five sides (19). However, I cannot check if the bibliographic reference is correct, namely, author's names, journal name, volume, and page numbers. Ideally, the author should use a reference manager to ensure the bibliographic data are correct. If you need me to check and correct each of your references I will quote separately for this service. This service will ensure that all the references have the correct journal name, year, volume, and page numbers. It will also ensure the correct initials and surnames of the authors in the "References". The correct details of the references are very important because external examiners and peer reviewers hate to see spelling mistakes in their names.  You need to specify what reference style your supervisor or journal requires.

5) Do you check the page numbers in the table of contents for my thesis?
Yes, I recreate the table of contents, list of tables, list of figures and check that the list of abbreviations contains all the abbreviations used in the text.

6) Do you provide an editing certificate?
Yes, if requested by the author and if I am satisfied that most of my corrections and suggestions have been incorporated by the author in the revised document. The editing certificate specifies that the document has been edited for grammar, spelling, clarity and scholarly writing style. The certificate will have the title of the document, the names of the author/s and the date, and my signature.

7) How do you compare with other editors?
In four unique ways.

7.1) I understand the stress that comes with finishing a PhD because I have written my own two masters dissertations, one with cum laude, and my own PhD thesis, so I am very well qualified to help you.

7.2) I have published eleven of my papers in prestigious peer-reviewed journals. Therefore, I know how important the fine details of formatting a manuscript are. Verify this on my Google Scholar profile. 

https://scholar.google.co.za/citations?user=rLNTWT8AAAAJ&hl=en

7.3) I have hired a computer programmer to write a killer app for me. It will search and find many of the common mistakes that authors make so that I do not miss any of these mistakes while editing manually. 

7.4) I have peer-reviewed journal manuscripts in my subject, and know what journal editors look for when deciding to accept a manuscript.