David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting Reviews 

297
•
TrustScore 4.5 out of 5

4.5

While we don't verify specific claims because reviewers' opinions are their own, we may label reviews as "Verified" when we can confirm a business interaction took place. Read more

To protect platform integrity, every review on our platform—verified or not—is screened by our 24/7 automated software. This technology is designed to identify and remove content that breaches our guidelines, including reviews that are not based on a genuine experience. We recognise we may not catch everything, and you can flag anything you think we may have missed. Read more

See what reviewers are saying

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

David’s review is very thorough and thoughtful. I may not like what he says at first because it goes against what I’ve written, but after our discussion I know his ideas are better for the book I want... See more

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

David Lombardino took a rush job from me and did a very thorough developmental edit. I incorporated many of his edits and I think my work is much better for it. Thank you David!

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

I had an 86,000 word manuscript edited by David Lombardino, and I am so pleased! I felt as if he understood my urban fantasy like no one else has so far, and connected to my story enough to ask me the... See more

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

I've used DLA's help for both residency and fellowship and have been told by multiple program directors during interviews that my personal statement was really well written ! I can't thank DLA enough... See more

Company details

  1. Business to Business Service

Written by the company

I’m David Lombardino, founder of DLA Editors & Proofers. Since 2008, I’ve worked one-on-one with authors, applicants, academics, and professionals on writing and communication where judgment, clarity, and outcomes matter. I collaborate with authors on books and screenplays, helping them strengthen structure, narrative focus, and voice. I work with applicants pursuing medical residency, fellowship, and other competitive programs on personal statements, interviews, and application strategy. And I help academics and professionals shape complex ideas into clear, effective writing. My approach is hands-on and collaborative, centered on careful analysis, specific feedback, and thoughtful decision-making.


Contact info

4.5

Excellent

TrustScore 4.5 out of 5

297 reviews

5-star
4-star
3-star
2-star
1-star

Asks customers to review

This company invites their customers to review, whether positive or negative

Hasn’t replied to negative reviews

How this company uses Trustpilot

See how their reviews and ratings are sourced, scored, and moderated.

4.5

All reviews

(297)

12 reviews in the last 12 months

Write a review
Companies on Trustpilot aren't allowed to offer incentives or pay to hide reviews. Reviews are the opinions of individual users and not of Trustpilot. Read more

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

this was worst place to get your paper …

this was worst place to get your paper edited; they are never on time; rob you for your money. very disrespectful once they get your money. I will never recommend this for anybody, I rather get my one year son to edit for me if than to submit to them. Please please please save your money

November 27, 2017
Unprompted review
David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting logo

Reply from David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting

Thank you, Elvis Mensah, for sharing your opinion regarding the proofreading we provided you on your CV for the Canadian residency match. While we do disagree with what you have stated, we appreciate your taking the time to share your opinion with us and wish you every success with your application.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

Service Fast but Result is too dry for me to use.

Your service is speedy and the editor who worked on my synopsis was adept at the English language. The finished product was clear, but very dry and did not convey my writing voice. I am having the synopsis reworked by a NYC acquisition agent freelancing from an agency since the added text made the synopsis very long and it felt too wordy. This new editor asked me if I would let her condense the synopsis to 1 page. Slush piles are long with agents and I welcome her rework of my synopsis. No agency has time to read 2 pages of story detail. I would recommend that your editors keep that in mind when working on synopses.

September 25, 2017
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Don't waste your money

September 15, 2017
Unprompted review
David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting logo

Reply from David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting

We are sharing parts of the email we sent you regarding your project:

Thank you for sharing your expectations. We understand that this has been a frustrating process for you. We believe if there simply had been a closer alignment in expectations, these frustrations could have been avoided.

Regarding having deleted the subject of your presentation and asked you to put it in again, we believe you were referring to “rheumatoid arthritis,” “cholangitis,” etc. Is that correct? As subjects, “rheumatoid arthritis,” “cholangitis,” etc. are vague. They give no clear, specific understanding of what your presentation was about. The easiest way to address this concern, and the preferred way of listing presentations in a CV, is to provide the title of the presentation. In lieu of a title, you can put a more specific subject, for example the effect of a certain drug on reducing joint inflammation in patients suffering from rheumatoid arthritis.

The CV you sent for review had 340 words and was comprised predominantly of headings and titles. There was little in the way of descriptions, which is where we could have done more for you. The average CV we work on is 1,400 words. The CV service is a flat-rate service, so certainly the client who sends 340 words will feel he did not receive enough, while a client who sends 2,460 words will feel he got a bargain. That is the nature of a flat-rate service.

Where we feel disappointed is in receiving only 340 words to work with, because we know how much more we could do if only we had been entrusted with more to work with.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

DLA Recommendation

I worked with Terry Cummings on my MBA application essay and he was great! He provided really good and insightful feedback on my essays.
The process of getting the right service for what I needed was a bit confusing to me at first, but David Lombardino was a great help in sorting that out. Overall great experience. I recommend them.

April 19, 2017
Unprompted review
Rated 3 out of 5 stars

I satisfied

I satisfied, but I think my expectations were higher than the results. There were some things that I thought would be done through the discussion that I did not see. I am thankful to have found you all.

April 15, 2017
Unprompted review
Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Editing of my paper

With reference to the last week editing of Part 1 of my paper, Mr. David Lombardino did excellent job. However, a second “pass” on the edited text should not take too much time and may provide additional editorial comments.

April 5, 2017
Unprompted review
Rated 5 out of 5 stars

ATA Preventability Guidelines

Our reviewer did an excellent job putting the text into one voice and ensuring a much better flow. After working on this project for six months, I think all of us in the office were not seeing what we needed to see in terms of the grammatical structure, but were rather focusing on the technical. It was absolutely critical for us to receive an outside edit to make this the best publication possible.

December 14, 2016
Unprompted review
Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Excellent

Great service - I had important letters to write - I love this service- it's like writing with phd in English-

October 13, 2016
Unprompted review
Rated 4 out of 5 stars

letter of recommendation

I am a loyal customer of DLA editors for many years and I have been satisfied with all the editors I worked with so far. I only gave four stars because I did not appreciate the price for letter of recommendation editing. I think there should be more of a price control for multiple edits. You should either have a package like you do for personal statements 3 edits and a polish or give like 40 to 50 % off for the 2 edits and just 10% off. I got 2 edits and paid $473, which I did not mind. After my second edit, the editor asked me to add two more sentences to further describe two examples. I wanted her to see those two sentences to make sure they are properly written. However, I did not want to pay another $224 just for those 2 sentences. I asked the editor if she can help with those 2 sentences but the editor said that she is not allowed to help. I think after people invested that much money, you should be willing to help out at the end if it is minor like that. It just made me feel like you don't really care about your customers' projects.

June 28, 2016
Unprompted review
David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting logo

Reply from David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting

Thank you, Deepthi, for that suggestion! Many times our best ideas come from feedback like this. Changing the discount amount is the easier of the two options, so that is what we will develop. Thanks again for the tip!

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

Worse than before

I have used DLA Editors & Proffers now three times. I have come back because the work done on the first two occasions was good: timely, helpful, and with good service. This time, though, the document returned to me was worse than no help. 99% of the changes were changes to the formatting of the variables and technical sentences in the paper. Since the technical parts were formatted as I wanted them to be, I had to reject all of these changes, one by one, which took forever. I couldn't find the useful proofs since they were buried among the non-useful ones. The proofing of the rest of the document was also a tad bit inconsistent. I wished I had been asked whether I wanted the formatting to the variables in the document changed, since then I could have received a product that I could have used profitably. I don't think I will be using DLA a fourth time.

May 24, 2016
Unprompted review
David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting logo

Reply from David Lombardino | DLA Editors — Editorial & Consulting

Thank you for this valuable feedback. Our approach for all academic documents is to italicize the variables, since this is what is required by the majority of institutions our clients work with. What we recommend to all of our clients is that if there are particular style conventions they are following, to mention them in the comments box of our submission form so we can make sure to follow them when proofreading or editing the document.

The Trustpilot Experience

Anyone can write a Trustpilot review. People who write reviews have ownership to edit or delete them at any time, and they’ll be displayed as long as an account is active.

We use dedicated people and clever technology to safeguard our platform. Find out how we combat fake reviews.

Learn about Trustpilot’s review process.

Here are 8 tips for writing great reviews.

Verification can help ensure real people are writing the reviews you read on Trustpilot.

Offering incentives for reviews or asking for them selectively can bias the TrustScore, which goes against our guidelines.

Take a closer look