Translate a tender document into Italian
Whether you are bidding for an Italian gara d'appalto or publishing a tender in Italy, Manuce translates your documents into Italian with Dédale, its technical specialist. Each file comes back in its original format, layout included. Figures, exclusion clauses and official forms still need your own check before submission.
What it costs
For a tender document of about 9,000 words, into Italian:
To understand, internal use.
Ready to send, by the technical specialist.
Cross-checked. For documents that commit you.
Price for one language, original layout included. VAT not applicable — article 293 B of the French General Tax Code (CGI). The exact quote, based on your file's word count, is shown before you pay.
The vocabulary of Italian procurement
Tender documents are not translated word for word into Italian. Each document has an established name, and Italian contracting authorities expect to see it. Common equivalents:
- contract notice → bando di gara
- instructions to tenderers → disciplinare di gara
- technical specifications → capitolato tecnico or capitolato speciale d'appalto
- technical proposal → offerta tecnica; the price proposal → offerta economica
- discount → ribasso, usually a percentage off the importo a base di gara
Some phrases carry legal weight. A pena di esclusione marks a requirement whose breach disqualifies the bid. If your source text says "failure to comply will result in rejection", the Italian must keep that force, not soften it into a suggestion. Likewise, "calendar days" becomes giorni naturali e consecutivi. A loose rendering can be read as working days.
Italian procurement codes such as the CIG (Codice Identificativo Gara) or the CUP are never translated. They must appear exactly as issued, with no added spaces or altered characters.
Figures, dates and register: Italian conventions
Number format is where price schedules most often go wrong. Italian uses a full stop for thousands and a comma for decimals, so 1,250,000.00 becomes € 1.250.000,00 or 1.250.000,00 euro. A figure left in English format becomes ambiguous, or simply wrong. Dates run day/month/year, as in 15/03/2025, or "15 marzo 2025" in words, with the month in lower case.
Round large numbers follow an Italian plural rule that CLDR places in a separate many category, alongside one and other. You write "3 milioni di euro", with the preposition, but "3.200.000 euro" without it. A table that mixes the two forms should be made consistent.
Italian administrative prose favours impersonal forms (si richiede, è necessario) and the formal Lei in correspondence. Accents matter: è (is) is not e (and), perché takes an acute accent, and the capital is written È, never E'. Italian text runs close to French in length and usually a little longer than English. If your technical proposal has a page limit, check the page count after translation.
What Manuce delivers, and what it does not
Your documents are handled by Dédale, Manuce's specialist engine for technical writing. It suits the content of a technical proposal: methodology, staffing and equipment, schedule, quality plan. A typical tender pack of about 9,000 words, some 30 pages, is delivered in a few minutes. The files are then kept in your client area.
- Accepted formats: Word, PDF, PowerPoint, Excel, plain text, Markdown, HTML, RTF, CSV.
- Output: each file returns in its original format, layout included. An Excel price schedule stays an Excel workbook, and a Word proposal keeps its styles and tables.
- Free sample: before paying, you receive one paragraph of your file translated at the level you chose. Use it to check how terms such as ribasso, or the name of your own process, come out.
What Manuce does not do:
- it cannot read scanned PDFs, meaning image-only pages with no selectable text, such as a signed certificate that was scanned;
- it does not provide sworn or certified translation. If the authority requires a certified translation of a company registration extract or tax certificate, you will need a sworn translator;
- it does not fill in official forms for you. The ESPD exists in an official Italian version (DGUE): complete that version directly rather than translating your own.
Preparing the pack and checking before submission
Before uploading, separate what needs translating from what does not.
- Split the documents: upload the technical proposal, price schedule and annexes as separate files. Leave out any form for which the authority supplies an Italian template.
- Replace scans with source files wherever possible, for example a project manager's CV in Word rather than a scanned printout.
- Check calculated cells in Excel: translation works on the text, so recheck totals once the number format has changed.
When the translation arrives, check these first:
- every amount and discount percentage, line by line, with the right
.and,separators; - deadlines and their unit (giorni naturali e consecutivi or giorni lavorativi);
- references to the disciplinare (clause numbers, lot numbers, CIG), which must match the authority's documents exactly;
- proper names and brands to keep unchanged, which you will already have spotted in the free sample.
For a binding bid, the Professional or Premium level is the better fit. Essential is enough to understand an Italian bando internally.
In practice
- Gather the technical proposal, price schedule and annexes as editable files, leaving out scans.
- Upload them to Manuce, choose Italian and a level, and the quote appears straight away.
- Review the free sample, especially procurement terms and your own proper names.
- Pay, then download the translated files in their original format from your client area.
- Check amounts, deadlines and references to the disciplinare before submitting on the authority's platform.
Frequently asked questions
Does my bid have to be in Italian?
Very often, yes. The disciplinare di gara sets the language of the bid and of supporting documents, so read it first. It also states whether some documents need a certified translation, which Manuce does not provide.
Can Manuce translate an Italian bando into English so I can assess it?
Yes, as long as the PDF contains selectable text. The Essential level is enough to understand the tender internally before you decide whether to bid.
Will my Excel price schedule keep its structure?
Yes, it comes back as an Excel file with its layout intact. Then check the amounts in Italian format (1.250.000,00) and any calculated totals: this is where an error costs the most.
Should I translate the ESPD?
No. The ESPD (DGUE in Italian) is available in an official Italian version, and filling in that form directly is safer. Keep translation for the documents you wrote yourself, such as the technical proposal, annexes and CVs.
How can I make sure a product or process name stays untranslated?
Look for it in the free sample, which shows one paragraph of your file at the level you chose. Then check every occurrence in the delivered translation before you submit.
The specialist in charge
This subject goes to Dédale, the technical specialist. See how it works.
The same file, into another language
Into Italian, other files
See also
Try it on your own file, free
A sample of your file translated at the level you choose, before any payment. You judge, then you decide.