Why Learn Freelancing?

Learn Freelancing offers the most comprehensive proofreading course available at the best price.

The training is easy to follow but highly effective. You’ll enjoy working on the structured exercises. Many people taking this course, who began as complete beginners with no previous experience, have gone on to find regular, well-paid work as freelances. Others have found editorial work 'in-house' with publishing houses.

It was the original proofreading course, a concept since copied by many others.

Learn Freelancing still offers the ultimate distance learning course for proofreaders and copy-editors.

Most successful freelances (also known, particularly in the US, as 'freelancers') have outstanding fees, sometimes as much as £1,500 to £2,000 waiting to be paid. Most publishers pay within one month or so.

Beginners will appreciate the clarity of the material, and The Pocket Book of Proofreading, with interesting tips, advice, quotes, a list of the main proofreading marks, and some sample exercises to test and develop your skills.

Enjoy reading about Sir John Betjeman’s teddy bear, Archibald Ormsby-Gore ('Archie'), and his contribution to the book!

How does it work? Proofreaders work on (and are paid for) about 10 pages per hour (on average). 

If you are sent a set of proofs of, say, 300 pages, it may take you around 30 hours to complete.

At the suggested 2014 minimum freelance rate of £22.00 per hour, this works out at a gross total for the job of £660. So, imagine having to read, say, The Cloudspotter’s Guide (about 330 pages and £12.99 in the shops).

If proofreading this readable book, for example, you would be sent a cheque by the publisher for about 33 × £22.00 = £736.00, plus return postage. 

If you get a generous publisher paying £24 an hour, this would mean a cheque for £792.

If you can find the work, this is very good for working just over 30 hours, at home, in peace and comfort, reading and checking through what may well be an interesting book. Learn Freelancing's book and course can show you how.

Copy-editors can charge more. Sometimes a copy-editor will also proofread the same manuscript, and will in effect be paid twice for working on the same manuscript/proofs.

You'll find Learn Freelancing's new Proofreading and Editing Course offers you superb quality, and the best value.

Hourly rates for freelance proofreading (from 1 April 2019) are around £24/£28.70 for proofreading and copy-editing. There has been a slight increase in 2019.

Note: There are other courses. Please be aware (with perhaps one or two exceptions) that some courses offered are not all that they seem. Caveat emptor - they are after your money!

There's a School of Yoga, for example, that also markets proofreading and editing courses, how to write for TV and radio, and how to write short stories! They should stick to yoga! Another company formerly specialised in selling courses on 'how to get a flat stomach in 7 days'. Most of these companies want about £200-£350 for their 'courses', and the 'hard-sell' is often hidden in slick packaging.

Thriving publishing means plenty of work.

Some publishing facts from recent copy of The Times

£3.3bn Total sales of British books at home and abroad in 2014

17% percentage of digital sales

£1.45bn Value of exports of physical and digital books to UK publishers last year

2,160 Number of publishers registered in the UK in 2014

184,400 Number of new and revised titles published in the UK in 2013,

of which 61,300 were digital

Check out (change of subject) this interesting article on spelling from The Times.

Is Latin a dead language? Sometimes in various books you will encounter Latin maxims or proverbs and may need to check the spelling for accuracy. This resource may help.

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And another, which is not happy reading! 

Smarter than a 16-year-old? Try this Harrow literacy test!

President of the Queen's English Society (Dr Lamb from Imperial College London) can't spell!

Spelling: does it matter?

"Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn'tmttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe." By Tenacious

The pedants are revolting!

Yes, the use 'of' instead of 'have' is a classic one. Another good one is the use of 'your' instead of 'you're'.

I wouldn't say that it really bugs me but poor grammar and spelling can make a post more difficult to read and understand. I'm not saying that my spelling and grammar is [are?] perfect (before someone points out any mistakes in this post) but I wish more people would proof read what they have written before posting it on here, just to check that it makes sense.

Ultimately, it's what people post rather than how they post it that is important but it can be a pain sometimes to have to reread a sentence a couple of times just to get the gist of it. By ferrograph