Work on a European standard for translation services began early in 2003 with the submission to CEN (Comité Européen de Normalisation) of a proposal by the EUATC (European Union of Associations of Translation Companies). The national standardisation bodies of the member countries of CEN quickly reached almost unanimous agreement on the need for such a standard. In response to views expressed by translators’ associations in the various countries, the newly established working group soon came to the conclusion that the standard should apply to translation service providers (TSPs) in general, and not only to translation companies.

FIT-Europe supported the project right from the outset, encouraging its member associations to take part and join the national committees to ensure that the voice of “field” professionals was heard and heeded.

"Mirror committees" were set up in the individual countries to examine the project text as it developed and to elaborate the national positions. In a succession of alternating national and European meetings a consensus was gradually reached on the approach and wording of the new standard. This is deliberately kept fairly neutral and free from detail to permit flexible application to a broad spectrum of situations, ranging from complex projects in several languages handled by large translation companies with many subcontractors, to single jobs in one language translated by individual freelancers.

In late 2004 the draft standard was published for comment, and following further discussions in 2005 the final version was published on 1 August 2006 as European Standard EN 15038. This supersedes any relevant national standards in the CEN member countries.

EN 15038 is a service standard. It provides a framework that can be used to improve quality control in the translation process, and therefore offers great potential for enhancing the service provided and raising the status of the translation profession as a whole. It also helps make clients aware of what is involved in a translation assignment and what they can and should do to facilitate the translation process in the interests of good results. The official text is published by CEN in English, French and German, but national translations into a growing number of other languages are becoming available.