Documentation / QueryTek Review glossary / Per-Word Pricing
Per-word pricing charges review work by document volume rather than by hours spent. It gives buyers a cost they can forecast from material they already have, and shifts the risk of a document taking longer than expected from the buyer to the provider.
The appeal is predictability. A buyer with 40,000 words of policy content can calculate the cost before committing, which hourly billing cannot offer and which makes budget approval considerably easier.
Three parameters define what a rate actually covers.
What counts as a word. Source or target text, and whether headings, tables, footnotes, boilerplate, and repeated content are counted. These choices can move a total materially, and disputes here are common when the basis was left implicit.
What the rate includes. One review pass, or a pass plus reconciliation of the author's response? A rate covering only the first pass is not comparable to one covering the cycle to closure, though the numbers look adjacent.
How complexity is handled. Dense regulatory text takes far longer per word than routine internal communication. Either the rate varies by material type or it is an average — in which case simple material subsidises complex material, and the model breaks when the mix shifts.
The model works because volume correlates with effort across a reasonable body of work, not because it determines it. Individual documents vary widely; averages hold. That is why per-word pricing suits ongoing programs and fits poorly for a single unusual document, where the average is the wrong estimate.
Two interactions are worth naming. Turnaround trades against rate, since expedited work compresses reviewer time and is normally priced separately. And per-word pricing covers the review service — where a proprietary framework is also being used, licensing is a distinct commercial component rather than something absorbed into the rate.
Buyers need to forecast cost, and hourly estimates for review work are difficult to trust because effort is genuinely hard to predict per document. Volume-based pricing gives a figure derived from something both parties can count.
It also aligns incentives usefully: the provider absorbs the variance, so efficiency benefits them rather than reducing the buyer's bill for the same work.
QueryTek Review offers volume-based commercial models with the counting basis, included scope, and complexity handling stated in the engagement agreement. Specific rates and terms are commercial matters handled through direct engagement.
