Proofreading FAQ

Placing an Order

What can you proofread?
Can you proofread legal or medical documents?
Who can place a proofreading order?
What are your hours?
What payments do you accept?
Can you explain your rates?
Where do I send my proofreading order?
How do I place a proofreading order?
How do I get my document's wordcount?

Receiving an Order & Refunds

How soon will I get my document back?
What will you send back to me?
Can you send my proofread document as a PDF?
Do you offer refunds?
What happens if I still get a bad grade on my academic paper?

About the Proofreading Process

How many documents can you proofread in a week?
What do you do when you proofread?
Why shouldn't I just use Microsoft Word's spellcheck & grammar check?

Other Questions?

If your question is not answered in this FAQ, please e-mail me.

 

 

Who can place a proofreading order?
Anyone

What can you proofread?
Documents written in U.S. English, including:

• academic essays & papers
• brochures, business cards, and other business documents
• business proposals
• writing for the Web
• other writing!

I cannot proofread medical or legal documents.

Can you proofread legal or medical documents?
No.

How many documents can you proofread in a week?
I do not currently have a limit on the number of documents I will proofread.

What do you do when you proofread?
As a proofreader, I check for the following:

• spelling
• capitalization
• homonyms (words that sound alike but have different meanings, such as there, their & they're)
• grammatical mistakes, including apostrophes, punctuation, & comma usage
• subject/verb agreement & tenses
• typographical errors
• page formatting errors (for academic papers)
• check for in-text MLA or APA formatting (additional $10 fee)

What will you send back to me?
I will provide you with 2 Microsoft Word documents: one will have track changes, which shows you my edits in red or blue, while the other will be the finished product ready for you to print.

Can you send my proofread document as a PDF?
Yes, but please ask for this when placing your order.

What payments do you accept?
Through PayPal, I accept credit or debit payments (or bank transfer, if you have a PayPal account).

Do you offer refunds?
I do not offer refunds on my service. If I proofread a paper and it is significantly free of errors, I may refund a partial amount of the sale at my discretion.

What happens if I still get a bad grade on my academic paper?
Strong writing excels in 6 ways: organization & paragraph development; content & ideas; sentence fluency; word choice; voice; and, finally, spelling & grammar. As a proofreader, I can ensure your spelling & grammar are up to par, but I cannot fix the other 5 aspects of good writing.

These are skills you can master by working with a writing tutor (a service I also offer locally in Eastern Connecticut and may offer virtually soon). As an editor, yes, I could fix your paper for every one of those traits, but then I would be substantially altering your work in an unethical manner. School is meant for you to develop your writing & thinking skills; if I do all the work for you, how will you learn? (If you give a man a fish, he eats for a day, but if you teach him how to fish, he eats for a lifetime, right?)

What are your hours?
I accept proofreading & editing orders every day of the week for your convenience! I check my e-mails daily.

How soon will I get my document back?
Within 24 hour to 4 days, depending on which option you selected at checkout.

Where do I send my proofreading order?
First you must purchase the service, then you can e-mail me the document as an attachment (or you can copy & paste the text into the e-mail).

Can you explain your rates?
My rates are average compared with other proofreading Web sites. Like others, my rates are higher for shorter deadlines (24-hour turnaround) and lower for longer deadlines (4+ days). Unlike other proofreading sites that outsource their work, I provide quality, individualized service.

Why shouldn't I just use Microsoft Word's spellcheck & grammar check?
Microsoft Word's spelling & grammar check fails for the following reasons:

• misses homonyms (i.e., their, there, & they're)
• regulary misses fragments & run-on sentences
• cannot catch tense or subject/verb agreement issues for ESL writers
• misses most errors overall, while correcting only a few spelling errors

How do I place a proofreading order?
First you must purchase the service, then you can e-mail me the document as an attachment (or you can copy & paste the text into the e-mail).

How do I get my document's wordcount?
Use word count to determine how many words are in your document. Don't know how? Here are video guides for Microsoft Word 2007 - 2010 editions, Microsoft Word 2003, or Open Office. If you're not using Microsoft Word or Open Office, you can copy & paste your document into the word count tool at wordcounttool.com.