Consolidated annual activity report of the translation centre 2020.
Date: 2021-07-13
Institutions: Translation Centre
Subjects: Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union, activity report, administration of the Institutions, interinstitutional cooperation (EU), translation

CONSOLIDATED ANNUAL ACTIVITY REPORT OF THE TRANSLATION 
CENTRE 2020 

NO CT/CA-005/2021EN 

NO CT/CA-025/2021EN 

This Consolidated Annual Activity Report (CAAR) has been drawn up in compliance with Article 8(3) of Council Regulation 
(EC)  No 2965/94  of  28 November 1994  setting  up  the  Translation  Centre  for  the  Bodies  of  the  European  Union,  as  last 
amended by Council Regulation (EC) No 1645/2003 of 18 June 2003 (the ‘Founding Regulation’) and Article 48 of the Financial 
Regulation of 22 September 2019 applicable to the Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union. 

Consolidated Annual Activity Report of the Translation Centre 2020 
This publication of the Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union is available on its website: http://cdt.europa.eu  
©  Translation  Centre  for  the  Bodies  of  the  European  Union,  2021.  Reproduction  is  permitted  provided  the  source  is 
acknowledged. 
ISBN 978-92-95212-32-9 
ISSN 1830-0294 
doi: 10.2817/414851 
Further information on the European Union is accessible via the Europa server: http://europa.eu/. 

 
 
 
 
 
Contents 

MANAGEMENT BOARD’S ASSESSMENT OF THE CENTRE’S CONSOLIDATED ANNUAL ACTIVITY REPORT 2020 .. 5 

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................................................................... 3 

PART I. ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE YEAR .............................................................................................................. 8 

CHAPTER 1 CORE OPERATIONAL ACTIVITIES.................................................................................................................. 8 
CHAPTER 2 SUPPORT ACTIVITIES ............................................................................................................................... 21 
CHAPTER 3 MANAGEMENT AND SUPERVISION ACTIVITIES .............................................................................................. 23 
CHAPTER 4 ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES ........................................................................................................................... 29 
CHAPTER 5 MAIN ACHIEVEMENTS CONTRIBUTING TO EU PRIORITIES ............................................................................... 34 

PART II. MANAGEMENT AND EXTERNAL EVALUATIONS ................................................................................. 36 

PART II A.  MANAGEMENT ........................................................................................................................ 36 

3.1. 
3.2. 
3.3. 
3.4. 
3.5. 

CHAPTER 1 MANAGEMENT BOARD ........................................................................................................................... 36 
CHAPTER 2 MAJOR DEVELOPMENTS .......................................................................................................................... 38 
CHAPTER 3 BUDGETARY AND FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT ................................................................................................ 40 
Revenue ......................................................................................................................................... 40 
Expenditure ................................................................................................................................... 40 
Financial Key Performance Indicators ........................................................................................... 40 
Control results ............................................................................................................................... 42 
Costs and benefits of controls ....................................................................................................... 42 
CHAPTER 4 DELEGATION AND SUB-DELEGATION OF THE POWERS OF THE BUDGET IMPLEMENTATION ..................................... 44 
CHAPTER 5 HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENT .......................................................................................................... 45 
CHAPTER 6 STRATEGY ON EFFICIENCY GAINS ............................................................................................................... 45 
CHAPTER 7 ASSESSMENT OF AUDIT RESULTS DURING THE REPORTING YEAR ....................................................................... 47 
Internal Audit Service (IAS) ............................................................................................................ 47 
Internal Audit Capability (IAC, where applicable) ......................................................................... 47 
European Court of Auditors (ECA) ................................................................................................. 47 
Quality audits ................................................................................................................................ 48 
CHAPTER 8 FOLLOW-UP OF RECOMMENDATIONS AND ACTION PLANS FOR AUDITS AND EVALUATIONS .................................... 48 
CHAPTER 9 FOLLOW-UP ON OBSERVATIONS FROM THE DISCHARGE AUTHORITY ................................................................. 48 
CHAPTER 10 ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT ............................................................................................................ 50 
CHAPTER 11 ASSESSMENT BY MANAGEMENT .............................................................................................................. 50 

7.1. 
7.2. 
7.3. 
7.4. 

PART II B. 

EXTERNAL EVALUATIONS ........................................................................................................ 51 

PART III. ASSESSMENT OF THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEMS ................................... 52 

CHAPTER 1 EFFECTIVENESS OF INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEMS ......................................................................................... 53 
CHAPTER 2 CONCLUSIONS ON THE ASSESSMENT OF THE INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEMS ....................................................... 56 
CHAPTER 3 STATEMENT OF THE OFFICER IN CHARGE OF RISK MANAGEMENT AND INTERNAL CONTROL COORDINATION ............... 57 

PART IV. MANAGEMENT ASSURANCE ............................................................................................................ 58 

CHAPTER 1 REVIEW OF THE ELEMENTS SUPPORTING ASSURANCE .................................................................................... 58 
CHAPTER 2 RESERVATIONS ...................................................................................................................................... 59 

PART V. DECLARATION OF ASSURANCE .......................................................................................................... 60 

ANN E X I  –  C OR E B U SIN E SS  S T AT I ST IC S  .............................................................................................. 62 

ANN E X I I  –  ST A TI S TI CS   ON  FIN A N C IA L M AN A G E M EN T  .................................................................. 69 

ANN E X I II  –  C OS T  OF  C O NTR OL S  .......................................................................................................... 76 

ANN E X I V  –  ORG AN I S AT ION  C H AR T  ON  31/ 12 / 2 02 0  ...................................................................... 78 

ANN E X V  –  E S T AB L I SH M EN T  PLAN   O F  TH E  C EN T RE  ........................................................................ 79 

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ANN E X V I  –  H UM AN  AN D  FIN AN CI A L R E S OU RC E S B Y  AC TI VI T Y  .................................................. 83 

ANN E X V II  –  S E RV IC E  L E V EL  A GR E EM EN T S  ....................................................................................... 87 

ANN E X V II I  –  EN V IRO N M EN T AL  M AN AG EM EN T  .............................................................................. 88 

ANN E X IX  –   K EY  IN D IC A TO RS  A ND  P AR AM E T ER S ............................................................................ 90 

ANN E X X  –  LI S T O F M E M B ER S  OF  T H E M A NA G EM EN T B O AR D  .................................................... 94 

ANN E X XI  –  L I ST  O F C LI E N T S  ................................................................................................................. 97 

ANN E X XI I  –  GL O SS AR Y  ........................................................................................................................... 99 

ANN E X XI I I  - F IN A L  ACC OU NT S  OF  T H E  TR AN SL A TI ON  C EN TR E  FOR  T H E B O DI E S  OF  T H E 
E UR OP E AN  U N I ON   FO R  T HE  F IN AN CI A L Y E AR  2 020  ..................................................................... 101 

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 

This Consolidated Annual Activity Report provides an overview of the activity and achievements of the 
Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union in 2020. The first part of the report describes the 
implementation  of  the  targets  of  the  2020  Work  programme  which  is  included  in  the  Programming 
document 2020-2022 adopted by the Centre’s Management Board. 

According to their importance and in line with the human and financial resources available for 2020, the 
Centre has attributed the following weightings to its activities: 
•  Core operational activity: language services – 70% 
•  Support activities – 18% 
•  Management and supervision activities – 12%. 

Following  the  end-of-year  review  carried  out  by  the  Centre’s  management  and  application  of  these 
weightings, the overall implementation of the 2020 Work programme stood at 90.3% based on the initial 
Budget 2020, and 90.3% based on the Amending budget 2/2020. 

With regard to the Centre’s ‘Core operational activity: language services’, the majority of the actions set 
were completed (91.8%) during 2020. In total, the Centre translated 635 269 pages compared with the 
583 080  pages  forecast  in  the  Amending  budget  2/2020.  The  number  of  document  pages  for  2020 
(334 921) increased by 8.4% compared with 2019 (309 047 pages). This volume was 20.6% higher than 
the forecast (277 791 pages) in the Amending budget 2/2020. EU trade marks (300 348 pages in 2020) 
represented 27.9% of the Centre’s revenue in 2020 (36.3% in 2019), 13.8% lower than in 2019. EU trade 
marks  remain  a  key  product  in  the  Centre’s  portfolio  although  with  a  decreasing  trend.  The  Centre 
produced 1 601 minutes of subtitles for 11 clients and 793 minutes of transcription using speech-to-text 
technology. 

In 2020, the Centre launched its fully revamped client feedback system: the Corrected Version Request 
(CVR). As part of its technological transformation, the Centre has started to modularise the concept of 
translation.  This  will  lead  to  a  diversification  of  services  as  from  2021.  eCdT  has  been  technically 
configured for  the  implementation of  new  functionalities,  such  as  custom translation embedded  in  the 
translation service and an automatic translation service.  

The translation memories update functionality was made available in the Client Portal to all clients. Clients 
can now send bilingual files and automatically update the Centre’s translation memories. As part of the 
Transformation plan and the projects developed in cooperation with the EUIPO, custom neural machine 
translation  engines  in  the areas  of  intellectual  property  case-law and  public  health  were  developed  in 
eTranslation and in NICE, the Centre’s neural machine translation system. Additionally, the terminology 
content of IATE was integrated in the translation process at the beginning of 2020.  

With  respect  to  IATE,  the  technical  work  in  2020  focused  on  continuous  user  support  and  the 
implementation of numerous change requests validated by the IATE2 task force. In total, 9 releases were 
deployed in 2020 and the migration of the IATE1 history was completed in November with the transfer of 
over 78 million transactions from the old system.  

The implementation rate for the Centre’s ‘Support activities’ was 88.9%. The Centre has introduced Systal, 
a  new  e-Selection  and  recruitment  IT  tool  covering  all  the  phases  of  the  selection  procedures.  In 
December, an electronic signature facility was fully implemented using the ARES tool internally and for 
documents exchanged with the European Commission.  

The Centre continued to deploy some IT systems to the cloud, whenever this was advantageous for the 
Centre  and  in  line  with  the  relevant  legal  provisions  in  place.  The  speech-to-text  module  was  also 
deployed allowing the Centre to offer new related services to its clients. 

3 

 
In terms of the Centre’s ‘Management and supervision activities’, 83.3% of actions were completed during 
2020.  The  re-engineering  of  the  Activity  Based  Costing  (ABC)  and  Activity  Based  Budgeting  (ABB) 
methods has been successfully completed and talent management initiatives have been implemented 
through a special programme of managerial excellence. The Centre also organised several seminars and 
ad-hoc training sessions; selected staff were trained in the use of machine translation, post-editing and 
evaluation of machine translation output.  

The Centre signed a cooperation agreement with the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) for a 
specific  on-site  machine  translation  solution.  This  service  is  based  on  a  dedicated,  secured  and 
customised version of the eTranslation software developed by the Commission's DGT and DG CNECT. 

An agreement was also reached with the Research Executive Agency (REA) on the implementation of a 
new service (Paste ‘n’ Go) in order to respond to the agency’s translation needs as from 2021. 

The Centre continued to foster cooperation with its clients. The pandemic meant that there was hardly 
any possibility to physically meet clients, so the Centre doubled its efforts to provide information in bilateral 
video-conferences, or in written format. The 2020 marketing priorities focused particularly on new services 
(transcription,  modularised  translation,  optimised  subtitling,  and  language  consultancy)  and  tools 
(eCdT4me mobile application, and a new workflow to handle client feedback), 

In 2020, the Centre recovered its capacity to balance its budget. The budget outturn for the financial year 
2020 was EUR 2.2 million, namely EUR 5.1 million more than expected in the initial budget. After taking 
into account the cancellation of the appropriations carried over from 2019, the movements in the reserves 
and  the  budget  outturn  carried  over  from  2019  (EUR -2.1  million),  the  final  balance  of  the  carry-over 
budget outturn to 2020 is EUR 4.1 million. This surplus will boost the reserve for stability pricing in 2021. 

The Centre invoiced a total of 589 651 pages, which is 45 618 fewer than pages translated (635 269). 
This  difference  is  explained  by  the  Centre’s  pricing  policy  not  to  charge  for  content  retrieved  from 
translation memories, namely 37 503 pages in 2020 (35 492 pages in 2019), and the number of pages 
translated for internal use (8 115). This brought down the average unit price paid by clients for translation 
services to EUR 85.47, surcharges excluded. 

Finally, 2020 was the second and final year of the implementation of the Centre’s Transformation plan 
and of the Programme Initiation Document (PID) comprising five projects developed and managed with 
the EUIPO. By the end of 2020, there was a combined implementation rate of 98% for both of these 
initiatives that were undertaken to bring about the Centre’s structural changes.  

4 

 
 
 
 
MANAGEMENT BOARD’S ASSESSMENT OF THE CENTRE’S CONSOLIDATED ANNUAL 
ACTIVITY REPORT 2020  

THE MANAGEMENT BOARD OF THE TRANSLATION CENTRE FOR THE BODIES OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, 

Having regard to Council Regulation (EC) No 2965/94 of 28 November 1994 setting up the Translation 
Centre  for  the  Bodies  of  the  European  Union  (‘the  Translation  Centre’),  as  last  amended  by  Council 
Regulation (EC) No 1645/2003 of 18 June 2003, 

Having regard to the Financial Regulation of 22 September 2019 applicable to the Translation Centre for 
the Bodies of the European Union (Ref. CT/CA-028/2019EN), 

Having  regard  to  the  Decision  of  the  Management  Board  of  the  Translation  Centre  establishing  an 
assessment committee (Ref. CT/CA-049/2014), 

HAS ADOPTED AS FOLLOWS: 

1. The consolidated activity report 2020 is considered by the Management Board to provide a faithful and 
comprehensive account of the work undertaken by the Translation Centre in 2020. The Board notes 
that, after the application of the weightings of the various strands of the Centre’s activities, the overall 
implementation  rate  of  the  work  programme  for  2020  was  90.3%  based  on  both  the  initial  and 
amending budget 2/2020. This continues a positive trend of year on year improvements from 2018 
and 2019 where the implementation rates were 82.4% and 89.1% respectively. In total, the Centre 
translated 635 269 pages compared with the 583 080 pages forecast in the amending budget 2/2020. 
The Management Board notes with satisfaction that the number of translated pages of EU trade marks 
was for the first time lower than that of documents. In 2020, EU trade marks accounted for 28% of total 
revenue compared to 36% in 2019. The Board welcomes this reduction in the Centre’s dependence 
on trade marks and its successful introduction of new product lines including the 1,601 minutes of 
subtitles for 11 clients and 793 minutes of transcription using speech-to-text technology. 

2.  The Management Board appreciates the well-structured and consistent presentation of information in 
respect  of  the  implementation  rates  of  the  various  actions  within  each  activity.  In  particular,  it 
congratulates the Centre on the 98% implementation rate of the ambitious 2019-2020 Transformation 
Plan and of the Programme Initiation Document comprising five projects developed and managed with 
the EUIPO which have resulted in the introduction of new services and new resources for the Centre 
to develop its language technologies. The Board is very satisfied that the Centre is now well-equipped 
with state-of-the art technologies based on AI, in particular neural machine translation and speech-to-
text technology and able to offer a broader range of linguistic services in an efficient and cost-effective 
way. 

3.  The Management Board acknowledges the high workload undertaken and the Centre’s commitment 
and  dedication,  under  the  leadership  of  its  Acting  Director,  to  its  tasks  and  its  clients  and  for  the 
efficiency of its service while maintaining high levels of quality in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. 
The Board notes with satisfaction that the Centre’s client portfolio continues to grow and now includes 
the  European  Public  Prosecutor’s  Office  (EPPO)  for  which  the  Centre  has  developed  a  bespoke 
service  to  meet  its  specific  needs.  The  Board  welcomes  that  the  EPPO  brings  the  Centre’s  client 
portfolio to a total of 69 clients. 

4.  The Centre’s achievements in 2020 are consistent with its strategic goals as set out in its Strategy 
2016-2020 and the Board considers that its vision of becoming a linguistic centre of excellence for the 
EU  agencies  and  bodies  by  2020  has  been  achieved  in  large  measure.  The  Management  Board 

5 

 
welcomes  the  new  emphasis  on  delivering  to  its  clients  a  ‘bespoke  approach’  and  ‘added-value 
services’ (transcription, modularised translation, optimised subtitling and language consultancy) and 
tools (eCdt4me mobile application and a new workflow to handle client feedback), many of which are 
built on the Centre’s growing expertise in the field of machine translation. The Board highly appreciates 
the  Centre’s  continued  commitment  to  interinstitutional  cooperation  in  2020,  including  further 
development  of  the  interinstitutional  terminology  database  IATE  and  the  sharing  of  the  Centre’s 
expertise gained from the development of its eCdT workflow system. 

5.  The Management Board congratulates the Centre’s Acting Director and management group on their 
effective  management  of  the  Centre’s  financial  resources  during  the  year  and  their  success  in 
recovering  the  Centre’s  capacity  to  balance  its  budget.  The  Board  notes  with  satisfaction  that  the 
budget outturn for 2020 was EUR 2.2 million, EUR 5.1 million more than expected in the initial budget 
and  that  the  resulting  final  carry-over  budget  outturn  of  EUR  4.1  million  will  boost  the  reserve  for 
stability pricing in 2021. It is particularly to the Centre’s credit that this was achieved in spite of the 
COVID-19  pandemic  and  its  investment  projects  included  in  the  Transformation  Plan.  The 
Management Board is inclined to agree with the Centre’s management group’s assessment that ‘2020 
represents a turning point for the Centre and provides a solid basis for its future’. 

6.  The Management Board considers that Part III of the report contains sufficient information pertaining 
to internal controls and risk management processes in order to assess their effectiveness. The Board 
notes that the Centre reviewed the effectiveness of the implementation of the characteristics of the 17 
principles pertaining to the five components of its internal control framework and that it considered that 
the reviews showed no instances of inadequate/ineffective controls that may have exposed the Centre 
to key risks. Furthermore, the Board welcomes the measures taken by the Centre in response to the 
COVID-19 pandemic both in respect of its duty of care towards its staff and to maintaining the regularity 
of its transactions by the introduction of paperless procedures and considers that its control systems 
are effective overall with some improvements needed to further increase the Centre’s resilience. The 
Board  welcomes  the  Acting  Director’s  decision  to  prioritise  the  risk  management  process  and 
paperless  processes  involving  e-signature  in  order  to  further  accelerate  the  Centre’s  digital 
transformation. 

7.  Part IV of the report describes the building blocks of assurance. The Management Board notes with 
satisfaction that there are no instances of significant and/or repetitive errors or inadequate/ineffective 
controls and observes that the Acting Director’s declaration of assurance is based on a robust control 
system. 

8.  The  Management  Board  considers that  the  information  provided  in  the  report provides  reasonable 
assurance that the resources available to the Centre in 2020 were used for their intended purpose and 
in accordance with the principles of sound financial management. Furthermore, the control procedures 
in  place  give  the  necessary  guarantees  concerning  the  legality  and  regularity  of  the  underlying 
transactions. 

9.  Finally, the Management Board congratulates and thanks the Centre’s Acting Director Benoît Vitale 
and all the Centre’s staff for their commitment and the achievements reached in a quite extraordinary 
year. 

6 

 
 
Done at Luxembourg, 26 June 2021. 

For the Management Board 

(electronically signed) 
Rytis Martikonis 

Chairman 

7 

 
 
 
PART I. 
ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE YEAR  

CHAPTER 1 
CORE OPERATIONAL ACTIVITIES 

The Centre has attributed a weighting of 70% to this activity. The overall implementation rate was 91.8% compared 
with the initial budget for 2020. 

Action 1.1 Translate, modify, edit and revise documents in accordance with agreed quality 
criteria 

Indicator/Output: Number of pages of documents translated, modified, edited and revised 
Target 2020: 313 316 pages delivered 
Implementation rate: 100% compared with the initial budget, 100% compared with the amending budget (weighting 
of the action within the activity: 11%) 

In 2020, the Centre’s translation volume reached a total of 635 269 pages, which represented a 3.4% 
decrease on the figures for 2019 (657 323 pages). These figures include documents and EU trade marks 
and pages translated for the Centre’s own needs. For the first time, the number of pages of documents 
translated was higher than EU trade marks (53% vs 47% respectively).  

With 334  921 pages, the number of pages of documents (translated, modified, edited and/or revised) 
increased by 8.4% compared with 2019 (309 047 pages). These figures include pages translated for the 
Centre’s own needs. This volume was 6.9% higher than the forecast (313 316 pages) in the initial budget 
and 20.6% higher than the forecast (277 791 pages) in the amending budget 1. With regard to documents, 
Figure 1  below  shows  the  number  of  translated  pages  actually  invoiced,  following  their  screening  to 
identify how  much  text  was  already  in  the  Centre’s  translation  memories.  This  resulted  in  savings  for 
clients and reduced the number of invoiced pages to 589 651.  

In  addition  to  translation,  modification,  editing  and  revision,  the  Centre  also  provided  other  language 
services. Some 1 448 man/days were spent on terminology work.  

A total of 21 clients requested the translation or revision of term list entries (see details under Action 1.3 
below). 1 601 minutes of subtitling and 793 minutes of transcription were produced for clients. 
As  part  of  the  Centre’s  quality  assurance  assessment  of  its  external  language  service  providers, 
translations produced by its external providers are revised and evaluated by in-house translators prior to 
delivery to clients. In 2020, in 99% of cases, the translations were assessed as being of reasonable or 
excellent quality. 

Although the percentage of external translations of poor quality was low in 2020, the Centre took some 
stringent  measures  against  several  contractors  whose  documents  were  judged  to  be  repeatedly 
unsatisfactory.  In  2020,  a  total of 332  outsourced translations  were  submitted  to the  Centre’s  internal 
assessment committee following an assessment of poor quality by internal revisers. The results were 
judged  to  be  conclusive  (with  poor  quality  being  confirmed  for  250  of  them  in  75%  of  cases)  and 
contractual  measures  were  applied  to  the  contractors  concerned.  In  some  cases,  these  contractual 

1 Total number of pages of documents forecast is pages in the 2/2020 Amending budget. 

8 

 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
measures involved termination of the framework contract, for instance if the contractor had provided raw 
or unrevised machine translation output to the Centre.  

The Centre also measured the percentage of outsourced translations for which in-house revisers indicated 
areas of weakness when filling in the assessment sheets. This percentage indicates where the Centre's 
in-house  revisers  spotted  problems  and  were  able  to  improve  the  translations  provided  by  external 
language service providers, even if the translation was found to be, on the whole, of reasonable quality. 
In 2020, 10% of the outsourced translations (= 2 557 documents) (12% in 2019) were found to contain an 
area of weakness, which was addressed by the revisers before sending the translation to clients.  

The outsourced documents belong to the general domain (26%), followed by the legal (17%), the scientific 
(8%), the medical (8%), and the finance (8%) domains. 

9 

 
 
 
 
 
Figure 1: Fluctuations in forecasts vs actual volumes in 2020 (in pages)  

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Preliminary draft budget 2020

Initial budget 2020

Amending budget 2/2020

Delivered pages including the Centre

Delivered pages excluding the Centre

Invoiced pages after translation memory analysis

Delivered pages to the EUIPO

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T O T A L

D O C U M E N T S

T R A D E   M A R K S

Action 1.2 Translate EU trade marks in accordance with agreed quality criteria 

Indicator/Output: Number of pages of EU trade marks translated 
Target 2020: 305 289 pages 
Implementation rate: 98% compared with the initial budget, 98% compared with the amending budget (weighting of 
the action within the activity: 11%) 

Of the 635 269 pages translated in 2020, 300  348 pages (47% of the total volume) consisted of EU trade 
marks, in comparison with 305 289 pages forecast in the initial budget 2020. The number of pages of EU 
trade  marks  translated  represents  a  13.8%  decrease  in  comparison  with  2019  (348 276  pages).  The 
fluctuations in forecasts in comparison with actual invoiced volumes are shown in Figure 1 above.  

The Centre delivered the translations of the EU trade marks on time, six days after their submission, in 
line with the objective agreed with the EUIPO for 2020.  

10 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Action 1.3 Translate and revise term lists according to agreed quality criteria (including a 
Terminology Maintenance Console (EUIPO) for terms and designs) 

Indicator/Output: Number of terms translated and revised 
Target 2020: 83 009 terms (‘term list’ entries) 
Implementation rate: 59% compared with the initial budget, 60% compared with the amending budget (weighting of 
the action within the activity: 3%) 

In 2020, 21 clients requested the translation or revision of 49 277 ‘term list’ entries (including Community 
Designs,  Euroclass/Terminology  Maintenance  Console  terms  and  Design  Terminology  Maintenance 
Console  terms  for  the  EUIPO).  The  implementation  rate  is  low  as  the  targets  were  based  on  clients’ 
forecasts that were not in line with the final results.  

Action 1.4 Subtitle videos 

Indicator/Output: Number of minutes of videos subtitled 
Target 2020: 654 minutes 
Implementation rate: 100% compared with the initial and amending budgets (weighting of the action within the 
activity: 1%) 

The Centre produced 1 601 minutes of subtitles for 11 clients, namely FRA, EU-OSHA, ECHA, EIGE, 
EASO,  CDT-CA,  FRONTEX,  EUIPO,  ETF,  IMI  JU  and  EIB.  The  volume of  subtitling  showed  a  6.9% 
decrease in comparison with 2019 (2 571 minutes in 2019 for ten clients, i.e. DG EMPL, Chafea, EASO, 
ECHA, EFSA, EIGE, EUIPO, EU-OSHA, FRONTEX and the OMBUDSMAN).  

The videos are usually embedded in the agencies’ websites, circulated on social media and/or used in 
presentations. 

During  the  year  the  Centre  changed  the  tool  used  to  produce  subtitles.  The  same  speech-to-text 
technology is now used for both subtitling and a new transcription service launched at the end of June 
2020, with clear synergies between the two services and important efficiency gains, in particular in terms 
of turnaround times. In total, the Centre produced 793 minutes of transcription for 3 clients, namely FRA, 
CDT-CA and EIB. 

Action 1.5 Ensure on-time delivery of services to clients 

Overall implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 11%)  
Indicator/Output: Percentage of deadlines met 
Target 2020: >99% of deadlines met 
Implementation rate: 100%  

The Centre delivered services to its clients on time in 99.7% of cases (99.9% in 2019). 

Specifically, with regard to documents, the Centre delivered translations to its clients on time in 99.4% of 
cases (99.8% in 2019). In this context, ‘translations’ includes translation, editing, modification and revision, 
invoiced in pages. This excludes EU trade marks as they are always sent by the contractual deadline. It 
is worth noting that the Centre delivered translations ahead of the deadline in 38% of cases (22.4% in 
2019). The difference between the 2019 and 2020 rates is linked to clients wishing to receive all language 
versions at the same time.  

11 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
In 2020, 59.4% of translations were requested with a normal deadline, 24% were slow and 15.3% were 
urgent. In 2019, these figures were 59.6%, 3.7% and 17.9%, respectively. The ‘slow’ delivery translation 
service represented 24% of the volume of documents translated in 2020, an increase of 29.7% compared 
to 2019 (18.5%). The demand for ‘very urgent’ translation services remained low, comprising 1.3% of the 
total translation volume. 

Indicator/Output: Rate of renegotiated deadlines 
Target 2020: <=8% 
Implementation rate: 100%  

In 2020, the Centre renegotiated 3.13% of agreed deadlines for services to clients (in comparison with 
3.9%  in  2019).  In  practice,  this  means  that  deadlines  agreed  initially  were  modified  in  the  course  of 
ongoing jobs, and that both parties agreed to the renegotiated deadlines. 

Action 1.6 Review the indicative turnaround times of language services  

Indicator/Output: Review of turnaround times of language services undertaken 
Target 2020: 100% (review of turnaround times of language services undertaken) 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 3%)  

During 2020, the Centre continually monitored the turnaround times of its language services. This led to 
the conclusion that it was possible to start reducing some of the indicative turnaround times for translation 
and revision, namely those requested with slow and normal priority. The new indicative turnaround times 
will come into force on 1 January 2021 and include reductions of between 1 and 4 days.  

Action 1.7 Fine-tune the translation process after the integration of the relevant ISO 17100: 
2015 (Requirements for translation services) and ISO 18587:2017 (Post-editing of machine 
translation output) standard principles 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of fine-tuning of the translation process following the integration of relevant ISO 
17100:2015 and 18587:2017 standard principles 
Target 2020: 100% (Fine-tuning of the translation process following the integration of relevant ISO 17100:2015 and 
18587:2017 standard principles) 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 3%)  

The translation workflow process for documents was updated in the last quarter of 2020 to include custom 
translation  and  automatic  translation.  In  addition,  negotiated  procedures  for  the  selection  of  external 
contractors were launched to integrate the post-editing of machine translation as from 1 January 2021. 

Action 1.8 Implement measures identified in the ‘Translation Quality Assurance Action 
Plan 2019-2020’ 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of implemented actions included in the Translation Quality Assurance Action Plan 
2019-2020 
Target 2020: 100% implemented actions 
Implementation rate: 98.6% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%)  

The Centre implemented the remaining actions included in its 2019-2020 Translation Quality Assurance 
Action  Plan  (TQAAP)  which  was  adopted  at  the  beginning  of  2019.  By  the  end  of  2020,  the  rate  of 
implementation of the TQAAP was 98.6%. 

12 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
In 2020, the focus was on further enhancing the quality of language services provided to clients and the 
Centre’s operational efficiency.  

The set of actions planned for and achieved in 2020 primarily related to: 

- 

- 

- 
- 
- 

- 

- 

further training of in-house translators in the use of neural machine translation (NMT), post-editing 
and evaluation of NMT output, optimised subtitling, etc.; 
organising a workshop on quality control and evaluating outsourced translation for newly recruited 
in-house  translators  to  ensure  the  application  of  the  same  quality  control  mechanisms  and 
procedures between language group members and across all language groups; 
defining and implementing the Centre's policy on the use of NMT; 
integrating the post-editing of NMT output in the translation process;  
optimising the subtitling service by using the same speech-to-text technology as in transcription, 
and integrating subtitling workflow functionalities to enable outsourcing to improve timeliness and 
efficiency; 
reviewing criteria to penalise poor quality service, downrank and terminate contracts with external 
language service providers who deliver poor quality; 
producing easy-access information for clients to explain the Centre's services and way of working 
(e.g. information campaigns on new services, mailing information on the main outcomes of the 
Centre’s Transformation Programme, notification of the release of the latest version of the booklet 
‘Writing for translation / Écrire pour être traduit’, etc.). 

Action 1.9 Configure in eCdT the requirements of a data-driven approach for the revision 
of outsourced translations 

Indicator/Output: Configuration of eCdT for a data-driven approach for the revision of outsourced translations  
Target 2020: 100% (eCdT configured for a data-driven approach for the revision of outsourced translations) 
Implementation rate: 0% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%)  

The increasing number of clients, the complexity and specialisation of texts, the growing number of pages 
to be revised, the fluctuating quality of outsourced translations and the need to reduce costs - has led the 
Centre to consider changing the revision model, which is based on the revision of all translations carried 
out by external language service providers. The aim is to convert it into a data-driven model to eliminate 
low-quality translations and ensure the quality improvement of outsourced texts where the quality is likely 
to be below the agreed quality standards. With the new approach, the choice of the degree of revision will 
no longer be made on single outsourced translations but will rather be predefined on a data-driven basis 
reflecting the track record of external language service providers and the intended use of texts by clients. 
In order to mitigate the quality risks of the new revision approach, random thorough checks will also be 
carried out regularly on all translated texts.  

As  priority  was  given  to  the  actions  included  in  the  Transformation  plan,  the  configuration  of  the 
requirements  of  the  data-driven  approach  could  not  be  implemented  in  2020  and  has  therefore  been 
postponed.  In  October  2020,  a  new  project  to  improve  the  eCdT  platform  -  eCdT  evolution2  -  was 
discussed at top management level and validated. The project includes 16 actions which were identified 
and  defined  on  the  basis  of  client  expectations  and  core  business  needs.  These  actions  will  be 
implemented over a period of two years. During the prioritisation phase of eCdT evolution2, importance 
was given to actions that would add more value to clients. As a result of this exercise, the implementation 
of the data-driven approach will be finalised by the end of 2022. 

13 

 
 
 
 
 
Action 1.10 Monitor translation quality ex post 

Overall implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%)  
Indicator/Output: Number of ex post quality checks (EPQC) on translations provided to clients 
Target 2020: EPQC undertaken on a quarterly basis on translations provided to clients 
Implementation rate: 100%  

In  addition  to  quality  control,  the  Centre  regularly  carries  out  ex  post  quality  controls  on  translations 
delivered  to  its  clients  to  detect  any  recurring  problems  in  the  translation  process  and  to  take  the 
appropriate remedial actions. 

Four ex post controls took place in 2020, i.e. one control per quarter, on documents from a range of clients 
representing different domains. These ex post quality controls were carried out on samples selected from 
the whole translation output. 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of excellent translations provided to clients following an ex post quality control 
Target 2020: 25% 
Implementation rate: 100% 

In 2020, 45.8% of translations delivered by the Centre was considered of excellent quality. This represents 
a slight increase compared to the previous year when the percentage of excellent translations was 44.50%. 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of fit for purpose translations provided to clients following an ex post quality control 
Target 2020: 72% 
Implementation rate: 100% 

53% of translations delivered by the Centre was considered ‘fit for purpose’. The percentage is slightly 
lower  than  in  2019.  However,  given  the  fact  that  the  differential  can  be  traced  to  the  percentage  of 
excellent translations rather than the percentage of poor translations, the trend for 2020 is positive. 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of poor translations provided to clients following an ex post quality control 
Target 2020: 3% 
Implementation rate: 100% 

The remaining 1% of translations delivered to clients were not up to the required standards. They were 
analysed with the relevant language groups and corrective measures were taken, as appropriate. 

Action 1.11 Launch the new client feedback system which will be based on two modules: 
the CVR (corrected version request) module and the client satisfaction module, both 
interconnected with the client portal (see CdT-EUIPO PID) 

Indicator/Output: New client feedback system is launched  
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

As a result of its two-year cooperation with the EUIPO on the Centre’s Transformation plan, at the end of 
August 2020 the Centre launched a fully revised client feedback system shifting the focus from measuring 
client satisfaction to the provision of updated versions, as requested by clients. The new system consists 
of the Corrected Version Request (CVR) and a related workflow connected to eCdT and the Client Portal. 
The new CVR system replaced the process formerly in place for feedback purposes, which was based 
on the Client Satisfaction Form (CSF). The main objective of the CVR is for clients to ask the Centre to 

14 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
review the feedback submitted by their in-house or national subject matter experts on linguistic outputs 
delivered  by  the  Centre,  to  ask  the  Centre  to  correct  issues  purely  related  to  the  formatting  of  the 
deliverables and to provide them with an updated version.[1]  

The measuring of client satisfaction will henceforth mainly be achieved through annual client surveys. To 
this end, a new approach was taken in cooperation with the Publications Office by using their survey tool 
with a questionnaire customised to the Centre’s needs and linked to an individual report for each client 
summarising key operational data for a given year. Clients will thus be able to express their satisfaction 
in the questionnaire based on the information provided to them in their specific reports. A dashboard, 
available in eCdT to the Centre’s management and staff responsible for client relations, will compile, per 
client, operational data (such as the number of requests by priority level, or the number of CVRs) and 
survey results. This will allow the Centre to better monitor the activity status and satisfaction level per 
client and thus facilitate client management. 

The first survey will be launched in Q1/2021 as the survey questionnaire will be linked to operational data 
from January to December 2020. 

Action 1.12 Organise webinars/information sessions for external language service 
providers 

Indicator/Output: Number of webinars/information sessions organised for external language service providers 
Target 2020: At least one webinar/information session held for external language service providers 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

As in the previous years, instead of holding in-house seminars, which may have limited the number of 
participants,  the  Centre  decided  to  continue  releasing  online  tutorials  to  address  recurring  issues 
encountered with external language service providers or provide them with information concerning the 
new  tools used  at  the  Translation  Centre.  These tutorials  focused  on  the  Centre’s  transcription editor 
(React Transcription Editor) and on the new tool for editing subtitles (Subtitle Edit). 

Action 1.13 Raise awareness among clients about the need to provide source documents 
of sufficient linguistic quality 

Indicator/Output: Preparation of an information package as part of the booklet ‘Writing for translation’ 
Target 2020: Updated booklet ‘Writing for translation’ 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

The booklet ‘'Writing for Translation’', which contains best practices for authors to consider when drafting 
texts for translation, was updated to include for the first time a section on technical aspects to bear in mind 
when producing documents for translation. The booklet, which is available in both English and French, 
was promoted through an article on the Centre's website, a mailing to clients and posts on social media 
at the beginning of May 2020. It can be downloaded from the Centre’s website. The Centre’s clients are 
encouraged to circulate it among their drafting staff. 

[1] For details on CSFs and CVRs processed in the course of 2020, please refer to Chapter 4: Additional activities. 

15 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
Action 1.14 Raise awareness amongst clients of the risks involved in using translation 
technology indiscriminately, without recourse to skilled support 

Indicator/Output: Run awareness sessions during the Translation Contact Network meeting 
Target 2020: One awareness session during the Translation Contact Network meeting 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Translation Contact Network meeting scheduled on 31 March 2020 
had to be cancelled. However, this did not prevent the Centre raising awareness on the risks of using 
machine translation technology without resorting to specialist support during bilateral meetings with clients. 
One such meeting was held with the European Public Prosecutor’s Office on 30 July 2020 at the Centre’s 
premises, and a videoconference was organised with EFSA on 12 November 2020.  

Action 1.15 Configure eCdT for the implementation of modularised translation services 

Indicator/Output: Configuration of eCdT for the implementation of modularised translation services 
Target 2020: Depending on the results of the proof of concept and the feasibility study, eCdT configuration 
undertaken 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

As part of its technological transformation, the Centre has started to modularise the concept of translation. 
This will lead to a diversification of services as from 2021. eCdT has been technically configured for the 
implementation of new functionalities, such as custom translation embedded in the translation service and 
automatic translation. Both functionalities will be operational as from 1 January 2021, with the former in a 
pilot phase with one client and the latter available to all clients. An additional service to be introduced on 
1 January 2021, called Paste ‘n’ Go, will allow clients to send translation requests through the Client Portal 
in a simplified way. The modularisation concept will also lead to the introduction of another new service, 
called light post-editing, in the second half of 2021. 

Action 1.16 Finalise the cost-benefit analysis with regard to new added value services (e.g. 
transcription service, automatic subtitling and voiceover service) 

Indicator/Output: Cost-benefit analysis on the introduction of new added value services 
Target 2020: 100% (cost-benefit analysis undertaken) 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

A cost-benefit analysis of the transcription service was done in 2019. In 2020, the Centre performed a 
cost-benefit  analysis  on  automatic  translation  and  simplified  translation  services.  The  analysis 
encouraged the Centre to launch the related services as from January 2021.  

Action 1.17 Finalise the extension of the web translation service (via a generic B2B 
solution) to other platforms or versions with the assistance of clients, if needed 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of implementation of the web translation service on other platforms or versions 
Target 2020: 100% (B2B solution for planned platforms or versions) 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 3%) 

During 2020, the Centre finalised the developments of the web translation modules for Drupal 7, Drupal 
8 and Drupal 9-based websites, which were validated by the Commission’s DIGIT and are accessible to 
clients on Drupal.org. Connectors related to other web platforms are available via B2B solutions.  

16 

 
 
 
  
 
 
 
Action 1.18 Implementation of a new translation memories update service 

Indicator/Output: Availability of the translation memories update service 
Target 2020: Service is available 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 3%) 

In 2020 in the P1 project, a translation memories update functionality was made available in the Client 
Portal to all clients. With this option, clients can now send bilingual files in tmx format and automatically 
update the Centre’s translation memories. This content is used to calculate the final page count for clients 
with corresponding price reductions based on translation memory retrievals. 

Action 1.19 Implement the new computer-assisted translation (CAT) tool selected via the 
CATE 2020 interinstitutional call for tenders 

Indicator/Output: Implementation rate of new CAT tool 
Target 2020: 100% (new CAT tool implemented) 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 0%) 

The interinstitutional CATE call for tenders was concluded at the end of 2019 and SDL was awarded the 
contract. The Centre deployed the latest version of Trados Studio in 2020, trained its users and adapted 
the required documentation. 

Action 1.20 Start to develop an alignment service in order to feed the Centre’s translation 
memories with the final versions of translations provided by clients in cases where the 
bilingual files are not provided 

Indicator/Output: Development rate of alignment service 
Target 2020: 50% (alignment service developed) 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

The Centre noted a seemingly low demand for the alignment service and was able to meet clients’ needs 
in this area by offering three alternatives to this service, i.e. the exchange of bilingual files, the use of 
Euramis by the Centre, and the translation memories update service. 

Action 1.21 Develop customised Translation Centre engines in intellectual property case-
law and public health 

Indicator/Output: Engines in the two areas are operational 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

As part of the P2 project developed in cooperation with the EUIPO, custom neural machine translation 
engines in the areas of intellectual property case-law and public health were developed in 2019 and 2020 
in eTranslation and in NICE, the Centre’s neural machine translation system.  

Action 1.22 Finalise the integration of customised machine translation engines (such as 
public health, intellectual property case law) and the terminology content of IATE in the 
translation process for in-house and external translators 

17 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Indicator/Output: Integration rate of customised machine translation engines and terminology content of IATE in the 
translation process for in-house and external translators 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 3%) 

As part of the P2 project, the terminology content of IATE was integrated in the translation process at the 
beginning of 2020, and the customised neural machine translation engines were integrated in the Centre’s 
eCdT workflow system at the end of the year and were ready for use from 1 January 2021. 

Action 1.23 Identify and exploit adaptive translation technologies interactively integrated 
with translation tools 

Indicator/Output: A report is drafted on the capacity of the Centre to exploit new translation technologies 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

The  identification  and  the  potential  integration  of  adaptive  translation  technologies  in  the  translation 
workflow  started  already  in  2019  and  will  continue  well  beyond  2020.  The  most  advanced  solution 
identified so far is to implement in the near future a machine translation multi-engine system which would 
make it possible to get the best of several machine translation engines used at the same time. 

Action 1.24 Depending on the results of the feasibility study, complement outsourcing of 
translations with machine translation and post-editing of machine translation output 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of pages translated in-house with machine translation and post-editing of machine 
translation output 
Target 2020: 10% 
Implementation rate: 0% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

Following an assessment of the feasibility of introducing post-editing of machine translation output, in the 
last quarter of the year the Centre launched negotiated procedures to select external post-editors to work 
on documents in the legal, intellectual property and public health areas. As from 1 January 2021, the 
Centre will thus be able to complement the outsourcing of translations with the post-editing of machine 
translation output in specific domains and language combinations. Given that this will be implemented at 
the end of the Transformation plan, in 2020 the Centre was only able to perform tests on this working 
method. The tests were successful in the sense that the quality of the machine translation output in the 
selected domains and language combinations was deemed good enough for post-editing purposes.  

Action 1.25 Depending on the results of the financial feasibility analysis, integrate machine 
translation in the segments provided to external language service providers 

Indicator/Output: Integration rate of machine translation in the segments provided to external language service 
providers 
Target 2020: 100% of translation requests for EU languages analysed using machine translation for potential 
integration in the segments provided to external language service providers 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

The integration of machine translation in the segments provided to external language service providers 
was  an  important  objective  for  2020.  The  outsourcing  of  translation  tasks  with  machine  translated 
segments started on 1 January 2021. 

18 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Action 1.26 Finalise the integration of the new tool to manage the translation of EU trade 
marks as a back-up solution 

Indicator/Output: Integration rate of the tool to manage the translation of EU trade marks 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 85% (weighting of the action within the activity: 3%) 

The aim of the P4 project developed together with the EUIPO was to make sure that the present workflow 
tool used to manage the translation of EU trade marks would be complemented by a back-up solution in 
the case of failure of the main system. However, the new solution was not completed by the end of 2020 
and implementation of the P4 project will continue in the first quarter of 2021.  

Action 1.27 Provide technical and organisational support for the IATE2 database 

Indicator/Output: Implementation rate of IATE2 features according to the interinstitutional project plan 2020 
Target 2020: 100% of planned developments of IATE2 according to the interinstitutional project plan 2020 
Implementation rate: 80% (weighting of the action within the activity: 3%) 

Technical work in 2020 focused on continuous user support and the implementation of numerous change 
requests validated by the IATE2 Task Force, including the redevelopment of the entry creation and data 
modification modules to increase functionality and optimise their performance. Other highlights of the 9 
releases deployed in 2020 were user preferences, collections exports, new fields and metadata in the 
data structure, on-demand public IATE downloads, enlarged statistics including user statistics, a watch 
mechanism  to  monitor  changes  on  selected  entries  and  an  automatic  merge  feature.  Two  awaited 
developments  were  delayed  (a  terminology  project  management  module  -  requirements  finalised  in 
September- and an internal IATE SDL plug-in) and will be delivered in 2021. The migration of the IATE1 
history  (creations,  modifications,  deletions)  was  completed  in  November  with  the  transfer  of  over 
78 million  transactions  from  the  old  system.  Documentation  was  updated  regularly  and  enriched  with 
video tutorials. 

The interinstitutional collaborative platform, EurTerm, was fully revamped and made available to EU staff 
on 30 June 2020. 

Other activities related to follow-up on interinstitutional terminology work with quarterly monitoring via a 
scorecard, coordination meetings for interinstitutional exchanges of the IATE Management Group and 
specific working groups were held in 2020, with additional virtual meetings. Particular support was given 
to the Commission’s DG SCIC in advance of the upcoming migration of their glossaries into IATE and 
their request to incorporate features adapted to interpreters’ needs. 

Action 1.28 Offer Joint Training Ventures (JTV) 

Indicator/Output: Number of JTV offered 
Target 2020: 1 
Implementation rate: 0% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

During the last few years, the Centre offered Joint Training Ventures (JTVs) in the field of quality control 
and evaluation of outsourced translations to the interinstitutional community. During the JTVs, the quality 
control approach at the Centre as well as the Centre’s system for evaluating outsourced translations was 
presented  to  inhouse  revisers  and  revisers  from  other  EU  institutions.  In  2020,  the  JTV  could  not  be 

19 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
organised because of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, a remote workshop on the same topic was 
organised on 10 December 2020 for in-house translators recruited in 2020. 

Action 1.29 Analyse the financial impact of integrating bilingual files in the Centre’s pre-
processing workflow for the EU institutions 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of feasibility analysis on the integration of bilingual files in the Centre’s pre-
processing workflow for the EU institutions 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

Considering  the  systematic  use  of  Euramis  for  pre-translation  and  feeding  the  same  interinstitutional 
translation memories (TM) system, the availability of the bilingual files exchange functionality and the TMs 
update functionality for clients, the conclusion is that the same objective under this action was achieved 
through different means than those initially planned.  

Action 1.30 Establish a central repository of information to follow up and centralise 
information on interinstitutional cooperation on an operational level 

Indicator/Output: Repository established 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 1%) 

One  of  the  actions  of  the  2019-2020  Translation  Quality  Assurance  Action  Plan  was  to  establish  a 
repository  of  information  to  follow  up  and  centralise  information  on  interinstitutional  and  international 
cooperation at operational level The repository, to which all participants in various interinstitutional and 
international events have access via the Centre’s intranet, gathers information on all the events at which 
the Centre is represented, topics raised and main actions taken or to be taken. The repository is a useful 
follow-up tool on interinstitutional participation. 

20 

 
 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 2 
SUPPORT ACTIVITIES 

The Centre has attributed a weighting of 18% to this activity. The overall implementation rate was 88.9%. 

Action 2.1 Depending on the results of the feasibility study and the status of the 
interagency e-recruitment project, select the best option for the development of a new e-
recruitment tool 

Indicator/Output: Selection of best option for the development of a new e-recruitment tool 
Target 2020: Best option selected for the development of a new e-recruitment tool 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 22%) 

An e-recruitment tool was selected with the provider, Oracle (contract signed), and the e-selection tool 
Systal  was  implemented.  The  system  went  live  on  21 September  2020  with  the  first  four  vacancies 
published in October 2020. 

Action 2.2 Define an action plan corresponding to the results of the initial environmental 
assessment of the Centre 

Indicator/Output: Action plan corresponding to the results of the initial environmental assessment of the Centre 
Target 2020: Action plan corresponding to the results of the initial environmental assessment of the Centre is 
defined 
Implementation rate: 0% (weighting of the action within the activity: 11%) 

The initial Environmental Assessment was done in Q4 2020. The aim was to establish the current level 
of efficiency of environmental protection and management measures at the Centre. The assessment also 
provided a starting point for the introduction of an environmental management system and it revealed 
three  different  options  for  the  Centre  to  consider:  ISO  14001,  EMAS  and  EMAS  ‘easy  for  small  and 
medium enterprises. No action plan has been defined as this was postponed to 2021. 

Action 2.3 Depending on the results of the analysis, proceed to implement the reporting 
module in eCdT 

Indicator/Output: Implementation rate of the reporting module in eCdT 
Target 2020: 50% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 22%) 

In order not to make the workflow management tool eCdT too complex, the action has been modified to 
achieve a similar result and no reporting module has been developed in eCdT. Instead, the Centre has 
expanded its data extraction from eCdT to feed specific BO reports (e.g. data to be provided to clients 
concerning their activities and interactions with the Centre during the year. 

Action 2.4 Following the results of the analysis, begin to implement e-signature, as 
appropriate 

21 

 
 
 
 
Indicator/Output: Implementation rate of e-signature, as appropriate 
Target 2020: 50% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 22%) 

In December 2020, e-signature was fully implemented internally using the ARES tool and for documents 
exchanged with the European Commission such as MoUs. 

Signing documents is managed through a unique signature workflow for the Centre and the relevant DGs 
of the Commission, which speeds up and facilitates the signing process. 

Action 2.5 Continue to deploy certain IT systems to the cloud (subject to outcomes of 
relevant feasibility studies) 

Indicator/Output: Deployment rate of certain IT systems to the cloud 
Target 2020: 100% of identified systems deployed 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 22%) 

All services were deployed as foreseen. The speech-to-text module was deployed and allowed the Centre 
to launch new related services for its clients. The models used in machine translation were improved to 
reinforce  on-premises  resources  for  times  when  increased  performances  are  needed.  This  mixed 
approach of on-premises and cloud resources enables the Centre to cap internal costs and be in a position 
to raise performance levels as required in times of high workloads. 

The Azure Windows Virtual Desktop proof of concept was postponed to the maximum as the provider 
was unable to deliver a fully-hosted in Europe solution. The Centre has a duty to ensure a maximum level 
of protection for personal data and takes full note of the ‘Schrems II’ decision of the Court of Justice and 
its  consequences  for  the  data  protection  officer  and  IT  services  network.  In  line  with  this,  the  Centre 
continued with this action in order to assess the maturity of the solution. 

The proof of concept enabled the Centre to conclude that this option is not mature enough for the moment, 
both in terms of personal data protection and cost control. As this was the solution intended to replace 
the current teleworking infrastructure and to reduce the footprint – and cost – of the datacentre, the Centre 
promptly decided to study two alternative solutions to select a solution and start defining the architecture 
of its future teleworking solution without further delay.  

22 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 3 
MANAGEMENT AND SUPERVISION ACTIVITIES  

The Centre has attributed a weighting of 12% to this activity. The overall implementation rate was 83.3%. 

Action 3.1 Use the technical model to allow simulations in Activity Based Budgeting based 
on the information provided by Activity Based Costing 

Indicator/Output: Technical model for allowing simulations in ABB based on the information provided by ABC 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 17%) 

The ABB model has been used to run several simulations as in the case of calculating the impact of a 
new pricing structure or the price of new services. The model has also been used in the projects in the 
Transformation  plan,  e.g.  in  determining  the  price  of  the  new  transcription  service  or  to  help  the 
management decide between outsourcing or in-housing a new service. Additionally, the model was used 
to draw-up the Centre’s two budgets in 2020 and it provided the Centre with robust data on which to base 
decisions in a timely manner.  

Action 3.2 Finalise the preparation of the draft Strategy 2021-2025 

Indicator/Output: Preparation rate of the draft Strategy 2021-2025 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: N/A (weighting of the action within the activity: 0%) 

The  preparation  of  the  Strategy  2021-2025  has  been  postponed  until  the  new  Director  is  appointed. 
Nevertheless, in September 2020 the Centre’s Management Board adopted the extension of the 2016 
Strategy  (CT/CA-037/2016/02EN)  to  enable  the  Centre  to draw up  its Single  Programming  Document 
2022-2024. 

Action 3.3 Implement the Centre’s Transformation plan 2019-2020 

Indicator/Output: Implementation rate of the Centre’s Transformation plan 
Target 2020: 100% (Transformation plan implemented) 
Implementation rate: 98% (weighting of the action within the activity: 21%) 

2020  has  been  the  second  and  final  year  of  the  implementation  of  the  Centre’s  Transformation  plan, 
following the recommendations adopted on the basis of the external ‘Study on the Translation Centre as 
the Shared Linguistic Service Provider for the EU Agencies and Bodies’. The plan was drawn up following 
a bottom-up approach to foster staff engagement and empowerment. It set out a number of projects and 
actions to be undertaken between 2019/2020 in order to reinforce structural changes and put in place a 
financially sustainable business model based on translation technologies and the provision of added value 
services to clients.  

A  total  of  49  actions  were  included  in  the  plan  spread  across  four  transformation  areas  (Translation 
Technology, Human Resources, Quality and Client Orientation, and ‘Institutional Aspects). Each action 
was linked to one (or more) study recommendation(s) as well as to the Programme Initiation Document 
(PID) developed and managed with the EUIPO, where possible. The status of these actions was regularly 

23 

 
 
 
 
 
monitored and reported to the working group set up by the Management Board for the purpose of providing 
advice and support to the Centre on implementing the study recommendations.  

Some illustrative outputs of the plan are presented in the next chapter, Chapter 4 Additional Activities 
(eCV,  Systal,  and  the  System  for  Activity  and  Resource  Allocation  (SARA))  and  in  Part II,  Chapter 2, 
under Major Internal Developments (transcription service and optimised subtitling, eCdT4me mobile app, 
eCdT software as a service (SaaS), and the tailor-made service offer for the European Public Prosecutor’s 
Office (EPPO)).  

By the end of 2020, 46 out of 49 actions had been fully implemented. For the remaining three actions, the 
bulk of the work was completed for one, and preparatory work was underway for the remaining two –as 
their implementation depended on the final outputs of the Transformation plan. It is estimated that the 
combined implementation of both the Transformation plan and the PID stood at 98% by the end of 2020.  

Action 3.4 Consider the improved integration of services provided by external service 
providers in the Centre’s Business Continuity Management System 

Indicator/Output: Enhancement rate of the BCMS 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

The Centre reviewed its dependencies versus main providers. The review showed that mitigations were 
already in the Centre’s SLA agreements. The Centre used such clauses to increase the available network 
bandwidth to enable full teleworking during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Action 3.5 Implement actions to comply with the Internal Control Standards (ICS) 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of very important recommendations fully implemented 
Target 2020: 90% of very important recommendations outstanding on 1 January 2020 fully implemented 
Implementation rate: N/A (weighting of the action within the activity: 0%) 

The Internal Audit Service (IAS) rates its audit recommendations in three main categories: Critical, Very 
Important, Important (2). There were no very important recommendations pending in 2020. Neither has 
the Centre received any new very important recommendations since 2015 (see Part II, Chapter 5 for more 
details on the status of internal audit recommendations. 

Action 3.6 Revise and document processes and procedures 

(2) Rating of audit recommendations of the Internal Audit Service (IAS): 
1 – CRITICAL: Fundamental deficiency in the audited process that is detrimental at the audited DG/Agency/autonomous body level. Immediate and decisive 
action is required. Could lead to a reservation in the AAR 
2 - VERY IMPORTANT: Fundamental deficiency in the audited process that is detrimental to the whole process.  Does not lead to a reservation in the AAR if 
only one recommendation. Prompt action is required. Several very important recommendations related to the same process could lead to a reservation in the 
AAR. 
3 – IMPORTANT: Significant deficiency in the whole audited process or fundamental deficiency to a significant part of the audited process. Action is required 
as soon as possible but it may not delay the actions taken to address critical or very important issues. Does not lead to a reservation in the AAR 

24 

 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
 
Indicator/Output: Percentage of revised/documented procedures and processes (including re-ranking procedure, 
mandatory requirements for translation requests, guidelines on source documents and formats, communication 
mechanism during translation process) 
Target 2020: 95% of processes and procedures documented and up to date  
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

The  planned  documentation  and  revision  of  processes  and  procedures  continued  in  2020.  Three 
processes and nine procedures were revised or documented during the year. These cover translation and 
project management, programming, purchasing, and monitoring performance. The achievement rate met 
the target level. 

Action 3.7 Perform the quality audit programme 

Indicator/Output: Number of quality audits performed 
Target 2020: At least two quality audits performed 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

The quality audit plan 2020 included the audit of the process S52 (IT change management) and of the 
procedure M42_2 (Manage deputisations). It was fully implemented as the Centre quickly adapted its 
working  methods  to  overcome  the  restrictions  imposed  by  the  pandemic.  The  audited  activities  are 
efficient, compliant and under control. There are no deviations mentioned in the audit reports. The retained 
recommendations  and  suggestions  for  improvement  will  be  implemented  through  the  corresponding 
action plans. 

Action 3.8 Based on the results of the benchmarking, undertake a feasibility study for the 
improvement of the Centre’s business process management tools 

Indicator/Output: Feasibility study for the improvement of the Centre’s business process management tool 
Target 2020: Feasibility study completed 
Implementation rate: 0% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

The action has not started yet due to the finalisation of other documents set as priorities in the interest of 
the Service. 

Action 3.9 Implement talent management initiatives 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of implementation of talent management initiatives 
Target 2020: Talent management initiatives implemented 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

Leadership  and  managerial  skills  have  been  identified  through  the  annual  appraisal  exercise  by  the 
reporting officers. Staff were identified for further development of leadership and managerial competences 
through the Programme of managerial excellence with a referral from the Heads of Departments. The 
overall development of management staff and their performance has been implemented by reinforcing 
management skills through dedicated management training. Training on dealing with underperformance 
for  managers  was  given  in  October  2020.  The  Guidelines  on  managerial  development  adopted  in 
December 2019 have been successfully implemented in 2020. 

Action 3.10 Build capacity to translate into Irish to prepare for the end of the Irish 
language derogation planned for 1 January 2022 

25 

 
 
 
 
 
Indicator/Output: Status of reserve lists 
Target 2020: Reserve lists established 
Implementation rate: 80% (weighting of the action within the activity: 8%) 

A vacancy notice for the reserve list and recruitment of Irish translator(s) was published in March 2020 
with a closing date in April 2020. The pre-selection and selection phases were completed, the interviews 
and  tests  were  scheduled  for  the  beginning  of  August  2020,  but  were  put  on  hold  due  to  quarantine 
restrictions  for  the  COVID-19  pandemic.  The  selection  was  re-started  and  invitations  were  sent  to 
candidates for tests and interviews at the end of October 2020, however, due to a new lockdown in Ireland, 
the selection is on hold again. 

Action 3.11 Develop key staff capabilities (e.g. post-editing of machine translation output, 
management of translation memories) 

Indicator/Output: Percentage of staff identified to receive training in post-editing of machine translation output, 
management of translation memories 
Target 2020: 60% of staff identified 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

The Centre organised several seminars and ad-hoc training sessions. 65% of selected staff was trained 
on the use of machine translation, post-editing and evaluation of machine translation output. The target 
for 2020 has been reached successfully. 

Action 3.12 Start implementing the action plan arising from the 2019 external survey of the 
Centre’s key stakeholders 

Indicator/Output: % of implementation 
Target 2020: 50% 
Implementation rate: N/A% (weighting of the action within the activity: 0%) 

In 2020, the Centre’s management decided to launch the general client satisfaction survey, postponed 
from the previous year, in Q1/2021 in order to be able to make use of the new survey solution elaborated 
in 2020 between the EUIPO/CdT and the Publications Office. The reasons for this decision were a) that 
the individual operational data report for clients that will be included with each survey would be created 
on a yearly basis (covering data from January to December) - starting from January 2020 and b) that, for 
the sake of data analysis, it would be necessary to run the survey consistently and to cover always the 
same period of time (as otherwise identifying trends would not be possible).  

Hence, the first client satisfaction survey under the new approach will be launched in Q1/2021 as it will 
include  an  individual  report  for  each  client  containing  annual  data  from  January  to  December  2020. 
Subsequently, the Centre will draw up an action plan to be implemented by the end of 2021. 

Action 3.13 Approach new EU bodies to seek cooperation agreements 

Indicator/Output: Number of cooperation agreements signed with new EU bodies 
Target 2020: Cooperation agreements signed with new bodies, if any 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

On  11 November  2020,  the  European  Public  Prosecutor’s  Office  (EPPO)  and  the  Centre  signed  a 
cooperation agreement which has brought the Centre’s portfolio to 69 clients. 

26 

 
 
 
 
 
 
Given the confidential nature of documents handled by the EPPO, the Centre and the EPPO agreed on 
a specific on-premise machine translation solution, namely Custom Machine Translation as a Service, 
which will be available 24/7 to the client as from the beginning of 2021.  

This  service  is  based  on  a  dedicated,  secured  and  customised  version  of  the  eTranslation  software 
developed by the Commission's DGT and DG CNECT and complementary components developed by the 
Centre. To this effect, the DGT and the Translation Centre signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) 
concerning the local installation of eTranslation (eTra-Local). 

In practical terms, the Centre’s service package for the EPPO will include the provision of all necessary 
resources, including management of the solution, and the periodic linguistic maintenance, quality control 
and assessment of the translation engines. 

A specific agreement was also reached with the Research Executive Agency (REA) on the implementation 
of a new service (Paste ‘n’ Go) to respond to the agency’s translation needs as from 2021 under the e-
Grants/e-Procurements/SEDIA project. 

Action 3.14 Marketing of the Centre’s services 

Indicator/Output: Number of marketing activities undertaken 
Target 2020: 1 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

The  2020  marketing  priorities  focused  particularly  on  the  new  services  (transcription,  modularised 
translation,  optimised  subtitling,  language  consultancy)  and  tools  (eCdT4me  mobile  application,  new 
client  feedback  workflow),  developed  in  cooperation  with  the  EUIPO  as  part  of  the  Centre’s  biennial 
Transformation plan, or on the Centre’s own initiative (e.g. the new budget forecast functionality on the 
Client Portal; new Paste ‘n’ Go service). Given that due to the COVID-19 pandemic there was hardly any 
possibility  to  physically  meet  clients,  the  Centre doubled  its  efforts  to  provide  information via  bilateral 
video-conferences with clients, or in written format via leaflets, brochures, mailings, articles on the website, 
social media posts, or in audio-visual format (e.g. a videoexplaining the Transcription service). The Centre 
also  continued  to  share  its  expertise  in  interinstitutional  working  group  meetings  and  presented  its 
activities  in  different  online  events  organised  by  the  EU  institutions,  universities,  or  international 
organisations. 

25 out of 69 clients (36.2%) were met during the year, many of them more than once, to discuss specific 
needs or projects. For more details on these activities, please refer to the Highlights of the year 2020 
report. 

For the October Management Board meeting, a Spotlights on CdT activities brochure was produced to 
keep  members  up-to-date  on  the  Centre’s  main  achievements  during  the  COVID-19  period  and  on 
developments planned for the near future. 

Action 3.15 Organise an event to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Centre 

Indicator/Output: Event for the 25th anniversary of the Centre 
Target 2020: Event is organised 

27 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Implementation rate: 25% (weighting of the action within the activity: 8%) 

Preparations  were  well  underway  for  the  Centre’s  25th  anniversary  conference  planned  to  be  held  in 
October 2020 in connection with the Centre’s Management Board meeting. The venue had been reserved 
and the programme had been set up and agreed with management. However, due to COVID-19, the 
project had to be dropped. The corporate video, a film with real actors, intended for the event, for which 
the script had been finalised and agreed with a contractor before the summer, had to be put on hold due 
to the fact that filming could not take place. The Centre therefore decided to replace this project by a 
motion design video to be released in Q1/2021. 

Action 3.16 Create a single operational point of contact for clients to make it easier to 
manage client relations on an operational level 

Indicator/Output: Single operational point of contacts for clients created 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 100% (weighting of the action within the activity: 4%) 

One  of  the  important  recommendations  that  were  made  in  the  ‘Study  on  the  Translation  Centre  as  the 
Linguistic Shared Service Provider for the EU Agencies and Bodies’ concluded in 2018 was that the Centre 
should  create  a  single  point  of  contact  for  clients  to  make  it  easier  to  manage  relationships  during  the 
processing of translations. The Centre has acted upon this recommendation by moving the handling of all 
incoming  client  feedback  and  the  management  of  the  Client  Portal  from  the  External  Relations  and 
Communication  Section  (ERCS)  to  the  Workflow  Management  Section  (WMS).  Henceforth,  all  questions 
related to the handling of language services requests, the processing of client feedback (the ‘after sale service’) 
and the functioning of the Client Portal are in the hands of a single section (WMS). In addition, with a view to 
moving away from a ‘one size fits all’ approach which was questioned by some clients, the Centre decided 
to  create  a  linguistic  hub  in  its  Translation  Support  Department  by  renaming  one  of  its  sections  into 
Advanced Language Solutions (ALS) and integrating it in the Project Management Office. In this way, 
close cooperation between ALS and WMS should lead to a closer coordination of all language evolution 
projects and to a more tailored way of organising and building on customers’ needs.  

Action 3.17 Revamp the Centre’s intranet 

Indicator/Output: Revamped intranet in place 
Target 2020: 100% 
Implementation rate: 50% (weighting of the action within the activity: 8%) 

An interactive intranet for staff has been in place at the Centre since December 2012, where regular news 
items for staff are published and staff can voice their opinions on these items. More than 200 articles were 
published on the intranet in 2020.  

An intranet satisfaction survey was conducted at the beginning of the year to gather staff opinions on the 
current  intranet and  suggestions  for new  features  and  improvements.  The  results  of  this  survey  were 
analysed and shared with the Centre’s staff via an article published on the intranet.  

Following this, the scope of the project was agreed on with the Centre’s management. Mock-ups of the 
new homepage and other pages were proposed and validated by the management. A technical solution 
for the decentralised management of documents and content pages was agreed with and tested by the 
IT department. The External Relations and Communication Section reviewed the current intranet content 
with all departments. Implementation of the revamped intranet is scheduled to take place in 2021. 

28 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 4 
ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES 

Client Satisfaction Forms (CSFs) and Corrected Version Requests (CVR)  

At the end of August 2020, the Centre launched a new system for handling client feedback, based on the 
Corrected Version Request (CVR). Until August 2020, the Centre had processed a total of 1 512 Client 
Satisfaction Forms (CSFs), which is close to the figure processed for the whole year in 2019 (1 597 CSFs). 
The overall return rate of CSFs received versus jobs delivered (except for EU trade marks, Community 
designs and Euroclass terms) was 4.9%, which is well above the return rate for the previous year (3.9%). 

In 2020, EBA, DG EMPL, EMA, ESMA, and EASO were the clients who submitted most CSFs. 

Figure  3: Number of CSFs received from clients (2015-August 2020) 

3500

3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

0

5,8%

6%

4,5%

7,0%

6,0%

4,9%

5,0%

2,7%

3,9%

2188

2015

3262

2016

2479

2017

2864

2018

1597

2019

1512

2020

Number of CSFs

Yearly average per total of jobs delivered

4,0%

3,0%

2,0%

1,0%

0,0%

29 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The spread over the four categories (very satisfied, satisfied, fairly satisfied and not satisfied at all) was 
as follows: very satisfied: 17.3% (15.3% in 2019); satisfied: 45.2% (53.9% in 2019); fairly satisfied: 32.9% 
(25.0% in 2019); not satisfied at all: 4.6% (5.8% in 2019), which shows a slight decrease in the satisfaction 
levels of the Centre’s clients for the first eight months of 2020 compared with the same period in 2019. 

Figure 4: Spread of CSFs over the four satisfaction levels (per total of CSFs received). 

5%

17%

33%

45%

Very satisfied (translation quality
excellent)

Satisfied (translation quality
good)

Fairly satisfied (translation quality
acceptable)

Not satisfied at all (translation
quality not acceptable)

The error categories mostly marked by clients on the CSFs (both positive and negative) included, in order 
of importance: terminology, inaccuracy, mistranslation and style. There was only one complaint about 
delayed delivery, corroborating the high level of on-time delivery reported under Action 1.5. 

Finally,  as  this  closes  the  chapter  on  CSFs,  it  should  be  noted  that  between  1 January  2008  and 
15 August 2020, a total of 24 469 CSFs were processed by the Centre. The overall return rate (CSFs per 
jobs delivered) for this period was 4.59%. 

Figure  5: Number of CSFs received from clients (1 Jan 2008 to 15 August 2020) 

30 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Not satisfied at all
3227
13,2%

Very satisfied
3719
15,2%

Fairly satisfied
6250
25,5%

1 Jan 2008 and
15 August 2020:
24 469 CSFs

RETURN RATE

4.59%

Satisfied
11273
46,1%

Between  September  and  the  end  of  the  2020,  the  Centre  received  a  total  of  493  Corrected  Version 
Requests (CVRs). The following were the clients who submitted the majority of CVRs: EBA, EMA, ESMA, 
EDPS, EASO, EEA and SRB. 

With the introduction of the CVR, the Centre reduced the satisfaction levels to three categories instead of 
the former four, in order to match them with the marking scheme for translations produced by external 
language  providers  that  are  revised  in-house.  The  spread  over  the  three  categories  of  satisfaction 
(excellent, fit for purpose, not fit for purpose) was as follows: excellent (29.6%); fit for purpose (60.3%); 
not fit for purpose (10.1%). 

Figure 6: Spread of CVRs over the three satisfaction levels (per total of CVRs received) 

10,1%

29,6%

60,3%

Excellent

Fit for purpose

Not fit for purpose

31 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
The error categories highlighted by clients for all CVRs received in 2020 are: ‘terminology/reference3’, 
‘formatting’, ‘mistranslation/inaccuracy’, ‘grammar’ and ‘omission’. 

Translation budget planning 
Three times per year the Centre asks its clients for their budget forecasts in order to prepare the Centre’s 
preliminary draft budgets, draft budgets and amending budgets to be submitted to the Management Board 
at its meetings in March and in October respectively, or by written procedure. Until July 2020, the Centre 
had always asked its clients to provide their data by filling in an Excel spreadsheet. As from the start of 
the exercise covering the period 2021-2023, it launched a new section on its Client Portal for clients to 
encode their budgetary forecasts directly on this platform. 

This has the advantage that client staff with access to the financial information on the Portal will always 
have the budgetary data readily available when submitting requests for language services and checking 
the  related  monthly  invoices.  Another  advantage  of  the  new  functionality  is  that  for  the  product 
‘Translation’, the system directly calculates the potential impact on invoicing based on the historical data 
of  each  client  and  the  selected  priority  (normal,  slow,  urgent,  very  urgent).  Finally,  once  clients  have 
encoded their data for this budgetary exercise, they will be able to retrieve them in subsequent exercises, 
so that they will only have to adapt the earlier forecast rather than starting from scratch. 

This new functionality is currently under development to include the possibility for clients to also monitor 
their budgetary consumption. 

eCV and Systal 
In 2020, the Centre launched eCV which is a staff competency database. eCV is a module in Sysper that 
enables staff to advertise their profile within the Centre and enables management and the HR section to 
search and match specific profiles to operational needs. It is envisaged that eCV will become an integral 
part of HR processes and will contribute to more effective staff management and career guidance. 

Additionally,  the  Centre  has  introduced  Systal,  a  new  selection  and  recruitment  IT  tool.  Systal  is  an 
evolution of a similar system already in use at the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). It allows the 
Centre to be 100% paperless and it will enhance the reliability and availability of candidate data as well 
as the generation of reports and statistics. The system will cover all the phases of selection procedures, 
from drafting vacancy notices to onboarding new employees. 

System for Activity and Resource Allocation (SARA) 
In December 2020, a new system for tracking activities performed by staff was released. The system will 
help the Centre to gain a better understanding of the time and resources spent on different operational 
tasks. It will thus enable it to set and align prices invoiced for its current and future services with their real 
production costs.  

The implementation of SARA is the response to the request for cost transparency from the Centre’s clients 
and takes place in the context of the deployment of Activity Based Management (ABM) and Activity Based 
Costing (ABC) at the Centre. 

COVID-19 communication 
In 2020, what was particularly noteworthy were the Centre’s targeted communication efforts in relation to 
the pandemic. To raise awareness of the importance to respect security measures in the effort to contain 
the spread of COVID-19, the Centre asked its language teams for their versions of the slogan ‘Stay at 
home, save lives!’. The results, in the 24 official EU languages plus Luxembourgish, were used to create 

3 Reference material provided by the client. 

32 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
language-specific  posters,  which  were  shared  on  social  media  and  with  the  EU  Agencies’  Heads  of 
Communication and Information Network (HCIN). The Luxembourgish newspaper L’essentiel reported on 
this initiative.  

Terminologists  from  the  different  EU  language  services  redoubled  their  efforts  to  enrich  IATE  with 
concepts relating to COVID-19 and SARS-CoV-2 to facilitate and harmonise multilingual communication 
on this topic. 270 entries, with 9 020 terms in 24 official EU languages were compiled by April and the 
Centre made them available in an article on its website. Later on, the Centre’s IATE tool manager, along 
with terminologists from the other institutions, reported on their efforts in an interview by DGT Academy – 
on Radio Lingvistika and in an online event on the EU Open Data Portal organised by the Publications 
Office. 

33 

 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 5 
MAIN ACHIEVEMENTS CONTRIBUTING TO EU PRIORITIES  

Multilingualism is a major cross-cutting theme for the social, cultural, economic and educational sectors. 
It promotes diversity and contributes to the dissemination of ideas and knowledge in Europe. Translation 
has a pivotal role in this process due to the links it establishes between people and languages and the 
doors it opens to content and ideas.  

The  key  points  of  Commission  Communication 4 (COM(2005)  596  final)  on  a  framework  strategy  for 
multilingualism  and  Council  Resolution 5 (2008/C  320/01)  on  a  European  strategy  for  multilingualism 
remain fundamentally valid till today. In particular, the points on access to EU information, promoting a 
multilingual economy, strengthening social cohesion and stepping up assistance for translation still apply.  

The Centre empowers EU citizens and organisations to take advantage of the opportunities presented by 
multilingualism by facilitating access to services and platforms. It supports European coordination and 
standardisation  in  this  area  of  multilingualism.  As  part  of  the  Centre’s  mission  in  the  field  of 
interinstitutional cooperation and as the lead partner in managing the EU’s interinstitutional terminology 
database (IATE), the Centre delivered the IATE2 database with improved features and new functionalities 
for a better user experience and improved terminology management. 

The Centre also fosters professional networks to exchange specialist knowledge and share best practices. 
It does so most prominently via the Translation Contact Network (TNC) meetings which give clients the 
opportunity not only to express their needs in terms of translation and make suggestions for improvement, 
but also to learn about the latest technological breakthroughs and the new services offered by the Centre.  

Multilingualism  requires  the  deployment  of  standardised  and  interoperable  language  resources 
(dictionaries, terminology, text corpora, etc.) and applications for all languages – including the less widely 
used languages of the EU, across different domains. Being at the forefront of translation developments, 
the Centre has invested in recent years in state-of-the art technology and has created synergies that have 
yielded noticeable efficiency and quality gains for both the Centre and its clients. These include Euramis 
(the  Commission’s  translation  memory  is  continuously  enriched  by  all  the  Institutions’  translation 
services), eTranslation (the Commission’s neural machine translation system), the Centre’s own custom 
machine translation engines in the fields of public health and intellectual property, as well as IATE which 
are now fully embedded in the Centre’s translation process and workflow management activities.  

In 2020, the Centre provided exceptional language contributions in relation to the outbreak of the COVID-
19 pandemic. Throughout the pandemic, the Centre proactively offered its help to the European Centre 
for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) to enable the agency to efficiently communicate with experts 
and the wider public in a wide range of languages.  

To give a flavour of the requests that the Centre handled, there were translations of a vaccination portal 
as well as infographics, reports and videos on topics such as ‘Using face masks’, ‘Effective hand-washing’, 

4 Communication from the Commission to the Council, the European Parliament, the European Economic and Social 
Committee and the Committee of the Regions: A New Framework Strategy for Multilingualism. Brussels, 22.11.2005. 
COM(2005) 596 final. 

5 COUNCIL RESOLUTION of 21 November 2008 on a European strategy for multilingualism (2008/C 320/01) 

34 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
‘Advice on cleaning and disinfection measures in healthcare and other professional environments’ and 
‘Contact tracing’. 

At the end of the year, the Centre supported the European Medicines Agency (EMA) by translating into 
all EU languages an info-card on the side-effects of some medicines for patients of COVID-19. It also 
translated EMA’s European Public Assessment Report for the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.  

35 

 
 
 
 
PART II. 
MANAGEMENT AND EXTERNAL EVALUATIONS 

PART II A.  MANAGEMENT 

CHAPTER 1 
MANAGEMENT BOARD  

As the main pillar of the Centre’s governance structure, the Management Board ensures that the Centre 
functions  efficiently  and  achieves  its  mission  under  its  Founding  Regulation.  It  defines  the  Centre’s 
strategic  orientations,  goals  and  priorities  and  has  a  supervisory  role  with  general  responsibility  for 
budgetary and planning matters. 

The Management Board consists of representatives from the Centre’s clients (EU institutions, bodies and 
agencies),  representatives  from  each  of  the  28  EU  Member  States  and  two  representatives  from  the 
European Commission. The Chairman of the Management Board is Mr Rytis Martikonis, Director-General 
of the Directorate-General for Translation at the European Commission. The full list of the Management 
Board members with a breakdown by gender and nationality is provided in Annex IX to this report. The 
declarations of interests of Management Board members are published on the Centre’s public website. 

Management Board decisions are taken by its members either during meetings or by written procedures. 
The 25 decisions adopted in 2020, by topic, are as follows: 

Governance: 

  The Activity report 2019 was assessed by the Management Board as providing a faithful and 
comprehensive account of the work undertaken by the Centre. The Management Board noted 
that the overall implementation rate of the work programme for 2019 was 88.1% based on the 
initial budget and 89.1% based on the Amending budget 2/2019. 

  The Work  programme  2020 sets out the key milestones to be achieved in the Centre’s three 
main  areas  of  activity  (i.e. core  operations,  support,  and  management  and  supervision),  and 
shows how they relate to the strategic actions set out in the Centre’s strategy 2016-2020. The 
human and financial resources necessary for the proper implementation of each activity are also 
outlined there. 

  The  Draft  programming  document  2021-2023  was  considered  for  the  first  time  by  the 
Management  Board  in  January 2020,  ahead  of  its  mandatory  submission  to  the  relevant 
institutions on 31 January 2020 as the Centre’s input to the overall EU budgetary procedure. This 
planning document includes both annual and multi-annual programming (i.e. the main lines of 
action,  the  human  and  financial  resources  necessary  for  the  proper  implementation  of  each 
activity and the key milestones to be achieved), as well as information on staff policy. 

  The Strategy 2016-2020 was extended until the end of 2022 in order to enable the Centre to 

prepare the Programming document 2022-2024 for adoption in January 2021. 

  The  draft  amended  Decision  No 8  of  the  Management  Board  on  the  pricing  structure  of  the 
Translation Centre was modified to reflect the introduction of the transcription service in 2020. 

36 

 
 
  The  Management  Board  amended  the  decision  of  29 October  2014  on  the  committee  for  the 
assessment  of  the  Centre’s  annual  activity  report  to  compensate  for  the  departure  of  two 
committee members. 

  The  Management  Board adopted  the  decision  on  internal  rules  concerning  restrictions on the 
rights  of  data  subjects  in  relation  to  the  processing  of  personal  data  for  the  functions  of  the 
Translation Centre. 

Staff matters: 

  During 2020, the Management Board adopted the following decisions regarding staff matters: 

o  The  draft  decision  of  the  Management  Board  of  9 April  2020  applying  by  analogy 
Commission Decision C(2019) 6855 final of 4 October 2019 on procedures for dealing 
with professional incompetence. 

o  The draft decision of the Management Board of 9 April 2020 on the non-application of 
the Commission Decision on the maximum duration for recourse to non-permanent staff 
in the Commission services. 

o  The draft decision of the Management Board applying by analogy Commission Decision 
of 16 March 2020 amending Decision C(2013) 9051 of 16 December 2013 on leave. 
o  The  draft  decision  of  the  Translation  Centre  applying  by  analogy  the  Commission 
Decision  C(2020)  4818  of  20 July  2020  amending  the  Commission  Decision  C(2011) 
1278 of 3 March 2011 on the general implementing provisions for Articles 11 and 12 of 
Annex VIII to the Staff Regulations on the transfer of pension rights. 

o  The  draft  decision  of  the  Management  Board  on  the  appointment  of  the  Accounting 

Officer of the Translation Centre. 

o  The draft decision of the Management Board on the promotion of the acting Director of 

the Translation Centre. 

Budget and accounts: 

  The Management Board gave a favourable opinion on the final accounts for the financial year 

2019. 

  The Management Board adopted Amending budget 1/2020 and 2/2020 which inter alia included 
the updated forecasts received from clients, the result of the re-examination of all expenditure 
items, and the carry-over of the 2019 budget outturn to the 2020 Budget. 

  The Preliminary draft budget 2021 reflected the revenue estimates, including clients’ forecasts 
and  expenditure,  as  included  in  the  Programming  document  2021-2023  approved  by  the 
Management Board in April 2020. 

  The Budget  2021 reflects the updated estimates for revenue and expenditure, as included in the 

Centre’s Programming document 2021-2023. 

37 

 
 
 
CHAPTER 2 
MAJOR DEVELOPMENTS 

MAJOR INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS  
2020  was  the  second  year  of  implementation  of  the  Centre’s  two-year  Transformation  plan  (for  more 
details please refer to Part I, Chapter 1, Action 3.3), following the recommendations adopted on the basis 
of the external ‘Study on the Translation Centre as the Shared Linguistic Service Provider for the EU 
Agencies and Bodies’ conducted in 2017/2018. The Transformation plan covered four areas (translation 
technology; human resources; quality and client orientation; and institutional aspects) and its main aims 
were  to  introduce  structural  changes,  implement  state-of-the-art  translation  technologies,  including 
machine translation, and create new services for clients.  

Transcription service and optimised subtitling 
In June 2020, the Centre launched its new transcription service. It is based on state-of-the-art speech-to-
text technology, combined with post-editing to ensure accurate transcriptions of clients’ audio or video 
files.  In  the  second  half  of  the  year,  the  Centre  and  the  EUIPO  continued  to  develop  automatic 
transcription,  which  has  been  launched  as  an  additional  service  in  January 2021.  The  Centre  has 
improved its internal processes and now uses the same speech-to-text technology for transcription and 
subtitling, with clear synergies between the two services and important efficiency gains. The outsourcing 
of the service is now easier and the delivery times to clients have been reduced. 

Automatic transcription 
Automatic transcription is an automatic service consisting of the conversion of an audio/or a video file into 
written text through the use of speech-to-text technologies. In this case, as opposed to the transcription 
service, there is no human post-editing of the raw output produced by the speech-to-text technologies. 

Paste ‘n’ Go translation 
Paste ‘n’ Go is a translation service for texts up to four pages (6 000 characters), with simple formatting 
options,  and  the  translation  preparation  and  the  final  technical  check  are  fully  automated.  Instead  of 
uploading files, clients just paste the text to be translated in a specific area of the Client Portal and, on 
delivery of the translated text, copy it into their own systems. This service is invoiced as a slow priority 
service and has an indicative turnaround time of three days. 

Automatic translation 
This service allows clients to use a completely automated service for the translation of documents/texts 
based  on  the  combined  efforts  of  the  Centre’s  translation  memories  and  custom  machine  translation 
engines.  This  service  does  not  involve  quality  control  by  translators,  or  preparation  of  the  source 
documents  for  technical  processing  and/or  formatting  activities.  Automatic  translation  requests  are 
processed  immediately  and  their  processing  time  depends  on  the  size  of  the  documents/texts  to  be 
translated. 

eCdT4me mobile app 
In June 2020, the Centre released its new mobile app, eCdT4me, which can be downloaded from the 
Google Play Store and the Apple App Store. This app allows clients, contractors, and in-house translators 
to access services that were previously available only through the Centre’s web portals. With this new 
app, users can stay connected and interact with the Centre via their mobile phone or tablet which gives 
them greater flexibility in organising and following up on their work. 

eCdT software as a service (SaaS) 

38 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
In October 2020, the Centre prepared a playground to allow the DGT to see the functioning of the Centre’s 
eCdT translation workflow management platform. The playground was open to the DGT for approximately 
two months and the EIB linguistic services attended the presentations. There were nine presentations, 
two  full  demos  and  six  Q&A  sessions.  In  total,  the  Centre  invested  61.5  days  in  the  creation  of  the 
environment  and  the  data-sets,  and  gave  presentations  on  the  philosophy  of  the  system,  its  main 
functionalities, the Centre’s linguistic services, the automations, the business rules engine, etc. Ten staff 
members of the Centre were involved in the presentations and the preparatory work. In 2020, the eCdT 
workflow tool was also presented to the Court of Auditors. 

Tailor-made service offer for the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) 
The Centre continued to study specific client needs to analyse how they could benefit from ad hoc services. 
This approach led to a new kind of multiparty arrangement. In this arrangement, the Centre drew up an 
MoU  with  the  Commission’s  DGT  to  have  privileged  access  to  the  eTranslation  system  to  create  a 
dedicated and secured eTranslation environment for the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO). 
This arrangement allowed the EPPO to benefit from secure machine translation, while at the same time 
avoid duplication of efforts and solution fragmentation.  

MAJOR EXTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS  
Undoubtedly, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a major disruption for the Centre and its clients in 2020. 
The Centre faced up to the challenge by pushing its limits and quickly adapting its ways of working. Within 
the  first  two  weeks  of  the  crisis,  almost  all  administrative  procedures  became  paperless  and  the 
introduction  of  various  communication  tools  and  videoconferencing  systems  was  greatly  accelerated. 
Additionally, a teleworking environment was set up for all staff within the first few days, making 98% of 
the Centre’s functions possible.  

The realisation of clients’ budgetary forecasts, in terms of revenue, followed a nonlinear pattern alternating 
between  peaks  and  troughs  during  the  course  of  the  year.  At  times,  this  fact  has  created  significant 
uncertainties about the trajectory of the Centre’s income. Nevertheless, as the year drew to a close the 
Centre was able to balance the 2020 budget exercise.  

The pandemic outbreak and subsequent lockdowns forced the Centre to quickly adapt its ways of working 
to ensure continuity of its services. As a response to this crisis, the Centre optimised its internal translation 
resources, and it not only continued to offer its regular services to its usual standards but it also managed 
to develop new and tailor-made solutions for some clients, such as in the case of EPPO.  

Adaptation, creativity and flexibility are becoming part of the Centre’s new values. 

39 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 3 
BUDGETARY AND FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT  

3.1.  Revenue 

The Centre’s revenue is primarily composed of revenue received from invoicing its clients for services 
provided. It is subject to strict financial control and monitoring in accordance with the applicable regulatory 
framework. The Centre regularly contacts each client to request forecasts for their planned translation 
volumes and expenditure, and closely monitors clients’ budgetary forecasts and its expenditure. 

The Centre’s initial budget for 2020 (EUR 47.1 million) was subject to two amending budgets. Amending 
budget 1/2020 was adopted by the Management Board by written procedure on 24 June 2020 in order to 
include the new service ‘Transcription’. Amending budget 2/2020 was adopted by the Management Board 
by written procedure on 23 September 2020 in order to include updated forecasts received from clients, 
and to reflect the result of the re-examination of all expenditure items and the budget deficit from 2019. In 
the end, the Centre modified its use of the reserve for stability pricing in order to balance the budget. 

In total, 755 recovery orders were issued in 2020. Since the Centre’s clients are other EU bodies, revenue 
management carries a very low financial risk. 

Since the implementation of the new pricing policy, the Centre’s revenue for translation services has fallen 
systematically because of repeated text stored in the translation memories that has been translated and 
invoiced  to  clients previously.  As  a  result,  in  2020, the  clients  benefitted  from  a discount  of 11.7%  of 
document  pages  (37 503  pages  in  2020,  35 492  pages  in  2019),  or  the  equivalent  of  a  reduction  of 
EUR 3.6 million for the Centre’s revenue. Consequently, the average unit price paid by clients in 2020 for 
translation services was EUR 85.47, surcharges excluded. 

3.2.  Expenditure 

The Centre applies a partly decentralised financial circuit model. The financial transactions are initiated 
in the relevant departments by operational and financial initiators, and are verified centrally by financial 
verifying officers in the Finance Group. All payments (8 808 in 2020) and commitments (404 in 2020) are 
financially verified ex ante by verifying officers or, for payments below EUR 1 000, made from budget line 
3000  (External  translation  services)  directly  by  authorising  officers.  The  exceptions  to  this  rule  are 
payments  for  the  reimbursement  of  staff  for  mission  expenses  that  are  verified  by  the  Commission’s 
Paymaster Office (PMO). If errors are detected by the verifying officers, the files are sent back to the 
relevant  departments  for  correction  before  approval  by  the  authorising  officer  by  delegation  or  sub-
delegation. In addition to ex ante controls, the verifying officers perform ex post controls on payments 
from budget line 3000 on an ad hoc basis. The advantage of the partly decentralised financial circuit is 
that verifying officers can guarantee to the management that all financial transactions comply with the 
financial regulations. 

Additional information on budget expenditure and implementation is provided in Annex II – Sections C 
and D. 

3.3.  Financial Key Performance Indicators 

The financial Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) relating to the number of pages translated (and invoiced 
in pages) overall by the Centre (635 269 pages) show an increase in the Centre’s operations in 2020 by 

40 

 
 
  
 
 
0.7% compared with 2019 (-4 257 pages). While the number of EU trade mark pages received from the 
EUIPO (300 348 pages) decreased by 13.8% compared with 2019 (-47 928 pages), the number of pages 
other  than  EU  trade  marks  amounted  to  334 921  pages,  an  increase  of  15%  compared  with  2019 
(43 672 pages). 

At the same time, the number of pages invoiced to clients in 2020 decreased by 0.8%, to 589 651 pages. 
The  difference  between  pages  translated  (635 269  pages)  and  pages  invoiced  (589 651  pages)  is 
explained by the new pricing policy for the translation of documents (that takes into consideration the use 
of translation memories on invoicing) and pages translated for internal use (8 115 pages). As a result of 
this pricing policy, the Centre gave reductions to clients. In 2020, 11.7% of pages (37 503 pages) was 
delivered  to  the  Centre’s  clients  without  charge  (35 492  pages  in  2019),  which  corresponds  to 
EUR 3 568 980 in financial terms. The amount of the reduction is highly variable from month to month 
and from client to client, as it depends on the type of document concerned and the amount of retrieved 
text  from  translation  memories.  The  Centre  applies  a  similar  pricing  scheme  to  its  language  service 
providers to reflect their use of translation memories. In 2020, there was an average reduction of 17.6% 
in  terms  of  pages  from  language  service  providers  based  on  their  use  of  translation  memories.  This 
represents a financial reduction of EUR 1 192 636. 

Invoicing for EU trade marks reached 98.8% of the initial budget. The decrease in revenue is due to a 
slight decrease in the forecast for EU trade mark pages (98.4%) compared with the initial budget (305 289 
pages forecasted). 

EU trade marks represented around 40% of the total revenue from clients for pages delivered and invoiced 
over  the  last  few  years,  reaching 27.9%  in  2020  (36.3%  in  2019),  which  means  that  EU  trade  marks 
remain one of the key products in the Centre’s portfolio although one with a significantly decreasing trend. 
In terms of pages delivered, EU trade marks represented 50.9% of the total volume, i.e. less than in 2019 
(58.6%). 

The budget execution of commitments was 94.2% for expenditure which was almost the same result as 
in 2019 (94.4%). 

The indicator for late payments by the Centre's customers is slightly higher, with 67 late payments in 2020 
compared with 60 in 2019. On average, 7 payments were late at the end of each month (3 per month in 
2019). The average collection period for revenue is 26 days, which is significantly less than the statutory 
45 days. An increase in the number of late payments to language service providers was observed in 2020, 
with 75 payments executed after the legal deadline (19 payments in 2020), however the average delay 
was less than 3 days. In 2020, with 22 days, the average payment delay to language service providers 
remained stable compared to 2019. 

The budget outturn for the financial year 2020 represented EUR 2.2 million, namely EUR 5.1 million more 
than expected in the initial budget. In the budget revenue, revenue collected from the advance payment 
mechanism  amounting  to  EUR 1.4  million  (EUR 347 179  in  2019)  is  also  included.  After  taking  into 
consideration  the  cancellation  of  the  appropriations  carried  over  from  2019  (EUR 0.4  million),  the 
movements  on  the  reserves  (EUR 3.9  million)  and  the  budget  outturn  carried  over  from  2019 
(EUR - 2.1 million),  the  final  balance  of  the  budget  outturn  to  carry  forward  into  2020  amounts  to 
EUR 4.1 million. This surplus will increase the reserve for stability pricing in 2021. 

41 

 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
3.4.  Control results  

The overall implementation of the budget in 2020 was EUR 42.1 million, the equivalent of 94.2% of the 
total budget in Titles 1-3. This means that the target of 94% for the year has been reached. Title 1 has an 
implementation level of 95.7%, Title 2 reached 85.9% and Title 3 reached 96.4%. In order to ensure sound 
financial management, the Centre draws up monthly and quarterly budget reports. Various analyses are 
done and reported to the Centre’s management each month, such as for the implementation of revenue 
and expenses. For this activity, the Centre has drawn up a set of indicators as per Table 1 below.  

Table 1: Indicators for budget control 

technical  errors 

Indicator name 
Budget – Commitment execution 
%  of  technical  errors  in  commitments  corrected  before 
authorisation 
%  of 
authorisation 
%  of  technical  errors  in  recovery  orders  corrected  before 
authorisation 
Ex-post controls: payment orders verified errors detected 
Ex-post controls: order forms with errors detected 

in  payments  corrected  before 

Target 2020 
94% 
10% 

Result 2020 
94.2% 
6.4% 

1% 

4% 

1.5% 
1% 

0.9% 

2.8% 

0% 
0% 

3.5.  Costs and benefits of controls   

As outlined in the Centre’s Internal Control Standards (CT/CA-025/2017/01EN), Principle 10 under 
Control Activities is ‘the Translation Centre selects and develops control activities that contribute to 
the mitigation of risks to the achievement of objectives to acceptable levels’.  

To be effective, controls must be adequate to accomplish the intended or expected results. To be 
efficient, controls must be performed in the best way possible with the least waste of time and effort, 
making  the  most  of  available  resources.  While  controls  need  to  be  considered  first  for  their 
effectiveness and efficiency, the cost of controls ("economy") is another key element that has to be 
considered given the constraints in terms of human and financial resources. To be cost-effective, 
controls need to strike the right balance between effectiveness, efficiency and economy.  

In line with the Communication from the Commission on the guidelines for the Consolidated Annual 
Activity  Report  (CAAR) 6,  to  report  on  the  balance  between  the  effectiveness,  efficiency  and 
economy of controls, the Centre has identified relevant indicators on the efficiency, effectiveness 
and cost of controls. These indicators were established in the following areas:  

1.  Controls on financial transactions in budget line 3000.  

2.  Quality controls (EPQC) on translations provided to clients. 

3.  Reranking of external contractors. 

4.  Checks on the procurement process. 

5.  Ex ante evaluation(s) for the Centre’s main initiatives/projects. 

6 Communication  from  the  Commission  on  the  strengthening  of  the  governance  of  Union  Bodies  under  Article  70  of  the 
Financial Regulation 2018/1046 and on the guidelines for the Single Programming Document and the Consolidated Annual 
Activity Report. Brussels, 20.4.2020, C(2020) 2297 final 

42 

 
 
                                                      
The above indicators were drawn up in line with the relevant guidance7 on the cost-effectiveness 
of controls issued by DG BUDGET.  

These  controls  have  an  operational  dimension  covering  activities  which  are  linked  to  the 
implementation of the budget, and apply to both operational and financial aspects of the operations. 
Additionally, the controls can have either an ex-ante or ex-post perspective and their objective is to 
give reasonable assurance on the legality and regularity of the underlying transactions.  

The Centre quantifies the effort for the activities covered by the above indicators as listed in Annex 
III, using data from its system for activity and resource allocation (SARA). Other costs incurred (e.g. 
external costs) are added to the cost of these efforts.  

However,  as  SARA  has  been  introduced  only  in  December  2020,  the  Centre  does  not  have 
appropriate data for 2020 to help it determine the costs of the above controls for 2020. Therefore, 
the relevant fields in Annex III carry a token entry pro memoria (p.m.). 

Consequently, estimations of the costs and benefits of controls will evolve over time as the Centre 
obtains and accumulates more data on this.  

7 Guidance on the estimation, assessment and reporting on the cost-effectiveness of controls. DG BUDGET Updated edition 
– November 2019.  

43 

 
 
 
 
                                                      
CHAPTER 4 
DELEGATION AND SUB- DELEGATION OF THE POWERS OF THE BUDGET 
IMPLEMENTATION  

All  the  Authorising  Officers  by  Delegation  and  sub-Delegation of  the  Centre  have  read  the  Charter  of 
Authorising Officers and are well aware of their duties and responsibilities. Each year in January, they 
have to make a declaration of assurance for the budgetary operations that they carried out the previous 
year. This is sent to the Head of Legal Affairs and to the Internal Control Coordinator. 

The delegations and sub-delegations are linked to the duration of the Director’s mandate and in practice 
these delegations are enforced within ABAC.  

As stated in the delegations, the AOD, shall draw up a report once every quarter for financial operations 
under  his/her  delegation.  This  report  is  sent  to  the  Authorising  Officer  on  each  individual  budgetary 
commitment  entered  into  during  the  reporting  period,  and  in  the  framework  of  global  or  provisional 
budgetary commitments, on any legal commitment [framework contract, specific or simplified contracts 
(order forms)] entered into during the reporting period on the basis of said commitments. 

Every year at least one reconciliation exercise is done to check whether any inconsistencies exist between 
the delegations and the access rights in ABAC. 

The handling of delegations and sub-delegations is improved when any weakness is identified. 

44 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 5 
HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENT 

Following a decision by the budgetary authority, the establishment plan for 2020 remained at 193 posts. 
At the end of 2020, the Centre employed 185 staff, namely 47 officials and 138 temporary staff members. 

During 2020, the Centre appointed one official, and recruited twelve temporary staff members and seven 
contract staff members on long-term contracts, consisting of five contract staff members in FG III and two 
contract staff members in FG IV. It also recruited one contract staff member on a short-term contract in 
FG IV. The Centre managed 14 agency staff contracts (6 headcounts or 4.1 full-time equivalents (FTEs)). 
The selection of trainees was put on hold in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In 2020, the Centre organised one internal competition (Linguistic Administrator with Portuguese as main 
language),  three  external  selection  procedures  for  temporary  staff,  three  inter-agency  selection 
procedures  for  temporary  staff,  one  external  selection  procedure  for  contract  staff  and  two  selection 
procedures for contract staff based on EPSO lists. In addition, seven internal job offers for officials and 
temporary  staff  were  published  and  one  interinstitutional  vacancy.  A  total  of  327  applications  were 
received for the various selection procedures. 

With regard to staff training, 305 individual training courses were followed in 2020 (435 individual courses 
were planned), which resulted in 70.11% implementation of the training plan. The Centre also organised 
the following in-house group training courses: dealing with underperforming staff, archiving and closing 
files  in  nomcom/ARES  and  language  courses  or  linguistic  seminars  and  workshops  (three  French 
interinstitutional  language  courses,  three  German  interinstitutional  language  courses,  two  courses  in 
English writing and one individual English language course). Training sessions on post-editing of machine 
translation output, and on subtitling and editing, ARES for regular users, a course for transcript editors 
and a presentation on the calculation of salaries were also organised internally in 2020. 

At the end of 2020, the Centre performed a new benchmarking exercise. Operational and neutral staff 
(finance/control and linguistics) amounted to 81.8% in 2020. This percentage was similar to 2019 (80.8%). 
See Annex IV for more details. 

CHAPTER 6 
STRATEGY ON EFFICIENCY GAINS  

During 2020, the Centre focused on implementing efficiency gains in different areas that required special 
attention in order to make the Centre even more customer-oriented, to guarantee optimal functioning of 
the agency in spite of the circumstances, to focus more on improving and modernising certain processes, 
and to do more on an environmental level. 

As a result, the Centre has progressively optimised its structure and working methods and implemented 
cost efficiency measures in its business model, for example, by introducing the Commission tools (ABAC, 
SYSPER, MIPS and ARES). In 2020, the Centre introduced Systal, a new e-selection and recruitment IT 
tool covering all the phases of selection procedures and increasing efficiency and enhancing the reliability 

45 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
and availability of candidate data. The system, also contributing to the Centre’s paperless objective, went 
live in September 2020 with the first four vacancies published in October 2020.  

In order to modernise skills management, the Centre launched eCV, a staff competency database. eCV 
is a module in Sysper for staff to advertise their profile within the Centre. The database offers management 
and  the  HR  section  the  possibility  to  search  and  match  specific  profiles  to  operational  needs.  It  is 
envisaged that eCV will become an integral part of HR processes and contribute to efficient and effective 
staff management and career guidance. 

The Centre has taken steps to embrace information technology for its administrative work by introducing 
e-Procurement and e-Invoicing solutions. In December 2020, the electronic signature facility was fully 
implemented  using  the  ARES  tool  internally  in  the  Centre  and  for  documents  exchanged  with  the 
European Commission. This facilitates and speeds up signing procedures and increases efficiency.  

The Centre has successfully completed the reengineering of its Activity Based Costing (ABC) and Activity 
Based Budgeting (ABB) methodology and it is now in a position to have more accurate information on the 
actual cost of its products and services in a transparent way. In 2020, the ABB model has been used to 
run several simulations as in the case of calculating the impact of the new pricing structure and the price 
of new services.  

In December 2020, a new system for tracking activities performed by staff was released. This step was 
essential  to  help the  Centre  gain a better understanding of the  time  and  resources  spent  on  different 
activities and products. It will therefore enable the Centre to set and align the prices invoiced for its current 
and future services with their real production costs.  

The improvement of the quality of the Centre’s translation memories through regular maintenance and 
the  integration  of  machine  translation  in  the  Centre’s  workflow  contributes  to  the  consistency  of 
documents,  improves  quality  assurance  and  results  in  efficiency  gains.  In  the  context  of  the  Centre’s 
Transformation plan / PID, the translation memories’ update functionality was made available to all clients 
via the Client Portal. Clients can now send bilingual files and automatically update the Centre’s translation 
memories, which in turn will further increase efficiency.  

The improvement of eCdT, the Centre’s workflow management tool, continued in 2020. The automations 
introduced  have  reduced  the  time  spent  on  pre-,  mid-  and  post-processing,  service  monitoring,  work 
distribution and outsourcing. The translation workflow for documents was updated in order to include the 
development  and  the  integration  of  custom  translation  and  automatic  translation.  The  Centre  also 
integrated machine translation in the segments provided to external language service providers. This will 
further increase the efficiency of the Centre’s outsourcing model.  

During recent years, the Centre has improved its internal processes and now uses the same speech-to-
text technology for transcription, automatic transcription and subtitling, with clear synergies between the 
three services and important efficiency gains. In 2020, the Centre changed the subtitling tool. The same 
speech-to-text technology is now used for both subtitling and the new transcription service launched at 
the end of June 2020. The outsourcing of the service is now easier and delivery times to clients have 
been reduced. 

In  order  to  achieve  efficiency  gains  and  implement  the  reduction  of  posts  required  by  the  Budgetary 
Authority, the Centre started optimising its structure and decreased its establishment plan posts from 233 
posts in 2009 to 193 posts in 2018.I It still maintains this same number of posts (although this will change 
with the setting up of an Irish translation team). As a result, the Centre has had to optimise its working 

46 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
methods to be able to respond to new challenges and demands posed by its clients and stakeholders, 
and do more with less. In order to reduce this additional effort and burden on staff, major technological 
advances were needed in both the operational and support services. At the same time, the Centre has 
had to adapt and to innovate. To embrace new technology, there is a need for change management. The 
Centre’s staff requires training to update their skills and expertise to be able to successfully cope with the 
new services being offered to clients. In this way, technological changes have increased efficiency and 
productivity.   

CHAPTER 7 
ASSESSMENT OF AUDIT RESULTS DURING THE REPORTING YEAR  

7.1.  Internal Audit Service (IAS) 

The Centre has never received any critical recommendations from the Internal Audit Service (IAS) of the 
European Commission. 

In November 2020, the IAS performed an audit on planning and budgeting in the Translation Centre for 
the bodies of the EU (CdT). The objective of the audit was to assess the adequacy of the design and the 
effectiveness and efficiency of the management and control systems put in place by the Centre for the 
planning and budgeting processes. The Advance Draft Audit Report (ADAR) of the audit is expected by 
March 2021. 

7.2.  Internal Audit Capability (IAC, where applicable) 

The Centre currently has no internal audit capability. 

7.3.  European Court of Auditors (ECA) 

By the end of 2020, the Centre had not yet received an opinion on the annual accounts of 2020. In its report 
on the Centre’s annual accounts for the financial year 2019, the ECA issued the following opinions:  

•  Opinion on the reliability of the accounts: ‘The accounts of the Centre for the year ended 31 December 
2019 present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of the Centre at 31 December 2019, 
the results of its operations, its cash flows, and the changes in net assets for the year then ended, in 
accordance  with  its  Financial  Regulation  and  with accounting  rules  adopted by  the Commission's 
accounting officer. These are based on internationally accepted accounting standards for the public 
sector.’  

•  Opinion on the legality and the regularity of the transactions underlying the accounts: ‘Revenue and 
payments underlying the accounts for the year ended 31 December 2019 are legal and regular in all 
material respects.’  

In 2019, part of the audit of the annual accounts was performed by a private audit company. Based on the 
tendering procedure organised in 2017 for the supply of technical assistance services in the field of audits, the 
Centre’s annual accounts 2019 were audited by the external auditor Baker Tilly for the second time.  

In its auditor’s report on the Centre’s annual accounts for the financial year 2019, Baker Tilly gave the following 
opinion:  “In  our  opinion,  the  final  annual  accounts  of  the  Agency  present fairly,  in  all  material  aspects,  its 
financial position as at December 31, 2019, and the results of its operations and its cash flow, for the year 
then  ended,  and  are  prepared  in  accordance  with  its  Financial  Regulation,  and,  in  accordance  with  the 

47 

 
 
 
accounting  rules  adopted  by  the  Commission's  accounting  officer,  and  the  International  Public  Sector 
Accounting Standards, as issued by the International Public Sector Accounting Standards Board.”  

7.4.  Quality audits 

The  quality  audits  successfully  completed  in  2020  provide  additional  assurance  to  the  Centre’s 
management on the compliance, effectiveness and operation of the processes and procedures audited. 

There  were  no  major  deviations  registered  for  the  processes  and  procedures  audited  in  2020. 
Nevertheless,  a  series  of  suggestions  and  recommendations  were  formulated  and  included  in  the 
corresponding action plans for their optimisation. 

CHAPTER 8 
FOLLOW-UP OF RECOMMENDATIONS AND ACTION PLANS FOR AUDITS  AND 
EVALUATIONS 

Internal Audit Service (IAS) 
In 2020, no follow-up audits were performed by the Internal Audit Service (IAS).  

Out of the four recommendations that were open at the beginning of 2020, one of them has been declared 
to IAS as ready for review, while the other three remained open. All four recommendations relate to the 
IAS 2019 audit on eCdT, the workflow management tool to manage client requests for translations. All 
four recommendations were prioritised by IAS as Important. The remaining three open recommendations 
were closed by the end of 2020. 

Internal audit capability (IAC) 
The Centre currently has no internal audit capability. 

OLAF 
The Translation Centre has not received any specific recommendation from OLAF in recent years. 

CHAPTER 9 
FOLLOW-UP ON OBSERVATIONS FROM THE DISCHARGE AUTHORITY 

Following the European Parliament’s observations in the 2018 discharge decision, the Centre gave its 
reply to the Parliament. Of the ten observations made by the Parliament, actions have concluded in five 
of them, and five are ongoing. 

The following actions on performance are ongoing: 

•  The European Parliament invited the Centre to further develop the key performance indicators to 
assess the outcome and impact of its activities to gain qualitative advice on how to provide more 
added value for the Centre’s output and improve the Centre’s business model. 
The Centre answered that given that its primary mission is to provide translations and related 
language services to the EU institutions, agencies, offices and bodies, it uses input and output 
indicators to ensure the implementation of its planned actions and to evaluate whether or not its 

48 

 
 
 
 
 
activities  achieved  the  intended  objectives  or  outcomes.  These  indicators  measure  the  direct 
outcome associated with the activities undertaken by the Centre. 
The  Centre  has  also  established  strategic  key  performance  indicators  (SKPIs)  linked  to  its 
Strategy 2016-2020. The Centre’s SKPIs have multidirectional perspectives combining those of 
the balanced scorecard as well as five sustainability areas. 
As a result of its Transformation plan, the Centre has delivered new types of linguistic services 
targeted to its clients’ needs. 

•  The European Parliament urged the Centre to adopt a sustainable business model in accordance 
with the Transformation plan drawn up following the external study; it also encouraged the Centre 
to fully implement those actions which would help adapt the new business model to technological 
advances, such as to web translation and speech recognition projects. 
The  Centre  replied  that  the  Transformation  plan  would  implement  a  financially  sustainable 
business model based on translation technologies and the provision of added value services to 
clients. The various projects and actions of the Transformation plan covered the following areas: 
translation technology, human resources, quality and client orientation, and institutional aspects. 
The Transformation plan comprises five IT projects: Quality Enhancement, Machine Translation, 
Speech  Recognition  and  Web  Translation,  Modernisation  of  IP  Translation  Systems,  and 
Modernisation of IT Infrastructures. The implementation of both the Transformation plan and the 
projects is being monitored and reported on. 

•  The European Parliament noted with concern that the Centre has not completed the anti-fraud 
plan which was targeted to be implemented by the end of 2018 and which had an implementation 
rate of 66% in 2018; it urged the Centre to speed up the implementation of that plan. 
The Centre replied that the actions which had not been finalised in the anti-fraud plan in 2018 
have  been  added  to  the  set  of  new  measures  in  the  anti-fraud  plan  2019-2020.  This  set  of 
measures is to be completed by the end of 2020. 

The following action concerning procurement is ongoing: 

•  Regarding  procurement  procedures,  the  Centre  has  introduced  e-invoicing  but  not  the  e-
tendering and e-submission tools launched by the Commission. The European Parliament called 
on the Centre to introduce all the necessary tools to manage procurement procedures and to 
report to the Discharge authority on their implementation. 
The  Centre  answered that e-tendering  was  put  in  place  in  the  Translation  Centre  in  2019, e-
submission should have been put in place at the beginning of 2020 but had been delayed due to 
the Covid-19 crisis. 

Other comment: 

•  The European Parliament encouraged the Centre to pursue the digitalisation of its services. 
The Centre replied that in the context of the revolution that is sweeping through translation, with the 
widespread  use  of  machine  translation,  it  has  concentrated  on  increasing  its  productivity  and  its 
service level. The sustainable business model that is being developed is based on the use of state-
of-the-art language technologies and the expertise of the Centre’s staff. 

. 

49 

 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 10 
ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT  

The Centre is currently not in possession of an ISO 14001 or EMAS certificate but the organisation is 
studying the possibility of starting the procedure in the near future. Nevertheless, the Centre is committed 
to continuously improving its environmental performance and relies on the general principles of EMAS 
and ISO 14001 in its daily practices. In this spirit, the Centre compiled its Initial Environmental Review in 
2020. 

Waste-sorting and recycling is possible at several locations throughout the premises and staff members 
actively use this opportunity. The Centre sorts / recycles paper, glass, plastic, organic waste and batteries 
and  in  acknowledgement  of  its  environmental  efforts  the  Centre  was  awarded  once  again  the 
SuperDrecksKëscht certificate in April 2020 (a Luxembourgish environmental initiative) which is valid until 
March 2022.  

Concerning air-conditioning  devices and  fridges,  the  Centre applies  preventative maintenance  and  no 
refrigerant losses were reported in 2020.  

The Centre endeavours to set an example in this area and replaced its petrol-fuelled agency car with a 
semi-electric car in 2020. In addition, the Centre started negotiations with the building owner to provide 
more charging stations for electric cars. 

CHAPTER 11 
ASSESSMENT BY MANAGEMENT 

2020 was an exceptional year in many respects. First of all, it was the final year of the Transformation 
plan based on the 2017 Study on the Translation Centre as the Linguistic Shared Service Provider for the 
EU Agencies and Bodies. The study had concluded that changes were required to give the Centre long-
term sustainability and that a key factor was technology. By the end of the Transformation plan, the Centre 
is  emerging  as  a  forward-looking  EU  language  service  provider.  It  is  equipped  with  state-of-the  art 
technologies based on AI, in particular neural machine translation and speech-to-text technology, and 
ready to offer a broader range of linguistic services in an efficient and cost-effective way. 

Secondly, in March 2020 the Covid-19 pandemic took centre stage and posed a serious challenge for the 
continuity of the Centre’s services. In order to avoid interruptions from the very outset of the pandemic, 
the Centre had to take immediate action in terms of internal rules, workflows, work organisation and IT 
infrastructure. The flexibility and good will of the staff enabled the Centre to ensure production continuity, 
and deadlines and quality expectations were met at all times. The impact of this crisis was not felt by the 
clients  because  the  Centre  never  failed  to  deliver.  Despite  the  exceptional  working  conditions,  the 
transformation projects pushed on and were completed and delivered on time, in line with the production 
objectives. 

After  several  years  of  budget  deficits,  the  end  of  2020  results  show  a  fully  balanced  budget  and  an 
increased  reserve  for  stability  pricing.  This  was  achieved  in  spite  of  the  Covid-19  disruptions  and  its 
investment in the projects included in the Transformation plan. On the whole, the management considers 
that 2020 represents a turning point for the Centre and provides a solid basis for its future. 

50 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
PART II B.  EXTERNAL EVALUATIONS 

In 2020 there were no external evaluations made of the Centre. 

51 

 
 
 
 
 
PART III. 
ASSESSMENT OF THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEMS  

52 

 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 1 
EFFECTIVENESS OF INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEMS   

3.1.1. Compliance with internal control systems 
The  Centre’s  management  assessed  the  administrative  internal  key  controls  in  the  process  areas  of 
procurement,  financial  management,  human  resources  management,  general  administration,  general 
support and IT processes, governance and strategic planning and programming (including monitoring and 
reporting), and concluded that they were present and functioning in all five components of the internal 
control framework. (8) 

Figure 7: Compliance with internal control principles, by component 

Control environment

Risk assessment

Control activities

Information and communication

Monitoring activities

3.1.2 Effectiveness of internal control systems 
The Centre’s management reviewed the effectiveness of the implementation of the characteristics of the 
17 principles pertaining to the five components of its internal control framework. 
Figure 8: Effectiveness of internal control principles 

t • 1. Commitment 
n
e
to integrity and 
m
ethical values
n
o
• 2. Oversight by 
r
i
v
n
e

the 
Management 
Board

l

o
r
t
n
o
C

• 3. Structures
• 4. Commitment 
to competence

• 5. 

Accountability

t • 6. Objectives
n
e
• 7. Risks
m
• 8. Fraud
• 9. Changes 

s
s
e
s
s
a
k
s
i
R

s • 10. Mitigation 
e
i
of risks
t
i
v
i
t
c
a

• 11. Technology
• 12. Policies and 

procedures

l

o
r
t
n
o
C

s • 16. Ongoing 
e
i
assessments
t
i
v
i
• 17. Internal 
t
c
a

control 
deficiencies

g
n
i
r
o
t
i
n
o
M

communication

communication

• 15. External 

n • 13. Quality 
o
i
information
t
a
c
• 14. Internal 
i
n
u
m
m
o
c
d
n
a
n
o
i
t
a
m
r
o
f
n

I

Within  the  risk  assessment  component,  as  regards  the  operational  structure,  the  Centre  is  unable  to 
implement mandatory mobility because of its size. The number of jobholders with sensitive functions is 
limited to 8. Six of them have been in their post for less than five years. One of the two other jobholders 
has been in the post for seven years. However, the Centre’s management assessed that the long-term 
experience and positive outcomes of audits provided enough proof that the risk was well mitigated and 
considered that the mitigating controls and additional checks in place reduced the risk to an acceptable 
level. 

(8)  Annex  1  -  Internal  control  framework  and  related  requirements  of  the  decision  on  internal  control  standards  for  the 
Translation Centre (CT/CA-025/2017/01). 

53 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
 
 
 
 
 
 
The  COVID-19  pandemic  constitutes  an  unprecedented  challenge  with  organisational  consequences 
such  as  the  obligation  to  ensure  safe  social  distancing  to  avoid  breaching  the  Centre’s  duty  of  care 
towards its staff. In 2020, one ex ante exception was handled in accordance with the procedure for the 
recording  of  exceptions.  The  Centre  introduced  a  paperless  procedure  for  the  ‘certified  correct’ 
endorsement (« Conforme aux faits ») of transactions pertaining to budget line 3000 ‘External translation 
services’  and  requested  its  language  service  providers  to  send  all  their  invoices  in  electronic  format 
instead of by paper. 

The  Authorising  Officer  took  into  consideration  the  fact  that  the  Centre  mainly  operates  framework 
contracts with external language service providers to outsource language services. These contracts have 
a  maximum  duration  of  four  years.  Currently,  there  are  797  framework  contracts  signed  under  four 
thematic groups. In 2020, such contracts were used for 86.58% of the Centre’s outsourcing operations. 
The remaining 13.42% consisted of individual contracts awarded via negotiated procedures without the 
publication of contract notices. 

Weaknesses  leading  to  reservations  relate  to  the  reasonable  assurance  about  the  use  of  resources, 
sound financial management, legality and the regularity of underlying transactions. Such weaknesses can 
be defined on the basis of quantitative or qualitative criteria. As regards the quantitative criteria on which 
to base a decision about whether to include a reservation, the threshold of 2% of the budget managed in 
2020 was used as a reference to define materiality. The materiality threshold of 2% of the budget of EUR 
46 804 684  amounts  to  EUR  936 094.  That  threshold  was  reached  by  the  value  of  budget  line  3000 
(EUR 10 410 000).   

For the management of its outsourcing activity, the Centre operates a highly automated workflow system 
with an integrated ranking system based on the performance assessment of each service provided. This 
ensures that the economically most advantageous offer is selected. The technical assessments of each 
outsourced translation done by in-house translators are also integrated into the workflow system to ensure 
the audit trail. 

Negotiated  procedures  of  low/very  low  value  enable  the  Centre  to  meet  requests  for  translations  in 
language combinations not covered by framework contracts. In such cases, the tender is published on a 
specific portal integrated in the automated workflow system in eCdT, the workflow management tool to 
manage client requests for translations ensures that the best price is retained. 

The recent IAS 2019 audit on eCdT concluded that the management and internal control systems set up 
by CdT for the translation process and for the eCdT as the workflow automation tool are overall adequately 
designed,  efficient  and  effective.  Notwithstanding  that  positive  conclusion,  the  auditors  identified  four 
important  areas  where  changes  are  recommended  to  further  improve  the  effective  functioning  of  the 
process  and  the  related  controls.  None of  their  four  recommendations  were  rated as  ‘critical’  or  ‘very 
important’. 

The rate of technical errors detected by the verifying agents and corrected in previous years for the budget 
line 3000 is very low. In view of the above, the Director decided therefore that the control system for 
outsourcing and the control chain are adequately adapted to the level of risk accepted (including primary 
and secondary controls and supervision methods, as well as possible compensatory actions within the 
system), and that this control system was effective overall, although some improvements are needed. 

The  controls  and  supervisory  checks  provided  no  evidence  of  significant  and/or  repetitive  errors  in 
reporting by departments, reporting on budget execution, reports by the accounting officer and financial 

54 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
reports, reporting on delegations, reporting on human resources, security, information security, personal 
data protection, business continuity, translation quality or ex post financial control. 

The key financial and non-financial indicators on legality, regularity and sound financial management (see 
Annex  IX  –  Key  indicators  and  parameters)  show  no  instances  of  inadequate/ineffective  controls  that 
would expose the Centre to key risks. 

The Centre’s management concluded that the outcome of the annual revision of indicators (i.e. annual 
indicators’ dashboards) is aligned with the matrix of responsibilities for the execution and reporting on the 
related annual work programme. The indicators (i.e. implementation rate of the annual work programmes 
and of  the  strategy)  demonstrated that  the  quarterly  performance  reviews  carried  out by  the  Centre’s 
management comply with the objective of ongoing monitoring of activity at the Centre. 

Performance and effectiveness reviews on a quarterly basis, regular reviews of the achievements of the 
work programme and reporting on project management on a monthly basis are key controls that have 
become increasingly embedded in the routine work of all departments. The process of performance review 
functions as it should at the Centre, and facilitates effective follow-up on the implementation of the annual 
work  programmes  and  strategy.  As  the  process  is  constantly  evolving,  improvements  continue  to  be 
identified and tackled in areas such as the robustness, relevance and analysis of indicators as well as the 
accessibility of the corresponding evidence. 

Management  considered  that  the  monitoring  reviews  showed  no  instances  of  inadequate/ineffective 
controls that would expose the Centre to key risks. Following the review, the Director concluded that the 
risk management process and paperless processes involving e-signature should be prioritised in order to 
accelerate the Centre’s digital transformation. 

3.1.3 Prevention, detection and correction of fraud  
The anti-fraud strategy was adopted by the Centre’s Management Board in October 2016. As part of the 
anti-fraud action plan and in order to further improve awareness of fraud, information sessions on ethics 
and integrity were organised for staff. These sessions are mandatory for new staff and are provided as 
part of the induction programme.  

The actions listed in the anti-fraud action plan 2019-2020 have been achieved. In particular, in cooperation 
with key staff, a list with red flags was established for IT and the guidelines concerning mission expenses 
and travel were reviewed.  

Implementation of the anti-fraud action plan is embedded in the annual work programme of the Centre 
and is therefore carefully monitored during the year. 

No whistleblowing cases were registered and no files were submitted to OLAF in 2020. The Ombudsman 
did not receive any complaints concerning the Centre in 2020. 

As regards the prevention of conflicts of interests, all members of the Centre’s staff must respect the 
European Code of Good Administrative Behaviour in their relations with the public and are discouraged 
from having direct contact with language service providers in order to avoid any conflicts of interests.  

This is complemented by the Centre’s policy on the prevention and management of conflicts of interest 
which  is  based  on  the  guidelines  on  the  prevention  and  management  of  conflicts  of  interest  in  EU 
decentralised agencies. Declarations of conflicts of interest are signed by all staff on entering the service 
and during selection and procurement procedures.  

55 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The Centre’s Director and Heads of Department in addition to members of the Management Board sign 
declarations of conflicts of interest which are published on the Centre’s website. An annual exercise on 
ex post controls of declarations of interest by members of the Management Board also takes place. 

CHAPTER 2 
CONCLUSIONS ON THE ASSESSMENT OF THE INTERNAL CONTROL SYSTEMS  

Based on all the facts presented in the previous sections, and in the light of the opinions expressed by 
the Court of Auditors on the reliability of the accounts and on the legality and regularity of the transactions 
underlying the accounts, it can be stated that the Centre operates in an environment where risks are 
appropriately managed. 

Taking into consideration that challenging unpredictable and dynamic factors have been introduced by 
the pandemic in its risk environment, the Centre considers that its control systems are fully effective overall 
with some improvements needed to further increase the Centre’s resilience. 

Furthermore, the control procedures put in place guarantee the legality and regularity of the underlying 
transactions, and also guarantee that the resources assigned to the activities described in this report have 
been  used  for  their  intended  purpose  and  in  accordance  with  the  principles  of  sound  financial 
management. 

56 

 
 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER 3 
STATEMENT OF THE OFFICER IN CHARGE OF RI SK MANAGEMENT AND 
INTERNAL CONTROL COORDINATION   

I declare that in accordance with the decision on internal control standards for the Translation Centre, I 
have reported my advice and recommendations on the overall state of internal control in the Translation 
Centre to the Director. 

I hereby certify that the information provided on the overall state of internal control in Part II of the annual 
activity report and in its annexes is, to the best of my knowledge, accurate and complete. 

Luxembourg, 31 January 2021 

(signed)  
Mr Maurice Van Weyenberg 

57 

 
 
 
 
 
PART IV. 
MANAGEMENT ASSURANCE 

CHAPTER 1 
REVIEW OF THE ELEMENTS SUPPORTING ASSURANCE 

The  declaration  of  assurance  provided  by  the  authorising  officer  is  structured  around  four  pillars  or 
‘building blocks’: 

(1) Assessment  by  management  (controls  and  supervisory  checks,  monitoring  reviews,  and 

self-assessments). 

(2) Assurances  and/or  recommendations  from  independent  monitoring  and  assessment  sources  (data 

protection, results from audits and evaluations during the reporting year). 

(3) Follow-up of reservations and action plans resulting from audits from previous years and follow-up of 

observations from the Discharge authority. 

(4) Management assurances. 

(1)  Assessment  by  management  (controls  and  supervisory  checks,  monitoring  reviews,  and 
self-assessments). 

After careful review of the results of the controls and supervisory checks, monitoring reviews and 
self-assessments, the Centre’s management considered that the actions implemented to date 
gave  reasonable assurance  as  to  the  architecture of the  internal  control  system  and  that this 
system was operating correctly as a whole, and the Centre considers that its control systems are 
fully effective overall with some improvements needed to further increase the Centre’s resilience. 

(2) Assurances and/or recommendations from independent monitoring and assessment sources (data 
protection, results from audits and evaluations during the reporting year). 

Data protection is well understood at the Translation Centre, which is a mature organisation in 
this  respect.  In  particular,  in  2020,  the  Centre  did  not  experience  any  data  breaches  and  no 
complaints were addressed to the data protection officer or to the EDPS concerning processing 
of personal data. 

(3) Follow-up of reservations and action plans resulting from audits from previous years and follow-up of 
observations from the Discharge authority. 

None of the remaining three open recommendations resulting from the IAS audit in 2019 was 
overdue at the end of 2020. Of the ten observations made by the Parliament in the 2018 discharge 
decision, five were ongoing, but delayed due to the COVID-19 crisis. 

(4) Management assurances. 

No authorising officer by delegation or sub-delegation has expressed any issues that could raise 
concerns. All four Heads of Departments, as well as other assurance providers (local informatics 

58 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
security officer, data protection officer, business continuity coordinator) within the second line of 
defence (9) of internal control have also provided statements on the adequacy of control activities. 

CHAPTER 2 
RESERVATIONS 

In  line  with  the  quantitative  and  qualitative principles established by  the  Centre  to  define  the  material 
criteria on which to base a decision about whether to include a reservation in the annual declaration of 
assurance in the annual activity report, the Centre’s authorising officer has not issued any reservation. 

9 THE IIA’S THREE LINES MODEL. An update of the Three Lines of Defense. The Institute of Internal 
Auditors, July 2020.  
Leveraging COSO across the three lines of defense’ – The Institute of Internal Auditors, July 2015. 

59 

 
 
                                                      
PART V. 
DECLARATION OF ASSURANCE 

I, the undersigned, Benoît Vitale, Acting Director of the Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European 
Union, 

In my capacity as Authorising Officer, 

Declare that the information contained in this Consolidated Annual Activity Report 2020 gives a true and 
fair view, 

State that I have reasonable assurance that the resources assigned to the activities described in this 
report have been used for their intended purpose and in accordance with the principles of sound financial 
management, and that the control procedures put in place give the necessary guarantees concerning the 
legality and regularity of the underlying transactions. 

This reasonable assurance is based on my own judgement and on the information at my disposal as 
reported in this report, among others: 

The end-of-year declaration of assurance issued by authorising officers by delegation or sub-delegation 
based on the knowledge gained from daily operations and management supervision activities. 

The results of ex post controls and monitoring activities. 

The  results  of  the  annual  self-assessment  by the  management of the  internal  control  system  and  the 
statement of the officer in charge of risk management and internal control coordination. 

The observations and recommendations of the Internal Audit Service. 

The lessons learnt from the reports of the Court of Auditors prior to the year of this declaration. 

I confirm that I am not aware of anything not reported here which could harm the interests of the agency. 

Luxembourg, 12 February 2021 

(signed) 
Mr Benoît Vitale 

60 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ANNEXES 

61 

 
 
 
ANNEX  I – CORE BUSINESS STATISTICS 

A.  Trends in translation volumes 1995-2020 

s
e
g
a
P

900.000

800.000

700.000

600.000

500.000

400.000

300.000

200.000

100.000

0

Total:  635 269 pages

EU trade marks: 300 348 pages

Documents: 334 921 pages

7
9
9
1

8
9
9
1

9
9
9
1

0
0
0
2

1
0
0
2

2
0
0
2

3
0
0
2

4
0
0
2

5
0
0
2

6
0
0
2

7
0
0
2

8
0
0
2

9
0
0
2

0
1
0
2

1
1
0
2

2
1
0
2

3
1
0
2

4
1
0
2

5
1
0
2

6
1
0
2

7
1
0
2

8
1
0
2

9
1
0
2

0
2
0
2

62 

 
 
 
 
 
 
B.  Volume of translated documents by client (in pages) 

ACER
BEREC
CCE-EMPLOI
CDT
CDT-CA
CEDEFOP
CEPOL
CHAFEA
CHAFEA OP
CJUE
CONSEIL
COR
CPVO
CSJU
DG-GROW
DG-JUST
EACEA
EASA
EASME
EASO
EBA
ECA
ECB
ECDC
ECHA
ECSEL-JU
EDA
EDPS
EEA
EEL2
EESC
EFCA
EFSA
EIB
EIGE
EIOPA
EIT
ELA
EMA
EMCDDA
EMSA
ENISA
EP-DGTRAD
ERA
ERC
ESMA
ETF
EUIPO
EU-LISA
EU-OSHA
EUROFOUND
EUROJUST
EUROPOL
F4E
FRA
FRONTEX
GSA
IMI JU
INEA
OMBUDSMAN
OSGES
REA
S2R JU
SJU
SRB

2775,00

520,00

3235,50

4879,50

1773,50

142,00

1087,50

119,00
170,50
50,00

867,50

14,50

3736,50

791,50

22,00
440,00

14137,50

12187,00

11104,50

9331,00

8566,50

171,50
395,00

11,50
596,00

3315,00

29,00
28,50

4973,00

1848,50

69,00

1687,00
1886,00

79,50

1326,50

26091,00

16888,50

17640,00

1267,50

2529,50

767,00

16,50

11,00

3675,00

1916,50

8481,50

4809,50
5163,50

1061,00
507,50

3523,00

195,50
5,00
458,00

588,00
142,00
310,00
63,50

11320,50

13752,00

12365,00

14248,00

10419,00

63 

40793,50

43545,00

 
 
 
C.  Comparative breakdown by target language  

2020 

2019 

Target language 
(EU 24) 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

FR 

EN 

DE 

IT 

ES 

EL 

PT 

PL 

LT 

NL 

SK 

BG 

FI 

CS 

LV 

SV 

SL 

RO 

HR 

ET 

DA 

HU 

MT 

GA 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

16 

17 

18 

19 

20 

21 

22 

23 

24 

39 366 

11.75% 

27 018 

8.07% 

23 563 

7.04% 

17 358 

5.18% 

16 651 

4.97% 

13 945 

4.16% 

13 116 

3.92% 

11 586 

3.46% 

11 523 

3.44% 

11 373 

3.40% 

11 308 

3.38% 

11 271 

3.37% 

11 069 

3.30% 

10 999 

3.28% 

10 971 

3.28% 

10 902 

3.26% 

10 846 

3.24% 

10 842 

3.24% 

10 539 

3.15% 

10 488 

3.13% 

10 424 

3.11% 

10 339 

3.09% 

9 279 

2.77% 

2 567 

0.77% 

1 

3 

2 

5 

4 

11 

6 

15 

21 

10 

14 

17 

8 

19 

20 

18 

7 

9 

13 

12 

16 

22 

23 

26 

37 301 

12.81% 

21 856 

7.50% 

22 077 

7.58% 

14 974 

5.14% 

15 213 

5.22% 

9 615 

3.30% 

10 588 

3.64% 

9 224 

3.17% 

8 954 

3.07% 

9 678 

3.32% 

9 255 

3.18% 

9 142 

3.14% 

9 814 

3.37% 

9 126 

3.13% 

8 986 

3.09% 

9 139 

3.14% 

9 837 

3.38% 

9 729 

3.34% 

9 402 

3.23% 

9 493 

3.26% 

9 222 

3.17% 

8 794 

3.02% 

7 242 

2.49% 

1 715 

0.59% 

Non-EU 

7 586 

2.27% 

10 879 

3.74% 

Total 

334 921 

100% 

291 249 

100% 

2020 

2019 

Target language (non-EU*) 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

TR_ Turkish 

NO_ Norwegian 

1 

2 

1 525 

0.46% 

1 478.5 

0.44% 

1 

4 

2 384.5 

0.82% 

1 563 

0.54% 

64 

 
  
 
 
  
 
 
  
 
Target language (non-EU*) 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

2020 

2019 

IS_ Icelandic 

MK_ Macedonian 

AR_ Arabic 

RU_ Russian 

SR_ Serbian - Cyrillic 

SQ_ Albanian 

KA_ Georgian 

ME_ Montenegrin 

ZH_ Mandarin Chinese 

JP_ Japanese 

UK_ Ukrainian 

BS_ Bosnian 

KO_ Korean 

HE_ Hebrew 

FA_ Farsi 

KU_ Kurdish 

PS_ Pashto 

TI_ Tigrinya 

UR_ Urdu 

BE_ Belarusian 

AZ_ Azerbaijan 

HY_ Armenian 

ID_ Indonesian 

LB_ Luxembourgish 

BN_ Bengali 

CA_ Catalan 

KY_ Kyrgyz 

TH_ Thai 

TK_ Turkmen 

VI_ Vietnamese 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

16 

17 

18 

19 

20 

21 

22 

23 

24 

25 

26 

36 

37 

38 

39 

40 

41 

1 050 

0.36% 

1 736 

0.60% 

295 

0.10% 

171.5 

0.06% 

407 

0.14% 

1 120 

0.38% 

36.5 

0.01% 

87 

0.03% 

37.5 

0.01% 

8 

0.00% 

76.5 

0.03% 

69 

7.5 

0.02% 

0.00% 

36.5 

0.01% 

15 

0.01% 

6 

6 

6 

6 

18 

7.5 

0.00% 

0.00% 

0.00% 

0.00% 

0.01% 

0.00% 

13.5 

0.00% 

7 

0.00% 

13.5 

10.5 

35.5 

7 

6.5 

3.5 

0.00% 

0.00% 

0.01% 

0.00% 

0.00% 

0.00% 

1 632 

0.56% 

6 

2 

8 

9 

7 

5 

14 

10 

13 

22 

11 

12 

23 

14 

18 

28 

28 

28 

28 

17 

23 

19 

25 

19 

21 

16 

25 

27 

32 

3 

1 226 

0.37% 

585 

0.17% 

573 

0.17% 

547.5 

0.16% 

465.5 

0.14% 

451.5 

0.13% 

195.5 

0.06% 

104.5 

0.03% 

80 

0.02% 

67 

0.02% 

47.5 

0.01% 

46.5 

0.01% 

38.5 

0.01% 

32.5 

0.01% 

25.5 

0.01% 

20 

0.01% 

12 

0.00% 

12 

0.00% 

10 

0.00% 

5.5 

0.00% 

5 

5 

0.00% 

0.00% 

4.5 

0.00% 

3 

0.00% 

65 

 
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
2020 

2019 

Target language (non-EU*) 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

Ranking 

Pages 

% 

Other (AK, HI, PA, PH, PR, 
SI, SO, SW, TA)10  

42 

19.5 

Total 

7 586 

2.3% 

10 879 

3.7% 

D.  Statistics on translation11 deadlines 

Total number 
of documents 
delivered 

On time* 

More than 
15 minutes 
early 

15 
minutes 
to 2 hours 
late 

Less than 
1 day late 

More than 
1 day late 

Client 

ACER 

BEREC 

119 

83 

119 

83 

CCE-EMPLOI 

1 935 

1 933 

CDT 

CDT-CA 

CEDEFOP 

CEPOL 

CHAFEA 

CJUE 

CONSEIL 

COR 

CPVO 

CSJU 

DG-GROW 

DG-JUST 

EACEA 

EASA 

EASME 

EASO 

EBA 

ECA 

ECB 

925 

336 

305 

84 

919 

336 

305 

84 

 1 160 

1 160 

3 

21 

12 

202 

2 

1 899 

1 372 

186 

22 

44 

3 

21 

12 

202 

2 

1 899 

1 371 

186 

22 

44 

1 316 

1 316 

713 

45 

44 

713 

45 

43 

72 

34 

873 

520 

235 

189 

62 

525 

2 

20 

6 

141 

2 

1 625 

594 

66 

18 

655 

379 

38 

29 

2 

3 

3 

1 

1 

10 AK (Akan), HI (Hindi), PA (Punjabi), PH (Filipino), PR (Dari), SI (Sinhalese), SO (Somali), SW (Swahili), TA (Tamil) 

11 In this context, ‘translation’ includes the following services invoiced in pages: translation, editing, modification, and revision. 
This chart does not include EU trade marks which are always sent by the contractual deadline. 

66 

 
  
 
 
 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
Client 

ECDC 

ECHA 

ECSEL-JU 

EDA 

EDPS 

EEA 

EEL2 

EESC 

EFCA 

EFSA 

EIGE 

EIOPA 

EIT 

ELA 

EMA 

EMCDDA 

EMSA 

ENISA 

EP-DGTRAD 

ERA 

ERC 

ESMA 

ETF 

EUIPO 

eu-LISA 

EU-OSHA 

EUROFOUND 

EUROJUST 

EUROPOL 

F4E 

FRA 

FRONTEX 

Total number 
of documents 
delivered 

On time* 

More than 
15 minutes 
early 

15 
minutes 
to 2 hours 
late 

Less than 
1 day late 

More than 
1 day late 

1 599 

3 755 

23 

53 

1 599 

3 531 

23 

53 

1 792 

1 792 

729 

20 

9 

569 

403 

205 

187 

48 

178 

729 

20 

9 

569 

402 

203 

187 

48 

178 

9 088 

9 088 

136 

238 

105 

7 

368 

22 

384 

198 

136 

238 

105 

7 

368 

22 

383 

198 

978 

779 

23 

47 

663 

262 

3 

7 

280 

266 

104 

59 

2 

113 

390 

62 

73 

105 

7 

110 

213 

102 

7 226 

7 224 

3 340 

208 

2 890 

1 101 

870 

100 

76 

750 

410 

208 

2 866 

1 100 

866 

100 

76 

749 

404 

67 

123 

488 

539 

528 

56 

27 

369 

247 

224 

1 

2 

1 

2 

24 

1 

4 

1 

5 

1 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Total number 
of documents 
delivered 

On time* 

More than 
15 minutes 
early 

15 
minutes 
to 2 hours 
late 

Less than 
1 day late 

More than 
1 day late 

OMBUDSMAN 

924 

924 

69 

10 

17 

69 

10 

17 

87 

26 

46 

27 

87 

26 

46 

27 

69 

9 

675 

50 

25 

8 

26 

Client 

GSA 

IMI JU 

INEA 

OSGES 

REA 

S2R JU 

SJU 

SRB 

Total 

578 

578 

300 

46 379 

46 103 

17 629 

272 

4 

0 

Percentage 

100% 

99.4% 

38% 

0.6% 

0.008% 

0.0% 

(*) ‘Delivered on time’ includes documents delivered early, on time, or less than 15 minutes late. 

68 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX  II – STATISTICS ON FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT  

A.  Budgets 

Title 

Heading 

Budget outturn 
2020 

Amending budget 
2020** 

Initial budget 2020 

Revenue 

Payments from agencies, bodies, offices 
and institutions 

Subsidy from the Commission  

Interinstitutional cooperation* 

Other revenue 

Surplus  carried  over  from  the  previous 
financial year 

Refunds 

Grand total 

Expenditure 

Staff 

Buildings, equipment and miscellaneous 
operating expenditure 

42 949 640 

41 536 000 

42 772 500 

0 

628 653 

371 022 

0 

0 

0 

664 600 

710 000 

p.m. 

664 600 

624 750 

3 894 084 

3 015 250 

0 

p.m. 

43 949 315 

46 804 684 

47 077 100 

24 430 429 

25 526 600 

27 538 900 

6 725 501 

7 826 400 

7 846 700 

Operational expenditure 

10 961 389 

11 370 400 

11 691 500 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

1 

2 

3 

10 

Reserves 

0 

2 081 284 

0 

Grand total 

42 117 319 

46 804 684 

47 077 100 

*  Interinstitutional  cooperation,  as  defined  in  Title 3  of  the  budget  revenue,  includes  revenue  received  with  regard  to  the 

interinstitutional IATE database. 

** The figures concern the Amending budget 2/2020. 

B.  Revenue collected 

Comparative analysis of budget revenue collected for 2020 and 2019 

the  core 

43 578 293 

2020 

Budget revenue 
to 
relating 

revenue 

Total 
operational activity 
Financial income 
Grants received 
Other operating income 

Total budget revenue  

0 
243 250 
127 772 
43 949 315 

69 

2019 
36 618 889 

11 299 
243 250 
414 678 
37 288 116 

% change 

19.00% 

-100.00% 
0.00% 
-69.19% 
17.86% 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Revenue collected by budget line 

Budget 
line 

Agency 

Revenue 
2020 

Revenue 
2019 

Change in 
EUR 

% change 

1000 

1001 

1002 

1003 

1004 

1005 

1006 

1007 

1008 

1009 

1010 

1012 

1014 

1015 

1016 

1017 

1018 

1019 

1020 

1021 

1022 

1023 

1024 

1025 

1026 

1027 

1028 

1029 

1030 

1031 

European Environment Agency (EEA) 

European Training Foundation (ETF) 

European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug 
Addiction (EMCDDA) 
European Medicines Agency (EMA) 

OSHA) 

European Agency for Safety and Health at Work 
(EU
European Union Intellectual Property Office 
‑
(EUIPO) 
EUIPO trade marks 

Community Plant Variety Office (CPVO) 

European Union Agency for Law Enforcement 
Cooperation (Europol) 
European Foundation for the Improvement of 
Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) 

European Centre for the Development of 
Vocational Training (Cedefop) 
European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights 
(FRA) 
European Investment Bank (EIB) 

European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) 

European Union Agency for Criminal Justice 
Cooperation (Eurojust) 
European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) 

European Network and Information Security 
Agency (ENISA) 
European Centre for Disease Prevention and 
Control (ECDC) 
European Border and Coast Guard Agency 
(Frontex) 
Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive 
Agency (EACEA) 
Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized 
Enterprises (EASME) 
European Union Agency for Law Enforcement 
Training  (CEPOL) 
Consumers, Health, Agriculture and Food 
Executive Agency (Chafea) 
European Global Navigation Satellite Systems 
Agency (GSA) 
European Defence Agency (EDA) 

313 654 

163 781 

157 692 

273 645 

96 946 

40 009 

66 835 

295 624 

-137 933 

3 164 899 

2 599 656 

1 099 785 

607 774 

565 243 

492 011 

3 941 051 

3 454 020 

487 031 

12 168 538 

13 272 441 

-1 103 903 

76 607 

92 440 

25 381 

52 051 

51 225 

40 389 

15% 

69% 

-47% 

22% 

81% 

14% 

-8% 

202% 

78% 

430 601 

398 043 

32 559 

8% 

167 242 

77 632 

89 610 

115% 

1 120 862 

976 431 

144 431 

15% 

8 827 

240 078 

486 604 

0 

227 329 

8 827 

12 748 

6% 

10 878 

475 726 

4 373% 

96 920 

6 687 

90 234 

1349% 

584 490 

299 197 

285 293 

1 306 275 

1 023 573 

282 703 

95% 

28% 

343 307 

681 977 

-338 670 

-50% 

31 605 

1 923 

29 683 

1544% 

13 907 

26 956 

-13 049 

-48% 

1 209 365 

471 594 

737 771 

156% 

17 275 

4 002 

13 273 

332% 

47 314 

16 402 

30 913 

432 135 

237 119 

36 313 

188% 

36% 

123% 

718% 

European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) 

2 585 

39 182 

European Union Agency for Railways (ERA) 

294 430 

602 725 

-308 295 

253 194 

102 898 

150 296 

-36 597 

146% 

-93% 

-51% 

European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) 

1 631 645 

1 199 510 

European Fisheries Control Agency (EFCA) 

430 069 

192 951 

Fusion for Energy Joint Undertaking (F4E JU) 

41 373 

5 060 

70 

 
 
 
Budget 
line 

Agency 

Revenue 
2020 

Revenue 
2019 

Change in 
EUR 

% change 

European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) 

191 813 

364 372 

-172 559 

1033 

1034 

1035 

1036 

1037 

1038 

1039 

1042 

1043 

1045 

1046 

1047 

1048 

1049 

1050 

1051 

1052 

1054 

1055 

1056 

1057 

1059 

1060 

1100 

1101 

1102 

1103 

1104 

Innovation and Networks Executive Agency 
(INEA) 
European Institute of Innovation and Technology 
(EIT) 
European Research Council Executive Agency 
(ERCEA) 
Research Executive Agency (REA) 

Clean Sky 2 Joint Undertaking (CS 2 JU) 

SESAR Joint Undertaking (SESAR JU) 

Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 Joint 
Undertaking (IMI 2 JU) 
Fuel Cells and Hydrogen 2 Joint Undertaking 
(FCH 2 JU) 
European Asylum Support Office (EASO) 

Agency for the Cooperation of Energy 
Regulators (ACER) 
European Securities and Markets 
Authority(ESMA) 
European Banking Authority (EBA)  

European Insurance and Occupational Pensions 
Authority (EIOPA) 
Office of the Body of European Regulators for 
Electronic Communications (BEREC) 
European Agency for the operational 
management of large-scale IT systems in the 
area of freedom, security and justice (eu-LISA) 
Electronic Components and Systems for 
European Leadership Joint Undertaking (ECSEL 
JU) 
The Single Resolution Board (SRB) 

Secretariat-General of the European Schools 
(EURSC) 
Bio-Based Industries Joint Undertaking (BBI JU) 

Shift2Rail Joint Undertaking (S2R JU) 

EUROHPC 

ELA 

European Commission – DG Employment 
(DG EMPL), DG Justice and Consumers (DG 
JUST) and DG Internal Market, Industry, 
Entrepreneurship and SMEs (DG GROW)  
European Parliament 

Council of the European Union (Council) 

European Court of Auditors (ECA) 

Committee of the Regions of the European 
Union (COR) 

71 

41 537 

16 723 

24 814 

148% 

8 578 

13 739 

-5 161 

1 034 

31 013 

-29 979 

17 015 

1 860 

3 273 

7 411 

13 742 

-5 551 

6 978 

972 

0 

2 484 

499 

0 

4 494 

474 

0 

3 432 946 

2 804 048 

628 898 

248 703 

158 761 

89 942 

-38% 

-97% 

420% 

-75% 

-47% 

181% 

95% 

22% 

57% 

716 808 

280 011 

436 798 

156% 

810 436 

164 617 

611 464 

198 972 

91 248 

73 369 

36 477 

23 992 

12 485 

811 305 

581 100 

230 205 

1 081 

0 

1 081 

1 054 655 

964 401 

4 120 

1 380 

3 128 

43 405 

22 229 

385 

89 398 

90 254 

39 285 

-1 380 

19 101 

89 398 

33% 

80% 

52% 

40% 

9% 

954% 

-100% 

611% 

100% 

3 463 373 

1 300 472 

2 162 901 

166% 

349 

14 658 

22 506 

8 635 

0 

349 

161 590 

-146 932 

5 021 

17 340 

17 485 

-8 705 

-91% 

348% 

-50% 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Budget 
line 

Agency 

Revenue 
2020 

Revenue 
2019 

Change in 
EUR 

% change 

1105 

1106 

1107 

1108 

1109 

3002 

4000 

4010 

4020 

European Economic and Social Committee 
(EESC) 
Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU)  

European Central Bank (ECB) 

26 781 

42 020 

-15 238 

3 678 

58 057 

19 845 

35 594 

-16 167 

22 463 

-3 768 

European Ombudsman (Ombudsman) 

264 589 

268 357 

European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) 

1 448 371 

1 029 336 

419 035 

Interinstitutional projects with the institutions 
(IATE) 
Bank interest 

Miscellaneous repayments 

Grant from the Luxembourg Government 

Total revenue 

628 653 

733 669 

-105 016 

0 

127 772 

243 250 

11 299 

414 678 

243 250 

-11 299 

-286 906 

0 

43 949 315 

37 288 116 

6 661 199 

-36% 

-81% 

63% 

-1% 

41% 

-14% 

-100% 

-69% 

0% 

18% 

C.  Expenditure 

Chapter 

Heading 

11  Staff in active employment 

13  Missions and duty travel 

14  Socio-medical infrastructure 

16  Welfare service 

17 

Entertainment and 
representation 
STAFF 

20 

Rental of buildings and 
associated costs 

21 

Information technology 

22 

Movable property and 
associated costs 

23  Operating expenditure 

24 

25 

26 

27 

Postage and 
telecommunications 
Expenditure on formal and 
other meetings 
Expenditure on Management 
Board meetings 
Information: acquisition, 
archiving, production and 
dissemination 
BUILDINGS, 
EQUIPMENT 
AND  SUNDRY  OPERATING 
EXPENDITURE 

TITLE 1 

TITLE 2 

Expenditure 
(execution 
commitment) 
2020 
23 821 703 

Expenditure 
(execution 
commitment) 
2019 
23 727 525 

8 146 

544 000 

56 579 

0 

67 050 

227 920 

83 400 

69 

24 430 429 

24 105 964 

3 051 148 

2 975 543 

3 124 150 

3 114 441 

39 148 

41 884 

216 212 

130 152 

Change in EUR 

% change  

94 178 

-58 904 

0.40% 

-87.85% 

316 080 

138.68% 

-26 821 

-32.16% 

-69 

-100.00% 

324 465 

75 605 

9 709 

-2 737 

11 776 

43 579 

1.35% 

2.54% 

0.31% 

-6.53% 

5.45% 

33.48% 

6 257 

3 270 

52.26% 

55 215 

-27 356 

-49.54% 

136 425 

-64475 

-47.26% 

227 989 

173 731 

9 527 

27 859 

71 950 

6 725 501 

6 676 130 

49 372 

0.74% 

30  External translation services 

10 073 213 

10 844 446 

-771 233 

-7.11% 

72 

 
 
 
31 

Interinstitutional cooperation 

to 

the 

32 

Expenditure  relating 
eCdT programme 
OPERATIONAL 
EXPENDITURE 

TITLE 3 

705 012 

183 165 

703 188 

233 623 

1 824 

0.26% 

-50 458 

-21.60% 

10 961 389 

11 781 256 

-819 867 

-6.96% 

TITLE 10 

RESERVES 

0 

0 

0 

n/a 

TOTAL BUDGET   

42 117 319 

42 563 350 

-446 031 

-1.05% 

Budgetary implementation 2019-2020 

Description 

2020 

Implementation 
2020 

2019 

Implementation 
2019 

% change 

Budget 
(excluding 
Title  10) 
Commitments 
entered into 
Appropriations 
cancelled 
Payments made 

Appropriations 
carried over 

44 723 400 

n/a 

45 105 300 

n/a 

n/a 

42 117 319 

94.17% 

42 563 350 

2 606 081 

5.83% 

2 541 950 

39 018 451 

3 098 868 

87.24% 

6.93% 

38 939 951 

3 623 399 

94.36% 

5.64% 

86.33% 

8.03% 

-0.19% 

0.19% 

0.91% 

-1.10% 

Appropriations cancelled – 2019 Budget  

Appropriations cancelled 

16%

42%

42%

Staff (EUR 1 096 071)

Buildings, equipment and sundry operating expenditure (EUR 1 100 998)

Operational expenditure (EUR 409 010)

73 

 
  
 
 
 
  
 
 
D. Table Budget outturn and cancellation of appropriations 
Calculation budget outturn 

Budget outturn  
Reserve from the previous years’ surplus (+) 

Revenue actually received (+) 

Payments made (-) 

Carryover of appropriations (-) 

Cancellation of appropriations carried over (+) 

Adjustment for carryover of assigned revenue 
appropriations from previous year (+) 
Exchange rate differences (+/-) 

Adjustment for negative balance from previous year (-) 

TOTAL 

2018 

2019 

2020 

2 115 924 

41 195 142 

-41 455 513 

-3 302 204 

246 930 

-9 

554 626 

-645 104 

 -645 104 

37 288 115 

 -38 939 951 

 -3 623 399 

226 997 

-197 

3 612 254 

 -2 081 284 

-2 081 284 

43 949 315 

 -39 018 451 

 -3 098 868 

407 982 

-236 

3 894 084 

 4 052 542 

Budget outturn  
Revenue collected by the Centre increased by 17.9% in 2020 compared with 2019, and by 6.7% compared with 2018. Three of the Centre’s clients chose to benefit 
from the advance payment system set up by the Centre, which resulted in the Centre receiving an additional revenue of EUR 1.4 million in 2020 for services to be 
delivered in 2021. This system has been put in place to assist the Centre’s clients to reduce their carried-over budget appropriations. In 2019, the Centre received 
advance payments of EUR 0.35 million for services to be delivered in 2020, and the net impact of the advance payments 2019-2020 resulted in a higher revenue 
in 2020 of EUR 4.1 million. In 2020, the revenue without the impact of advance payments would lead to an increase of EUR 5.6 million compared with 2019 (i.e. 
EUR 6.7 million with the impact of advance payments). Implementation of the new pricing structure puts the average unit price for translation services at EUR 85 
EUR. The payments and carry-over of appropriations decreased by EUR 0.4 million (-1.1%) in 2020. EUR 407 982 of the appropriations carried over to 2020 were 
cancelled. 

The Centre carried forward a budget outturn of EUR -2.1 million from 2019 to 2020. This operation reduced the budget outturn carried over to 2020. The changes 
in the Centre’s reserves also had an impact on the budget outturn being carried forward. In 2020, the Centre used EUR 188 300 of the ‘Reserve for exceptional 

74 

 
 
 
 
 
 
investments’ for eCdT. In order to balance the budget in 2020, the Centre had to use EUR 3.7 million from the ‘Reserve for stability pricing’. Those three operations 
added EUR 1 812 800 to the 2020 budget outturn.  
The Centre applies a system of automatic reimbursement of budget surplus to clients. This is activated if the positive budget outturn exceeds EUR 1 million. 
However, due to a series of factors, such as an exceptional boost in revenue of EUR 2 million for terminology projects, a significant decrease in expenses 
related to COVID-19, and unfilled posts of responsibility (such as the posts of Director, Head of Department, etc.), and in order to balance the budget in the 
years to come, the balance of the budget outturn for 2020 of EUR 2.2 million will not be reimbursed to clients. Given the collection of increased revenue and 
collection of advance payments in 2020, the carry-over budget outturn was EUR 4.1 million and this amount will be integrated in the Amending budget 1/2021. 

Cancellation of commitment appropriations  
By the end of 2020, 94.1% of the budget for Titles 1-3 had been used up in terms of commitments and consequently 5.9% of the appropriations were cancelled 
(compared to 5.6% in 2019). 

Cancellation of payment appropriations for 2020 and payment appropriations carried over 

The  Centre  has  non-differentiated  appropriations,  and  the  cancellation  of  payment  appropriations  for  the  year  is  therefore  the  same  as  the  cancellation  of 
commitment appropriations for the year. Of the payment appropriations carried over from 2019 to 2020, 11.3% were cancelled, compared with 6.9% in 2019. This 
corresponds to EUR 407 982. 29.4% of the cancellations concerned staff-related expenditure from Title 1 such as missions, agency staff and training. In Title 2, 
56.4% of the cancellations concerned IT and buildings expenditure.  

75 

 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX III –  COST OF CONTROLS  

COST OF THE CONTROL (EUR) 

TOTAL VALUE VERIFIED (EUR) 

RATIO (%): COST OF 
CONTROL (EUR) / TOTAL 
VALUE VERIFIED (EUR) 

No 1. Controls on financial transactions in budget line 3000    

(Perspective: Ex-post) 

Cost (EUR) of FTEs involved in the ex-post controls of order forms from budget 
line 3000.  

Total value of the budgetary 
commitments for budget line 3000  

(p.m) 

(p.m)  

No 2. Quality controls (EPQC) on translations provided to clients 

(Perspective: Ex-post) 

Cost (EUR) of FTEs involved in the ex-post controls of in-house and outsourced 
translations (Procedure C11_8), plus cost of external language service providers 
for conducting EPQCs on in-house translated texts. 

Total value of the budgetary 
commitments for budget line 3000 

(p.m) 

(p.m) 

No 3. Reranking of external contractors 

(Perspective: Ex-post) 

Cost (EUR) of FTEs involved in the reranking procedure C11_7. e.g. 1st and 2nd 
evaluator, reranking committee (RRC), assistant to the AO by delegation.  

Total value of the budgetary 
commitments for budget line 3000 

(p.m)  

(p.m) 

No 4. Controls on the procurement process  

(Perspective: Ex-post) 

N/A 

N/A 

N/A 

76 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Cost (EUR) of FTEs involved in the ex-post control of selected procurement files, 
plus possible cost of external resources (e.g. consultants) conducting such 
controls.   

Total value of the underlying 
procurement procedures for which 
such validation takes place 

(p.m) 

(p.m) 

No 5. Ex ante evaluation(s) for the Centre’s main initiatives/projects   (Perspective: Ex-ante) 

Cost (EUR) of FTEs involved in the ex-ante evaluation for the Centre’s main 
initiatives/projects (Process S_33).  

Total value (estimate) of the initiative / 
project e.g. EUR 500 000 

(p.m) 

(p.m)  

N/A 

N/A 

77 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX IV – ORGANISATION CHART  ON 31/12/2020 

Accounting Section (2*) 

LISO (1*) 

External Relations and 
Communication Section (5*) 

Translation Department 

T. Ferlușcă 

Temporary Head (3*) 

Finno-Ugric, Baltic and Slavonic 
(1*)  Languages Section (33*) 

Germanic and Slavonic (2*) 
Languages Section (39*) 

Romance and Mediterranean 
Languages Section (40*) 

(*)Headcount per section 

Management Board 

Rytis Martikonis 
Chairman 

Benoît Vitale 

Acting Director (1*) 

Director’s Assistant (1*) 

Secretariat (2*) 

Translation Support Department 
M. Bubnic 
Head (2*) 

Administration Department 

S. Miggiano 
Head (2*) 

IT Department 

P. Dufour 
Temporary Head (4*) 

Workflow Management Section 
(18*) 

Advanced Language 
Solutions Section (11*) 

Interinstitutional IATE Group 
(1*) 

Finance Group (3*) 

Strategic Planning Section (3*) 

Legal Affairs Section (5*) 

Facilities and Security 
Section (4*) 

Human Resources Section (8*) 

Development Section (5*) 

Service Desk Section (7*) 

IT Infrastructure Section (5*) 

78 

 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX  V – ESTABLISHMENT PLAN OF THE CENTRE  

Function groups and 
grades 

AD 16 
AD 15 
AD 14 
AD 13 
AD 12 
AD 11 
AD 10 
AD 9 
AD 8 
AD 7 
AD 6 
AD 5 

AST 11 
AST 10 
AST 9 
AST 8 
AST 7 
AST 6 
AST 5 
AST 4 
AST 3 
AST 2 
AST 1 

Subtotal AD 

Subtotal AST 

AST/SC 6 
AST/SC 5 
AST/SC 4 
AST/SC 3 
AST/SC 2 
AST/SC 1 

Subtotal AST/SC 
TOTAL 
TOTAL STAFF 

Filled on 31.12.2020 

Authorised under the budget 2020 

Permanent posts 
0 
0 
1 
1 
9 
3 
4 
6 
6 
7 
4 
0 
41 
0 
0 
4 
1 
0 
1 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
6 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
47 

Temporary staff 
0 
0 
0 
0 
3 
5 
6 
6 
16 
20 
19 
14 
89 
0 
0 
0 
3 
1 
8 
15 
10 
10 
0 
0 
47 
0 
0 
0 
1 
1 
0 
2 
138 

Permanent posts 
0 
0 
1 
1 
16 
8 
8 
5 
0 
5 
1 
0 
45 
0 
1 
3 
1 
0 
1 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
6 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
51 

Temporary posts 
0 
0 
1 
0 
11 
5 
5 
13 
21 
26 
8 
0 
90 
0 
0 
1 
2 
4 
7 
20 
12 
4 
0 
0 
50 
0 
0 
0 
1 
1 
0 
2 
142 

185 

193 

79 

 
 
Information on the entry level recruitment grade/function group for each type of post: indicative table 

Key functions (examples) 

Type of contract 
(official, TA or CA) 

Function group, grade 
of recruitment (or 
bottom of the bracket 
if published in 
brackets) 

Indication whether the 
function is dedicated to 
administrative support or 
policy (operations) 

CORE FUNCTIONS 

Head of Department 
Level 2 

Head of Section 
Level 3 
Senior  Administrator  =  Senior 
Linguistic Administrator 

Official/TA/CA 

Administrator 

Official/TA/CA 

Linguistic Administrator 

Official/TA/CA 

Senior Assistant 

Official/TA/CA 

Assistant 

Official/TA/CA 

Official/TA 

AD 9 – AD 14 

Policy 
(operations) 
administration support 

and 

Official/TA 

AD 8 – AD 12 

Policy (operations) 

AD 8 – AD 12 
FG IV 

AD 5 – AD 12 
FG IV 

AD 5 – AD 12 
FG IV 

AST 10 – AST11 
FG III 

AST 1 – AST 9 
FG II 

Policy (operations) 

Policy (operations) 

Policy (operations) 

Policy (operations) 

Administration support  

SUPPORT FUNCTIONS 

Head of Administration 
Level 2 

Head  of  Human  Resources 
Level 3 

Head of Strategic Planning 
Level 3 

Head  of  External  Relations  and 
Communication 
Level 3 

Head of IT 
Level 2 

Official/TA 

AD 9 – AD 14 

Administration support  

Official/TA 

AD8 – AD 12 

Administration support  

Official/TA 

AD8 – AD 12 

Administration support  

Official/TA 

AD8 – AD 12 

Administration support 

Official/TA 

AD 9 – AD 14 

Administration support  

Senior Administrator 

Official/TA/CA 

Administrator 

Official/TA/CA 

Secretary 
consideration 
types of post) 

(taking 
the 

into 
transitional 

Official/TA/CA 

AD 8 – AD 12 
FG IV 

AD 5 – AD 12 
FG IV 

–  AST 

1 

AST 
FG II 
SC 1 – SC 6 

Administration support  

Administration support 

9 

Administration support 

80 

 
 
 
Key functions (examples) 

Type of contract 
(official, TA or CA) 

Function group, grade 
of recruitment (or 
bottom of the bracket 
if published in 
brackets) 

Indication whether the 
function is dedicated to 
administrative support or 
policy (operations) 

Assistant 

Official/TA/CA 

AST 1 – AST 9 
FG II 

Administration support  

Mail Clerk 

TA/CA 

SPECIAL FUNCTIONS 

–  AST 

1 

AST 
FG I 
SC 1 – SC 6 

7 

Administration support 

Accounting Officer 

Official/TA 

AD 8 – AD 12 

Administration support  

Data Protection Officer 

Official/TA 

AD 5 – AD 12 

Administration support 

Assistant to the Director 

Official/TA/CA 

Webmaster – Editor 

TA/CA 

AST  3  –  AST  11 
FG III 

Administration support 

1 

–  AST 

9 

Administration support 

AST 
FG II 

Benchmarking against results of previous year 

Job type (sub)category 

2014 (%) 

2015 (%) 

2016 (%) 

2017 (%) 

2018 (%) 

2019 (%) 

2020 (%) 

Administrative support 
and coordination (total)  

Administrative support  
Coordination  

Operational (total) 

Top-level operational 
coordination  
Programme management 
and implementation  
Evaluation and impact 
assessment 
General operational 

Neutral (total)*  

Finance/Control  
Linguistics  

17.9% 

18.1% 

17.9% 

20.0% 

20.4% 

19.1% 

18.3% 

17.0% 
0.9% 
5.5% 
2.0% 

2.6% 

0.0% 

0.9% 
76.7% 
6.3% 
70.4% 

17.3% 
0.8% 
5.1% 
2.0% 

2.2% 

0.0% 

0.9% 
76.9% 
5.8% 
71.1% 

17.1% 
0.8% 
5.4% 
2.3% 

2.2% 

0.0% 

0.9% 
76.7% 
5.8% 
70.9% 

19.1% 
0.9% 
5.0% 
1.6% 

2.3% 

0.0% 

1.1% 
75.0% 
6.1% 
68.9% 

19.4% 
1% 
4.9% 
1.6% 

1.9% 

0.0% 

1.4% 
74.7% 
6.3% 
68.4% 

18.2% 
0.9% 
5.9% 
2.9% 

1.9% 

0.0% 

1.0% 
74.9% 
6.8% 
68.1% 

17.4% 
0.9% 
5.9% 
3.0% 

1.8% 

0.0% 

1.1% 
75.9% 
6.6% 
69.3% 

 *Linguistic jobs such as translation and interpretation and all financial management, internal control, accounting and internal financial audit 
tasks are marked as neutral, as agreed by the Heads of Administration of the agencies in October 2014. Neutral (Linguistics) enjoys the 
same standard as any OPER category. Screening snapshots taken on 31/12/2014 for 2014, on 31/12/2015 for 2015, on 31/12/2016 for 2016, 
on 31/12/2017 for 2017, on 31/12/2018 for 2018, on 31/12/2019 for 2019 and on 31/12/2020 for 2020. 

Information on the list of HR implementing rules adopted in 2020   

Decision of the Translation Centre on the non-application of the Commission Decision on the maximum duration 
for the recourse to non-permanent staff in the Commission services 
Date of adoption: 09/04/2020 
Decision of the Translation Centre applying by analogy Commission Decision C(2019) 6855 final of 4.10.2019 
on procedures for dealing with professional incompetence 
Date of adoption: 09/04/2020 

81 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Decision  of  the  Translation  Centre  applying  by  analogy  Commission  Decision  C(1559)final  of  16.03.2020 
amending Decision C(2013)9051 of 16.12.2013 on leave 
Date of adoption: 23/09/2020 
Decision of the Translation Centre applying by analogy the Commission Decision C(2020) 4818 of 20 July 2020 
amending the Commission Decision C(2011) 1278 of 3 March 2011 on the general implementing provisions for 
Articles 11 and 12 of Annex VIII to the Staff Regulations on the transfer of pension rights 
Date of adoption: 22/10/2020 

.

82 

 
 
ANNEX  VI – HUMAN AND FINANCIAL RESOURCES BY ACTIVITY   

D.  Human and financial resources by activity 

Activities 

Human resources (*)(**) 

Total 
(%) 

63.4% 
25.5% 
11.1% 

Core activity: translation 
Support activities 
Management and supervision 
activities 

Provisions 
Overall total 

Total 

Officials 

TA 

CA 

Title 1 

Financial resources (**) 
Title 3 

Title 2 

Total budget 

140.2 
56.3 
24.5 

30.2 
10.5 
11.3 

89.9 
39.1 
12.1 

20.2 
6.8 
1.0 

20 078 036 
5 465 551 
1 995 312 

4 430 295 
2 865 024 
551 381 

11 383 424 
239 198 
68 878 

35 891 755 
8 569 773 
2 615 572 

100.0% 

221 

52 

141 

28 

27 538 900 

7 846 700 

11 691 500 

47 077 100 

100.0% 

(*) Expressed in full-time equivalents (FTEs). 
(**) Rounded-up figures. 

E. 

Human and financial resources actually used by 31 Dec 2020  

Activities 

Human resources (*)(**) 

Core activity: translation 

Support activities 
Management and supervision 
activities 

Total 
(%) 

64.2% 

25.0% 
10.8% 

Total 

Officials 

TA 

CA 

Title 1 

Financial resources (**) 
Title 3 

Title 2 

Total budget 

132.9 

51.7 
22.4 

28.3 

7.7 
11.0 

89.3 

38.2 
10.5 

15.3 

5.8 
0.9 

17 551 954 

5 024 685 
1 853 789 

3 801 941 

2 521 205 
402 355 

10 665 420 

32 019 315 

243 909 
61 061 

7 780 799 
2 317 204 

Overall total 

100.0% 

207 

47 

138 

22 

24 430 429 

6 725 501 

10 961 389 

42 117 319 

100.0% 

(*) Expressed in full-time equivalents (FTEs). 
(**) Rounded-up figures. 

83 

Budget 
(%) 

76.2% 
18.2% 
5.6% 

Budget 
(%) 
76.0% 

18.5% 
5.5% 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
F. 

Human and financial resources actually used by sub-activities by 31 Dec 2020 

Activities 

Human resources (*)(**) 

Total 

Officials 

TA 

CA 

Title 1 

Financial resources (**) 
Title 3 

Title 2 

Total budget 

132.9 

28.3 

89.3 

15.3 

17 551 954 

3 801 941 

10 665 420 

32 019 315 

19.23% 

39.8 

5 303 958 

948 903 

174 586 

6 427 447 

15.3% 

Core activity: translation 

Total 
(%) 
64.2% 

Translation 

Revision 

Modification 

Editing 

Subtitling 

Terminology research 

Internal validation 

Client request management 

Technical pre-processing and pre-
formatting (TECH+CAT) 
Outsourcing management 

Linguistic pre-processing - 
reference documents 
(documentary search) REF 
Post-processing (CAT+TECH) 

Management of translation 
memories and machine 
translation 
Terminology 

EUTM workflow 

Re-ranking 

IATE 

External translation services (***) 

0.10% 

0.88% 

0.19% 

0.26% 

2.29% 

30.08% 

1.84% 

2.13% 

1.59% 

0.53% 

1.06% 

0.34% 

0.97% 

1.64% 

0.60% 

0.48% 

0.2 

1.8 

0.4 

0.5 

4.7 

9.6 

0.0 

0.4 

0.1 

0.1 

1.1 

27.0 

0.1 

1.2 

0.3 

0.4 

3.2 

62.3 

15.0 

42.3 

3.8 

4.4 

3.3 

1.1 

2.2 

0.7 

2.0 

3.4 

1.3 

1.0 

0.1 

0.0 

0.3 

0.0 

0.0 

0.2 

0.0 

0.0 

0.2 

1.0 

2.1 

2.1 

1.8 

1.1 

1.0 

0.5 

2.0 

3.3 

1.1 

0.0 

3.2 

0.0 

0.1 

0.0 

0.0 

0.4 

5.0 

1.6 

2.4 

1.2 

0.0 

1.3 

0.0 

0.0 

0.1 

0.0 

0.0 

Support activities 
Management and supervision 
activities 

24.95% 

10.84% 

Overall total 

100.0% 

51.7 

22.4 

207 

7.7 

11.0 

47 

38.2 

10.5 

138 

5.8 

0.9 

22 

Budget 
(%) 
76.0% 

0.1% 

0.7% 

0.2% 

0.2% 

1.8% 

23.9% 

1.4% 

1.6% 

1.2% 

0.4% 

0.8% 

0.3% 

0.7% 

1.3% 

0.5% 

1.9% 

27 159 

241 925 

52 416 

72 018 

630 760 

4 859 

43 282 

9 377 

12 884 

112 846 

8 295 546 

1 484 112 

409 815 

165 947 

474 522 

192 150 

355 892 

144 112 

894 

7 963 

1 725 

2 371 

20 762 

273 058 

23 912 

27 687 

20 765 

32 912 

293 170 

63 518 

87 273 

764 368 

10 052 716 

599 674 

694 359 

520 769 

118 631 

48 037 

6 922 

173 590 

237 261 

96 075 

13 844 

347 179 

75 492 

30 569 

4 405 

110 466 

215 692 

366 676 

134 807 

539 230 

87 341 

148 479 

54 588 

218 352 

5 024 685 

2 521 205 

12 585 

21 395 

7 866 

31 463 

10 815 571 
234 909 

1 853 789 

402 355 

61 061 

315 618 

536 550 

197 261 

789 044 

10 815 571 

25.7% 

7 780 799 

2 317 204 

18.5% 

5.5% 

24 430 429 

6 725 501 

10 961 389 

42 117 319 

100.0% 

84 

 
 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
(*) Expressed in full-time equivalents (FTEs). 
(**) Rounded-up figures. 
(***) External translation services are allocated as a direct cost. Consequently, they are not included in sub-activities. 

G. 

Description of the sub-activity  

Activities 

Description 

Translation  Translating documents and EUTMs. In this activity, only the cost of internal translation is considered since this translation 

Revision 
Modification 

is carried out internally. 
Internal translators perform this activity, which consists in comparing the translated version with the original document. 
Internal translators perform this activity, which consists in modifying translated documents based on a new version of the 
previous text. 

Editing  Editing consists in reviewing the version of a document in the same language. 

Subtitling  This activity consists in subtitling video material. 

Terminology research  This technical activity is carried out by translation teams and consists in looking for terminology (with references, context, 

Internal validation  Evaluating translations carried out by external service providers. 

definition, etc.).  

Client request management  Analysing client requests and determining the characteristics of the product (format, domain, etc.). 

Technical pre-processing and 
pre-formatting (TECH+CAT) 

Pre-formatting is the preparation of files to be translated so that they are correctly processed by CAT tools. Pre-processing 
is a set of tasks executed in order to identify repetitive material and facilitate the re-use of the Centre’s translation 
memories (TMs).  

Outsourcing management  Selecting external service providers, establishing and managing their contracts. 
Linguistic pre-processing - 
reference documents 
(documentary search) REF 

Processing documents from a linguistic point of view to find the correct reference documents and set the correct 
parameters for further processing. 

Post-processing (CAT+TECH)  Post-formatting are the checks and corrections carried out on translated files, so that they reproduce the layout of the 

Management of translation 
memories and machine 
translation 

source file. 
Organising and updating the content of the translation memories and the machine translation corpus. 

Terminology  Analysing customer requests and organising the terminology research work. 

EUTMs workflow  Analysing customer requests and organising the translation of EUTMs.  

85 

 
Re-ranking  Adapting the order in the list of external service providers on the basis of their quality evaluation. 

IATE  Managing the IATE database 

External translation services 
(***) 

Expenditure relating to the language services delivered by external service providers. 

86 

 
 
 
ANNEX VII – SERVICE LEVEL AGREEMENTS 12  

Date of 
signature 
07/01/2014 

1. SLA 
ERA 

2.SLA 
EuroHPC 

24/06/2019 

Total 
amount 
About 
57 000 €/ 
yearly 

About 
35 000 €/ 
yearly 

General information 

Duration 

Counterpart 

12 months 
renewable 

12 months 
renewable 

European 
Railway 
Agency 
(ERA) 

European 
High-
Performance 
Computing 
Joint 
Undertaking 
(EuroHPC) 

Short 
description 
Hosting of IT 
equipment in 
the CdT 
Datacentre 

Hosting of IT 
equipment in 
the CdT 
Datacentre 

Amount 

Number of CA 
Number of SNEs 

Amount 

Number of CA 

Number of SNEs 

Financial and HR impact 

2019 

2020 

CA 

PA 

CA 

PA 

EUR 68 411.91 
N/A 
N/A 

CA 
EUR 29 053.16 

N/A 

N/A 

EUR 71 293.10  
N/A 
N/A 

PA 

CA 
N/A13 

PA 

N/A 

N/A 

12 The Centre has agreements with its 69 clients for its core business 
13 Not invoiced in 2020 

87 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
ANNEX VIII – ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT  

Background 
The  Centre  is  currently  not  in  possession  of  an  ISO  14001  or  EMAS  certificate  but  it  is  studying  the 
possibility  of  starting  the  procedure  in  the  near  future.  Nevertheless,  the  Centre  is  committed  to 
continuously improving its environmental performance and relies on the general principles of EMAS and 
ISO 14001 in its daily practices. 

Actions and facts related to the environmental performance of the Agency 
Energy consumption: energy consumption at the Centre is reduced by using energy-saving lighting units 
and  movement  sensors  on  corridors,  in  rest  rooms  and  common  use  areas.  The  Centre  signed  a 
framework contract to purchase electricity from a green source. The framework contract was signed on 
31 July 2020 and became effective on 1 January 2021. 

Separation and recycling of different types of waste: waste sorting and recycling is possible on both floors 
of the Centre in several recycling bays and the cafeteria. Waste separation is also assured by the cleaning 
company. The Centre’s waste is collected by type and prepared for recycling by contract. The Centre 
recycles paper, plastic, glass, organic waste and batteries. All these measures were complied with in 
2020. 

Waste management certification: SuperDrecksKëscht is a Luxembourgish initiative in the field of waste 
management. The Centre received its fourth certificate in 2020 which is valid until March 2022. 

Paper consumption: due to the improvement in the Centre’s paperless workflow and the commitment of 
our colleagues to use as little paper as possible, the amount of paper used at the Centre fell by 75% in 
2020, compared to 2019, i.e. to 40 boxes of paper (one box contains 2 500 sheets). Although there is a 
steady decrease in paper consumption at CdT due to the dedication of the staff and the efficiency of the 
paperless workflow, Covid-19 is also behind this sharp decrease. 

Disposable plastic cups: in 2020, the Centre phased out single-use plastic cups at water fountains. Paper 
cups are available at water fountains but the staff are encouraged via internal communication channels 
to use multi-use cups. 

Refrigerant  losses:  the  air  conditioning  devices  and  refrigerators  used  by  the  Centre  are  inspected 
regularly and undergo planned preventive maintenance. Through preventive maintenance, The Centre 
will endeavour to keep up this trend to avoid leakages in the future. No leakage was reported in 2020. 

Professional mobility and commuting: the number of employees using public transport decreased in 2020 
compared to 2019. This is due to preventive measures introduced to minimise the possibility of contracting 
Covid-19  and  the  offer  of  teleworking.  At  the  same  time,  the number  of  missions  decreased  in  2020, 
counterbalancing  the  increase  in  private  vehicle  use  for  commuting.  In  2020,  the  Centre  used  video 
conferences extensively, thus reducing the Centre’s carbon footprint. 

Company car: the CdT company car running on petrol was replaced by a semi-electric car in 2020. 

Facilitating the use of electric cars: 
the Centre is currently studying the possibility of offering recharging stations for its staff. This must be 
done in collaboration with the building owner. This first phase of this project started in Q3 2020 and it 
should  be  completed  in  the  second  half  of  2021.  The  Centre  encourages  its  staff  to  use  more 
environmentally friendly modes of transport. 

88 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Measuring  CO2  emissions:  a  test  to  measure  the  CO2  emissions  of  the  Centre’s  back-up  electricity 
generators was planned for Q4 2020 but it has been postponed by the service provider. 
Staff training and awareness: as with environmental issues, such as reducing the Centre’s carbon footprint, 
recycling  and  waste  management  are  regarded  as  important  topics  and  the  Centre’s  new  colleagues 
receive  their  first  training  on  these  topics  during  their  induction  training  delivered  by  the  Facility  and 
Security Group. Any improvements in the field of environmental protection are published on the intranet 
for internal users and on social media platforms and on the agency website for clients and other interested 
parties. In addition to raising awareness among new colleagues during induction training, the renewal of 
the SuperDrecksKëscht label contributes to raising environmental awareness. 

Green  Public  Procurement:  the  Centre  signed  an  interinstitutional  framework  contract  to  purchase 
electricity from a green source. The contract was signed in July 2020. 

89 

 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX IX – KEY INDICATORS AND PARA METERS   

Indicator name 

Target 2020 

Result 2020 

Result 
2019 

Result 
2018 

Variance analysis/comments 

49 277   41 002 

47 861 

The  target  is  based  on  clients’  forecasts 
which did not materialise as expected. 

The  Centre’s  quality  steering  committee 
reviewed  the  reporting  related  to  the  on-
time delivery of services to clients. 
trade  marks  and 
As  of  2018,  EU 
Euroclass/Terminology 
Maintenance 
Console terms are also included in this KPI. 
In  2020,  the  Centre’s  internal  revisers 
quality  checked  96.2%  of  the    translation 
volume  before  its  delivery  to  clients.  This 
rate  is  slightly  lower  than  that  of  the 
previous two years (98.6% in 2019 and 99% 
in 2018).’ 

The  2020  result  covers  the  time  frame 
January to August as of September a new 
system is in place.   

313 316 

334 921   

309 047 

369 005 

305 289 

300 348   348 276 

412 834 

1 601   
99.7%   

2 571 

3 127 

99.9% 

99.2% 

n/a 

96.2% 

n/a  98.6% 

99% 

83.8% 

n/a 

82.5% 

92.5% 

4.9%   

36.2%   
15   

3.9% 

6% 

26.5% 

27.7% 

26 

20 

83 009 

654 

>99% 

n/a 

5% 

15% 

8 

0% 

0% 

GENERAL 

A. Translation 
volumes 
Number of pages of 
documents 
translated, modified 
and revised and sent 
to clients 
Number of pages of 
EU trade marks 
translated 
Number of terms (= 
‘term list’ entries) 
translated 
Number of minutes of 
subtitling 
B. Clients 
Rate of on-time 
delivery of services to 
clients 

Quality check of 
translations 

Outsourcing rate for 
documents 
CSF return rate (CSF 
returned/documents 
delivered)14 
% of clients met/year 

C. Interinstitutional 
cooperation 
Number of ICTI 
projects with CdT 
participation 
FINANCIAL 

A. Planning 
Variation in number 
of invoiced 
pages/initial forecast 
Variation in 
cumulated invoiced 
revenue/initial annual 
forecast revenue 
Ratio of EU trade 
marks/total pages 
invoiced (revenue) 

-7.7%   

-18.5% 

-4.8% 

The execution rate of forecast amounts was 
92.3%  for  documents  other  than  trade 
marks. 

-3.5%   

-11.4% 

-2.1% 

The execution rate of forecast amounts was 
96.5% for the invoiced revenue generated 
by documents other than trade marks.  

<40% 

29.8%   

36.3% 

36.3% 

14 The spread of CSFs over the four satisfaction levels is set out in Part 1, Additional activities. 

90 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                      
Indicator name 

Target 2020 

Result 2020 

<60% 

50.9%   

Result 
2019 
58.6% 

Result 
2018 
57.3% 

Variance analysis/comments 

Ratio of cumulated 
EU trade marks and 
Community 
designs/cumulated 
total invoiced pages 
(volume) 
Change in number of 
invoiced pages per 
client between years 
n and n-1 
B. Budget – 
Commitment 
execution 
C. Input (resources 
devoted to ex ante 
controls to ensure 
legality and regularity 
of underlying 
transactions) 
Staff devoted to each 
ex ante control 
Financial verifiers 

D. Output (level and 
nature of controls 
carried out) 
Number of 
commitments issued 
% of commitments 
verified ex ante 
Number of payment 
orders issued 
% of payment orders 
verified ex ante 
Number of recovery 
orders issued 
% of recovery orders 
verified ex ante 

+/-10% 

-0.8%   

-17.5% 

-0.7% 

94% 

94.2%   

94.4% 

94.9% 

2 

1.8 

n/a 

100% 

n/a 

100% 

n/a 

100% 

2   
1.8   

2 

1.8 

2 

1.8 

404 

n/a 

304 

402 

100%   

100% 

100% 

8 808 

n/a 

7 565 

5 991 

100%   

100% 

100% 

755 

n/a 

667 

683 

100%   

100% 

100% 

91 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Indicator name 

Target 2020 

Result 2020 

Result 
2019 

Result 
2018 

Variance analysis/comments 

E. Results of controls 
(what the controls 
allowed the Centre to 
discover/remedy) 
% of technical errors 
in commitments 
corrected before 
authorisation 
% of technical errors 
in payments 
corrected before 
authorisation 
% of technical errors 
in recovery orders 
corrected before 
authorisation 
Number of exceptions  

F. Ex post controls 

Payment orders 
verified 
Errors detected 

Order forms checked 

Order forms with 
errors detected 
G. Payments 
Late payments to 
suppliers 
Late payments by 
clients of CdT 
invoices 
Average payment of 
CdT invoices (days) 
Average payment 
time to suppliers 
(days) 

10% 

1% 

4% 

<10 

n/a 

1.5% 

n/a 

1% 

<32 

48 

32 

<30 

6.4%   12.8% 

15.9% 

0.9%   

0.8% 

0.9% 

2.8%    6.9% 

4.1% 

1   

4 

2 

278   
0%   
257   
0%   
75   

88   

26   
22   

215 

0% 

228 

0% 

19 

36 

26 

22 

333 

0% 

252 

0% 

15 

57 

28 

21 

92 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
7% 

3% 

79% 

80% 

99% 

<2 

<5 

0 

5 

Result 2019 

Result 
2020 
3.3%   
4.2%    4.1% 

5.5% 

Result 
2018 
5.4% 

3.2% 

Variance analysis/comments 

Eight  people  out  of  189  have  not  yet 
mastered basic competences. 

94.2%   

95.2% 

86.6% 

70.1%   
99.9%   
0   

0   

0   
3   

80.5% 

80.5% 

99.9% 

99.9% 

0 

0 

0 

2 

0 

2 

0 

3 

Indicator name 

Target 2019 

Staff turnover 

Gap between needs 
and skills: % of 
skills met 
Core skills 
possessed by at 
least two people in 
each section/group 
Implementation of 
the training plan  
Availability of major 
applications 
Number of cases 
referred to the 
Ombudsman  
Number of 
proceedings 
brought by 
contractors or 
unsuccessful 
economic operators 
against the Centre 
before court 
Cases referred to 
OLAF 
Number of cases 
examined by the 
Joint 
Promotion/Reclassif
ication Committee  

% implementation of 
the Centre's work 
programme for 2019 

85% 

90.3%   

88.1% 

82.3% 

(*) Key to the symbols: 

 (Green dot): Target achieved according to expectations. 

 (Amber triangle): Target achieved within limits. 

 (Red lozenge): Target not achieved or below target. 

93 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX  X – LIST OF MEMBERS OF THE MANAGEMENT BO ARD   

INSTITUTION/BODY - MEMBER STATE 

European Commission 

INFORMAL NAME/  
ABBREVIATION 

Commission 

European Parliament 
Council of the EU 
Court of Justice of the EU 
European Central Bank 
European Court of Auditors 
European Economic and Social Committee 
European Committee of the Regions 
European Investment Bank 
European Ombudsman 
European Fisheries Control Agency 
European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights 
European GNSS Agency 
European Union Agency for Network and 
Information Security 
European Defence Agency 
European Medicines Agency 
European Chemicals Agency 
European Border and Coast Guard Agency 
European Agency for Safety and Health at Work 
European Maritime Safety Agency 
European Environment Agency 
European Research Council Executive Agency 
Innovation and Networks Executive Agency  
Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive 
Agency 
Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized 
Enterprises 
Research Executive Agency 
Consumers, Health, Agriculture and Food 
Executive Agency 
European Union Agency for Railways 
European Food Safety Authority 
European Asylum Support Office 
European Centre for Disease Prevention and 
Control 
European Centre for the Development of 
Vocational Training 
European Union Satellite Centre 
European Union Agency for Law Enforcement 
Training 
Shift2Rail Joint Undertaking 
Eurojust 
European Training Foundation 
European Foundation for the Improvement of Living 
and Working Conditions 

FULL MEMBER 

ALTERNATE MEMBER 

Rytis Martikonis 
(Chairman) 
Christos Ellinides 
Valter Mavrič 
(1) 
Thierry Lefèvre 
Rossana Villani 

José Ortiz Pintor 
Anna Redstedt 
Ineta Strautina 
Maria Bühler 
Alessandro Del Bon 
Niall McHale 
Nicole Romain 
Patrick Hamilton  
 Juhan Lepassaar 

Dimitri Nicolaides 
Alexios Skarlatos 
Shay O’Malley 
Olivier Ramsayer  
Andrew Smith 
(1) 
Katja Rosenbohm 
Christos Ellinides 
Christos Ellinides 
Christos Ellinides 

Christos Ellinides 

Marcus Angioni  
Véronique Rosenkranz 
Katelijn Serlet 
Jurga Haenel 

Pawel Szuba  
Florence Melaerts 
Ani Damyanova 
Thierry Fontenelle (1)  
Marjorie Fuchs 
Rieke Arndt 
Michail Beis  
David Petrlik 
Paulo Empadinhas 

Bronislava Ouaki 
Monica Buch Garcia 
John Wickham 
Sabine Kloss-Tullius 
Mónika Azaola 
Steven Dunlop 
Gülcin Karadeniz 
Marcus Angioni  
Marcus Angioni  
Marcus Angioni  

EP 
Council 
CJEU 
ECB 
ECA 
EESC 
CoR 
EIB 
Ombudsman 
EFCA 
FRA 
GSA 
ENISA 

EDA 
EMA 
ECHA 
Frontex 
EU-OSHA 
EMSA 
EEA 
ERCEA 
INEA 
EACEA 

EASME 

Christos Ellinides 

Marcus Angioni  

REA 
Chafea 

ERA 
EFSA 
EASO 
ECDC 

Christos Ellinides 
Christos Ellinides 

Marcus Angioni  
Marcus Angioni  

Christopher Carr  
James Ramsay 
Anis Cassar 
Karen Aimard 

Anna Gigantino 
Alessandra Fantini 
Chiara Petrolito 
Signe Gilbro 

Cedefop 

Corinna Frey 

Stéphanie Wehrheim 

SatCen 
CEPOL 

Shift2Rail 
Eurojust 
ETF 
Eurofound 

(2) 
Roeland Woldhuis  

Carlo M. Borghini 
Cecilia Thorfinn  
Alastair Macphail 
Mary McCaughey 

Maria Molina-Sierra 

Vincent Declerfayt 

Hilary O'Donoghue 

94 

 
 
 
 
 
INSTITUTION/BODY - MEMBER STATE 

INFORMAL NAME/  
ABBREVIATION 

FULL MEMBER 

ALTERNATE MEMBER 

European Institute of Innovation and Technology 
European Institute for Gender Equality 
European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug 
Addiction 
Community Plant Variety Office 
European Union Intellectual Property Office 
European Union Agency for Law Enforcement 
Cooperation 
Belgium 
Bulgaria 
Czech Republic 
Denmark 
Germany 
Estonia 
Ireland 
Greece 
Spain 

France 
Croatia  
Italy 
Cyprus 

Latvia 
Lithuania 
Luxembourg 
Hungary 
Malta 
Netherlands 
Austria 
Poland 
Portugal 
Romania 
Slovenia 
Slovakia 

Finland 
Sweden 

(1) APPOINTMENT IN PROGRESS  
(2) NO NOMINATION 

EIT 
EIGE 
EMCDDA 

CPVO 
EUIPO 
Europol 

Tzvetan Zafirov 
Jane Shreckengost 
Rosemary de Sousa 

Alice Fišer 

Marie-Christine Ashby 

Martin Ekvad  
Andrea di Carlo 
Dietrich Neumann  

Francesco Mattina 
Inge Buffolo 
Thibault de Maignas 

Colette Taquet 
(2) 
(2) 
Carsten Sander 
Matthias Gruber 
Mari Peetris  
Eamonn Mac Aodha 
(2) 
Luis Tarín Martín 

(1) 
(2) 
Mattia Ventura 
Natassa  Avraamides-
Haratsi 
Māris Baltiņš 
Neringa Gaidyte  
Sylvie Lucas  
Endre Gáspár 
Adrian Tonna 
(1) 
Philip Bittner 
Justyna Tyburczy  
João Pina de Morais 
Mihai Constandache 
Boštjan Zupančič 
Roman Suchý 

Bernard Latour 

Erik Jessen 
Angela Göritz 

Dara Coyne 

Pablo Rupérez 
Pascualena 
Michele Ferrari 

Mirko Costa 
Demetris Hasikos 

Arturs Krastiņš 
Aleksas Dambrauskas 
Luc Scholtes  

Donatienne Spiteri 
Teresa Morris-Drew 

Bartosz Karpiński 
Filipe Honrado 

Tea Mejak 
Boris Nosek 

Panu Kukkonen 
Magnus Lärke  

Vesa Kulmala 
Jeffrey Ganellen  

95 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Figure: Gender and nationality breakdown of Management Board members 

Gender and nationality breakdown

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0

AT BE BG HR CY CZ DK EE FI FR DE EL HU IE IT LV LT LU MT NL PL PT RO SK SI ES SE UK

Male

Female

96 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX XI –  LIST OF CLIENTS 

Informal 
name/abbreviation  
ACER 
BBI JU 
BEREC Office 
Cedefop 
CEPOL 
Chafea 
CJEU 
Clean Sky 2 JU 
CoR 
Council 
CPVO 

DG EMPL 

DG GROW 

DG JUST 
DGT 
EACEA 
EASA 
EASME 
EASO 
EBA 
ECA 
ECB 
ECDC 
ECHA 

ECSEL JU 

EDA 
EDPS 
EEA 
EEL2 
EESC 
EFCA 
EFSA 
EIB 
EIGE 
EIOPA 

Agencies/Bodies/Offices/Institutions 

Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators 
Bio-based Industries Joint Undertaking 
Agency for Support for BEREC 
European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training 
European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Training 
Consumers, Health, Agriculture and Food Executive Agency 
Court of Justice of the European Union 
Clean Sky 2 Joint Undertaking 
European Committee of the Regions 
Council of the European Union 
Community Plant Variety Office 
European Commission Directorate-General for Employment, Social 
Affairs and Inclusion 
European Commission Directorate-General for Internal Market, Industry, 
Entrepreneurship and SMEs 
European Commission Directorate-General for Justice and Consumers 
European Commission Directorate-General for Translation 
Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency 
European Union Aviation Safety Agency 
Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises 
European Asylum Support Office 
European Banking Authority 
European Court of Auditors 
European Central Bank 
European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control 
European Chemicals Agency 
Electronic Components and Systems for European Leadership Joint 
Undertaking 
European Defence Agency 
European Data Protection Supervisor 
European Environment Agency 
European School Luxembourg II 
European Economic and Social Committee 
European Fisheries Control Agency 
European Food Safety Authority 
European Investment Bank 
European Institute for Gender Equality 
European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority 

97 

 
Informal 
name/abbreviation  
EIT 
ELA 
EMA 
EMCDDA 
EMSA 
ENISA 
EP – DG TRAD 
EPPO 
ERA 
ERCEA 
ESAs-JC 
ESMA 
ETF 
EUIPO 

eu-LISA 

EU-OSHA 

Eurofound 

EuroHPC JU 
Eurojust 
Europol 

F4E JU 

FCH 2 JU 
FRA 
Frontex 
GSA 
IMI 2 JU 
INEA 
MAOC (N) 
Ombudsman 
OSGES 
REA 
S2R JU 
SatCen 
SESAR JU 
SRB 

Agencies/Bodies/Offices/Institutions 

European Institute of Innovation and Technology 
European Labour Authority 
European Medicines Agency 
European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction 
European Maritime Safety Agency 
European Union Agency for Cybersecurity 
European Parliament – Directorate-general for Translation 
European Public Prosecutor’s Office 
European Union Agency for Railways 
European Research Council Executive Agency 
European Supervisory Authorities Joint Committee  
European Securities and Markets Authority 
European Training Foundation 
European Union Intellectual Property Office  
European Union Agency for the Operational Management of large-scale 
IT Systems in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice 
European Agency for Safety and Health at Work 
European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working 
Conditions 
European High-Performance Computing Joint Undertaking 
European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation 
European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation 
Fusion for Energy Joint Undertaking (European Joint Undertaking for 
ITER and the Development of Fusion Energy) 
Fuel Cells and Hydrogen 2 Joint Undertaking 
European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights 
European Border and Coast Guard Agency 
European Global Navigation Satellite Systems Agency 
Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 Joint Undertaking 
Innovation and Networks Executive Agency 
Maritime Analysis and Operation Centre (Narcotics) 
European Ombudsman 
Office of the Secretary-General of the European Schools 
Research Executive Agency 
Shift2Rail Joint Undertaking 
European Union Satellite Centre 
SESAR Joint Undertaking 
Single Resolution Board 

98 

 
 
ANNEX XII – GLOSSARY  

Abbreviation 
ABAC 
ABC/ABB/ABM 

AD 
ADAR  
AOD 
AST 
AST/SC 
BCMS 
BO 
CA 
CAT 
CATE 
CdT 

COVID 
CSF 
CVR 
DG CNECT 

DG  JUST 
DGT 
DIGIT 
eCdT 

EMAS 
EP 
EPQC 
EPSO 
ERCS 
eTranslation 

EU 
EUR 
EUTM 
FG 
FR 
FTE 
HR 
IAS 
IATE 

Description  
Accounting system of the European Commission 
Activity Based Costing/Activity Based Budgeting/Activity 
Based Management 
Administrator 
Advanced Draft Audit Report  
Authorising Officer by Delegation  
Assistant 
Secretarial staff 
Business Continuity Management System 
Business Objects 
Contract staff 
Computer-assisted translation 
Computer-assisted translation environment 
Centre de traduction (Translation Centre for the Bodies 
of the European Union)  
Corona Virus Disease  
Client Satisfaction Form 
Corrected Version Request 
Directorate-General for Communications Networks, 
Content and Technology 
Directorate-General for Justice and Consumers 
Directorate-General for Translation 
Directorate-General for Informatics 
Translation Centre’s system for the management of the 
translation workflow 
Eco-Management and Audit Scheme 
European Parliament 
Ex post quality check 
European Personnel Selection Office 
Eternal Relations and Communications Section  
Neural machine translation system of the European 
Commission 
European Union 
Euro (currency) 
European Union trade mark 
Function Group 
Financial Regulation 
Full-time equivalent 
Human resources 
Internal Audit Service 
Inter-Active Terminology for Europe 

99 

 
 
ICS 
ICT 
ICTI 

ISO 
JTV 
JU  
KPI 
MB 
MT 
NICE 
PID 
PMO 
p.m. 
SaaS 
SARA 
SDL Studio 
SKPI 
SLA 
SME 
SNE 
TA 
WMS 

15 A token entry 

Internal Control Standard 
Information and communications technology 
Interinstitutional Committee for Translation and 
Interpretation 
International Organisation for Standardisation 
Joint Training Venture 
Joint Undertaking 
Key Performance Indicator 
Management Board 
Machine translation 
Neural Integrated Custom Engines 
Project Initiation Document 
Project Management Office 
pro memoria15 
Software as a service  
System for Activity and Resource Allocation 
SDL Trados Studio 
Strategic Key Performance Indicator 
Service Level Agreement  
Small and medium-sized enterprise  
Seconded national expert 
Temporary staff 
Workflow Management Section  

100 

 
 
                                                      
ANNEX  XIII  -  FINAL  ACCOUNTS  OF  THE  TRANSLATIO N  CENTRE  FOR  THE 

BODIES OF THE EUROPEAN UNION FOR THE FINANCIAL YEAR 2020  

This publication of the Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union is available on its website: 
http://cdt.europa.eu. 

-
-

N
N
N
N
E
E
-
-
1
1
0
0
0
0
-
-
1
0
2
2
-
-
A
2
A
0
-
-
F
F
T
T

:
:
r
r
e
e
b
b
m
m
u
u
n
n

e
e
u
u
g
g
o
o
a
a
t
t
a
a
C
C

l
l

101