Remunerate means to pay a suitable equivalent in return for goods provided, services rendered, or losses incurred. Its root is related to money (hence the mune), not number.1 Renumerate is a common misspelling. At least one dictionary lists the latter as a legitimate word meaning to recount, but as far as we’ve seen, renumerate only appears as a misspelling of remunerate.2
Remuneration is remunerate‘s corresponding noun. Renumeration is not a dictionary-approved word.
Examples
While renumerate is rare, mistaken use of the nonword renumeration is relatively common—for example:
If the city ever determined to eliminate the parking spaces, it would then owe financial renumeration for the right-of-way created under the agreement. [Shore News Today]
Higher than expected bonuses for the UK’s 148,000 HR professionals saw pay-outs nearly double from £680 million to £1.5 billion last year, boosting their total renumeration by 12%. [HRZone]
Indeed, one result of the clash between politicians seeking to keep taxes low and public employees seeking higher renumeration is the funneling of compensation into pensions … [The New Republic]
And these writers use remunerate and remuneration correctly:
The suggestion was to remunerate teachers more on a personal basis related to individual contribution. [Lawrence Journal World]
The wage cut backfired””Fidesz found it hard to secure appropriate candidates to the rate-council partly because of the low remuneration on offer. [Wall Street Journal]
His 2010 remuneration package included €34,000 in benefit-in-kind payments and €4,000 for “other remuneration”. [Irish Times]
References
1. http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/274283 ^
2. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/renumerate ^
