Here's the secret to retiring early --
Posted By: Spherson on 2007-08-17
In Reply to: retiring from Spheris? Gonna get retirement pay from them or Social Security? nm - ME
Not taking SSI and Spheris (of course) doesn't have retirement pay.
What I did was work my behind off for 20 years, invested wisely, and will be retiring at 46. In a custom-built home sitting on 78 acres in a ski community. So, heck yeah, with that carrot in front of me I can put up with a dog of a job for seven more months. I encourage everyone on this board to work towards a GOAL, and not just slave away paycheck to paycheck.
Of course, I started in the heydey when a good MT brought home 60K without breaking a sweat, and I've refused to work for less over the years. Wouldn't have been possible if I'd settled for the paltry sum the companies are pawning off of newbies now adays.
I wish you as much success and looming happiness!!
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Retiring early...
First, how do you know the year I was born?? I have already checked with Social Security, and I can retire at the age of 62, 66 or 70 (according to my year of birth). In addition, I have checked with my financial advisor/stock broker, and he advises me that, yes it would benefit me if I wait until I am 66, as I would get more money, but I do not HAVE to wait until then. Furthermore, he explained the whole scenario if I work while I am drawing SS. I can work, but I cannot make over 14,130/year. Whatever amount I do make over that, they will deduct it from my SS. This money is put aside for me (so to speak). Then, when I reach age 66, I will then be distributed any monies (on my SS check) that I made over and above that 14,130/year, over the rest of my lifetime. So I will kind of get a raise. If you go to the SS website it explains all of this. So, the question is, do I want to continue typing my brains out; I don't think so. I will probably retire at 64-65 and do something enjoyable with my life, but it won't have anything to do with typing, guaranteed! 
Definitely not alone...I'd planned on retiring here
nm
Good luck with retiring in FL
I live in Miami - have to rent a furnished room per month -- and its getting worse here instead of BETTER!!!!
Keystrokes for the past 2 years!! I plan on retiring with them !! nm
nm
retiring from Spheris? Gonna get retirement pay from them or Social Security? nm
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Top Secret hon.......nm
?
Top secret
nm
What's the secret? Well...
As you can tell, I don't come to this website often. What a spaz some people seem to be having about those MTs who can manage to make a decent wage. (And by decent I mean over $25/hour.)
I'm not going to tell you who I work for for one very obvious reason. YOUR MILEAGE MAY VARY. Not everyone who works at my company makes what I do. Some make more. Some make less.
Are you assuming that if you work at my company you'd be bumped to the seventy-dollar-an-hour lane? Don't you think I worked my a@@ off to reach that level?
I spent 18 months in a college program (graduated early because as a single mother I don't have time to waste).
Then I spent another year and a half working IN HOUSE at a teaching hospital.
I found and paid attention to a fantastic MENTOR.
I studied. Every day. Every word I didn't know I wrote down on a sheet and kept it by my desk.
Every phrase I typed more than once got a macro. Every word I mistyped or misspelled went into auto-correct.
I spent 10 years learning, taking jobs nobody else wanted, working hours nobody else would work. Because I knew it would pay off some day. And guess what. That 'some day' has been 'this day' for the past six years.
It shocks me to see people working for 6 cents a line. It makes me think either they don't have enough training, enough innate skill, or enough 'sit down/shut up/and type' to make it in this business.
I've mentored MTs. Some picked it up right away. They had flying fingers. They had an ear for the indecipherable. They had fortitude. And they make as much or more than I do. And guess what, natural talent trumps training any day of the week. That's life. In every single profession on the face of the planet.
Some flat out don't have the right stuff. Even my own sister couldn't make a go of it, and we shared an office and all the same reference material.
Just wanting to be an MT doesn't mean it's the right career for someone. Hell, I'd love to be a jockey but I'm 5'9 and s.o.l.
Fortunately I have an ear for this work. I knock the hell out of the competition at MadGab. (And if you're not playing MadGab you're missing a great learning tool.) I worked as a court reporter for five years, where we were expected to transcribe at the speed of speech (140 wmp) so I made myself type 140 wmp ... accurately!
There's no 'secret.' Like all good things in life, it just takes the right combination of want to and can do, and once you have that you have to find the company, the account and the platform that jives with your work style.
I don't appreciate being called a liar. Some of the posts on this board are so bitter and snipey. Let me guess. Those are the women who found an 800 number in the back of Home and Garden Magazine that said you can make 80K from home in your jammies while your babies crawl around on the floor. Get real. This is a difficult, demanding career. It's not free daycare. It's not for someone who simply doesn't want to get dressed in the morning.
I work like a mad woman for five, sometimes six hours a day. I'd rather do that than stretch the work out for an eight hour shift. When I first worked at a hospital, my supervisor asked me to please slow down as I was making the others look bad. You know what? Too effing bad. If straight out of school I was doing twice their volume, that was a reflection on THEM, not on ME.
That advice still stands. 50-70 is absolutely possible, not asbolutely amazing. I do it every day of the week. So if it makes you feel bad to see some of us doing well, too effing bad.
Peace out.
not a secret
It's not a secret company. if anyone is interested, i am more than happy to talk with them directly if they want to send an email request.
Your post is just one reason that justifies why I am not just posting any and all information on this board directly.
No secret, I think .....sm
it was just a talent given to me. I was typing 65 wpm in high school, the second week of class. Then, I went on to transcription while I was a Junior in high school, and just picked it up quickly. Typing has always been my thing. I absolutely love to type and having ear phones on and blocking out everyone else when I feel like it is even better!!!
It is my peace!!
One secret to VR here is
I have worked for the same hospital now for over 15 years. Sure we have a lot of ESLs like never before but I know so many that to edit is like sitting here running the pedal and eating chocolate covered cherries (well almost). I set my pedal at the fastest I can and read just as fast as my eyes will let me.
Just ask your STM - it's not a big secret, as far sm
as I can tell.
Why is everything such a secret at MDI-FL? Just heard
thru the grapevine that Jason, the new general manager was no longer there and Liz is in charge now. What a way to find things out. Can't the team leaders notify the MLS of major changes?
Ditto! MDI-MD! Best-kept secret. sm
Best pay, no hassles, paid on time, best WAV platform around, easy to get lines.
You are so right its their dirty little secret
They have always skirted the law. I know alot of MT's who worked 6 and sometimes 7 days a week and not a penny extra. One coordinator told me to add my weekend lines to my lines from during the week but not record my hours I work extra and team lead said it is all about the lines anyways. They call you on the weekends to work and it looks like they would pay more for weekends but they don't they just want you to work on your day off on the weekend but not even pay a shift differental much less overtime. Never looked back so glad I am gone. Never again. They do not appreciate their MT's at all. They don't care about anybody except their own pockets.
secret message
Those voices in your head? They are saying take your meds. . . .
Insider secret at OSI but everyone knows
The top QA people have horrible grammar and spelling skills and they have been promoted to management because they did so poorly in the MT pool and because they knew all the right people for a promotion. This is a well-known fact. The QA pay is very low but this kept them from losing their jobs.
Did you read The Secret?
According to The Secret, this is the key to success and happiness in life. What we think about gets stronger and comes back to us in like form. Something like that. The book's author is Byrne.
What is Diskriter's secret?
I see that they advertise nonstop. I know MTs are not leaving at that fast. Therefore, they are going leaps and bounds and out bidding the competition. Is this a great place to work?
Thanks
I really hope that THE SECRET
and any other new-age sew-age myths of its ilk will pay your mortage when you run out of work. We will see what we will see. I see too many people running out of work.
What's the big secret? Just change the tests more
often. There is plenty of dictation to change the tests frequently. You must work for Keystrokes. That's the company they are talking about. I just wanted to know what I did wrong so in the future I can be more careful. Even in school you get corrected papers.
Spheris doesn't keep it a secret. Quite
xx
It's never been a secret that Transcend outsources.
They are very proud of their overseas partners as they call them. The only reason the work is more steady and not all going there is that a lot of their hospital contracts state that they cannot outsource their work. So I applaud those hospitals because without them taking a stand, we'd be having no work..again. I remember waking up in the morning and finding there is no work and this is because the Indians are opposite us. When it's night for them it is day for us. So technically while we slept, they worked and when we got up, there was nothing left. It still happens on occasions but we have gotten a few new accounts so that helps. Also, whenever they ran out of work, people would quit and that would leave more work for whoever was left. It's just the nature of the business I guess. I've gone elsewhere.
I don't get why you won't say the name. You sound like a 6th grader with a secret club. nm
ttttttt
If I do that, the secret cameras will know I've searched for it! nm
x.
Can you elaborate or is that top secret too. Do people really get incentives and bonuses there??
Yes, a day early!!!
x
Sorry about that, it's still early...nm
x
I have always been an early worker but now..sm
there is NO work and when it does come in it seems everyone is waiting like me to grab it and then there is NO work as there were only a few reports. I addressed these concerns only to be told I needed to be more flexible.
I was asking who the one who paid early is! nm
nm
To early riser
This is exactly who the posts are talking about. Gosh, wonder if this is the only 1 who apparently does this time after time because most seem to know who it is.
whoops, go FOR it, too early
xx
They release you from QA early because they
to review the reports correctly. It is sad. You get what you pay for. Plus you can type all you want from the first day with no regard to quality and I wonder how many slip through without going through QA first?
Pay on time or many times a day early.
nm
I agree - get on early - get leftovers (sm)
the name of the game. If I get somebody bad and it's almost time for me to quit for the day, I hang up too.
Deventure pays early.
Pay day is Friday but my DD is there every Thursday. :-)
The last InstantText I used was a very early version, so SM
I can't speak to that any more, but just wanted to stay that ShortHand is excellent and I also love it. But it is a very sophisticated program with a whole bunch of bells and whistles that you can use or not use as you choose.
Same here..I've been trying since early Friday..(sm)
I'll call Monday if I can't get in by then. It's never been down this long before.
..and yes I made a typo up there. It is early. :-P
x
I have said it for years! Back in the early
90s when my employer tried to do a business meeting with us then and did not say a word about the variable fonts, I asked the question because I do that. I think to ask when I know the outcome is the bottom line. I knew true type fonts were variable and could produce double the amount of characters on a line depending on the font. So, I asked the question in front of all their employees...so what do you do when you are transcribing more per line Mr X...is that such a deal for we MTs? I did the math on how much more we would be transcribing per line and as opposed to the 60 characters we are getting paid to do now with our standard pitch font, the change of fonts can reap as much as 123 characters per line. That's basically how I phrased the question. He evaded the question and then on the elevator leaving the room (that was a full elevator), said to me X...you WOULD have been the one to ask that question! He lost most his employees within two months. They think you don't know to ask, but I think still the older MTs are wise to this so they do ask, but someone new into the field might not know about the gross line situation.
My guess is M-F. early mornings. nm
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Woke up to no work early this a.m.
So, it's slow already, and this is the last payperiod before Christmas. How are you doing on this payperiod with your company?
I woke up at 1 a.m. and stayed until 7 a.m. to find 2 reports for me. Not a good way to start off the week. Wondering what your company will do for you and your family this Christmas paycheck.
BTW: When this MT worked inhouse at a hospital eons ago, there was always a holiday bonus for the Christmas paycheck, and it was never less than 1,000.00. Paid for Christmas and more. Now that they have outsourced, guess what this MT is getting? 40.00 until the end of the week for food money for a family of 5. 
Ho ho ho. Happy Holidays. Hope you will fare better!
don't yell, I know I screwed up....too early..lol..nm
xx
Any of you MT's up early this a.m . and trying to work, but got disconnected from VPN and cannot
logged back in to work?? Don't know if it is a server problem or what, but cannot log back into VPN.
Too early for me, I meant VR at my place
does not just have specific persons on, and the weekends are loaded with ESLs dictating and not on VR, basically 1 discharge summary after another. My place just does not have the easiest put on VR. I could really rake in the moola if that were the case.
MedQuist used to be Medifax in early 90s
Unless there's another company with same name.
Delete extra "not", too early! nm
x
pay has always been on time or early, no direct deposit as of yet though. sm
pay has been correct. as far as accts and ESLs, i was told about 25% on my acct but i would say it is more like 50/50. you can through the system view prior reports, etc. system is different than i have worked on, but wasn't hard to learn. one biggy for me is that it doesn't use autocorrect as it isn't word based and i had a lot added in autocorrect but ShortHand is compatible. i have been treated really well, very nice people to work for. only thing i don't really like is you are an IC but have to give a schedule since it is acute care. ins can be obtained though even though IC and not bad rates.
No work at MDI-FL. Starving. What a waste of day getting up early for nothing.
This gets old. It has been like this for a week. I wonder how long people are supposed to hang out and do nothing.
I'm new to Keystrokes and the pay has been early or on time. Can't complain about that! nm
s
They had an ad here in early June 2006. Did anyone start with them? nm
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