Here are the factors in my opinion...$1.10 is okay if...sm

• Rad MTs....$1.10 per report...is this on the low end or average? - Need info
  • Low - anon
  • Here are the factors in my opinion...$1.10 is okay if...sm - radmom
    • oops sorry for the typo - meant "companies" . nm - radmom
  • rad reports - darlene
    • I have had two accounts.... - RadTranstoo
  • Seems to me Rad pay is slowly creeping down. - nm
    • rad pay - rocklady
      • rad pay correction - rocklady
      • WOW $3.50 report? - Jamie
        • that is either the mtso rate or no middle man at all, betcha-nm - anon
        • not me! - rocklady

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How big is the page? In other words, how many lines define a page, and how many characters in the line? Or, if paid by line, how many characters in the line? Are spaces included? For both, are headers and things included. I assume you're referring to Silent Type. I have always heard they paid archaic wages per page. There are posts on Company Board about them - I would search back a few pages. I know they make you travel to their offices for 2 or 3 days, and even though I live in NJ, I would never stoop to that in this day and age - not very high tech.

I've been in the MT field for 16+ years now, produce quality work that I have always taken pride in, and my work ethic, well let's just say I do not think that there has been one weekend, Christmas day, etc. that I have not worked in 16 year iin this profession, and those times being mainly at night.

I agree with some of what you state, however with that said, you may want to ponder a few other things. I have met many, many hard working, highly experienced MT's who likewise produce quality documents, take great pride in their work, and even have a stronger work ethic than I.  I hear the same story, over and over from MT's such as they, the lack of respect in general for this profession declining over the years, along with declining wages, outsourcing, etc.

Another thought that you may want to ponder is regarding outsourcing. There are subskilled and substandard MT's in the US, however they are in a minority. By far most are intelligent, hard working and dedicated individuals.  The reason that this industry is being outsourced has little to do with the quality of the US MT. The industry is being outsourced strictly due to the ability to procure cheaper labor elsewhere. Period. Yes, the Indian MT, etc., works hard and does not whine as you state. They are paid 3 or 4 cents per line for their work. I don't know if you are aware of the cost of living in India, however it is far below that in the US; for example monthly cable television is $5.00 per month, etc., so the rate that is being paid there furnishes that MT with a nice lifestyle, thus nothing to whine about, as this industry used to provide to the equally hard working US MT.

It is often convenient to point one's finger at a small handful of people in a given profession and state that to be the cause of an industry that is declining in the US. Even if that were the case in the MT profession one also then needs to take a look at other professions such as engineering, the IT industry, support centers, etc. that are being outsourced, and likewise in those fields the jobs are not being outsourced due to the incompetance or lack of work ethic of the American worker.

1.  The cost of living has increased drastically since 1992.  That $15 an hour was worth far more than it is today. 

2.  TIME, which to many is the most important factor.  You really can't put a value on what you're losing with your family when you have to work *that couple more hours* to make what you made 15 years ago.  In fact, if we had worked that *couple more hours* 15 years ago, we would have been paid time and a half as overtime.  Also, 15 years ago when I worked in house I was paid hourly.  If it took me a little extra time to find the address for a copy the doctor wanted sent, I was still paid the same.  Have you figured the percentage of lost work now working production and trying to find the addresses, first names, correct spelling of referring physicians, etc., for the hundreds of different doctors from multiple accounts for multiple national MTSOs over the 15 years? Our job requires the same, if not more, amount of unpaid time...yet we're not paid hourly anymore.

3.  I really liked your phrase *the benefit of working from home.*  LOL  Sure, we don't have to buy business clothes or pay for gas, but what is the employer saving by having us work at home?  We buy the computer, buy the printers to print out the hundreds of pages of account specs, the ink, the electric, the internet access, our research materials, and in some cases even the software.  In fact, this brings me to the next point you never considered.

4.  IC status.  More and more MTSOs are asking for IC status.  When I started working at home about 14 years ago, I was an employee making 12 cpl WITH the best health insurance I ever had, weekends off, all holidays except 2 off with pay, AND 2 weeks paid vacation.  Here it is 15 years later and the MTSOs not only want us to work for less than we did then, but they don't even want to pay benefits, taxes, disability insurance, or unemployment insurance.  They want us to pay all that for less than what they paid us 15 years ago...AND THEN, they want to tell us what hours to work, what days to work, and how much work we have to do in a day.  In other words, they want to treat us as employees, but put the price of all the employee *extras* on our backs. 

And you're content with all this??  Maybe I shouldn't use the word content.  You're used to all this and accept it?  Now I see why posters have made the correlation between battered spouse syndrome and our profession.  The more you become used to the abuse, the more you accept it.

This is simply the opinion of the person who wrote it.  That does not mean you don't have the intelligence to make an informed decision.  Obvious the person who wrote this had problems with 2 different companies.  That particular person may have problems with any company they work for.

When you read these posts, keep in mind that if everyone agreed with all of these posts there would not be a transcription company in business anywhere.

I do not know about OSi but SoftScript has treated me well, as will most nationals if you give them your best effort.  They want to hire good MTs and expect quality work. Give them that and you will be compensated fairly and treated well.

Likewise...this is simply my opinion. Take it or leave it.

I've worked for them going on 4 years now and plan on staying.  I've worked on the same accounts all 4 years (tough ESLs, but after awhile, you get them all and can get plenty of lines---plus nobody wants your accounts and work is plenty--something I have learned in my 25+ years).  The pay is good, it's always accurate and on time, PTO is great, and I love not having someone over my shoulder all the time.  I've done my rounds at other nationals and this has been my best experience.  Each company is unique, you have to see what works best for you. 

In my experience the KS platform is easy to use, my rad account has plenty of work and great communication with team lead. Pay is on time and plenty of opportunity to make money.

Be careful with expressing yourself and getting answers with X-Press. I went through the interview process with X-Press over a year ago, they sent me manuals, ready to start but when I emailed my lead, asking the usual few questions about the company, (basically to ease my mind since the hiring process was SO long and had been told conflicting things)  she forwarded it to Mr. David and he in turn accused me of being a trouble maker and of slander!  It was all very strange. 

umm unusual.  I bet I can guess what network you watch and who your favorite anchorman/commentator is.  Reading minds and attributing such sweeping negativity towards workers. The spin is in your head.

When I was interviewed for the job, I of course asked many questions regarding work availability, pay, PTO/vacation benefits, supervisor communication, etc.  All my questions were answered, and even though I knew that companies tend to sugar coat things a bit, I was overall very pleased with the answers and felt the interviewer was extremely friendly and helpful.  So, I took the job the next day after giving it some thought.  Boy, did I get a wake up call very quickly with this company!  All the promises I was made, exciting incentives talked about, etc. by that friendly interviewer before I took the job just didn't exist entirely or had so many fine-print-type rules to obtaining them that made them virtually impossible to achieve!    Everything from baseline cpl rate and work availability to extra money incentives, equipment costs, and PTO/vacation was either less than I was told or I couldn't get due to certain standards I was never informed of. 

After the initial training phase, I started typing on my own.  During the first week or 2 after training, I started to asking questions about all of these things I was promised and was not getting.  I was given several reasons/excuses as to what happened with various things.  I was getting almost 2 cpl less than I was informed by the interviewer when I accepted the position.  The reason I was given for this is because the interviewer just simply made a SMALL mistake and didn't do it with the intention of misleading me.  After receiving my first paycheck (not the training pay period check paid by the hour but the first check of actual typing), I was very upset as I made a lot less than I had anticipated and didn't understand why.  I reviewed the check carefully and discovered I didn't get any incentives that I was initially told about and the cpl rate for about half of the work I did was wrong.  Again, I called to have this explained and fixed.  I was told that they must have simply forgotten to tell me that I was not eligible for the first incentive beause I reached the line count goals out of my regularly scheduled hours (I worked these off hours because they asked me to for coverage reasons).  The other part of my check for the higher weekend and afternoon/night cpl rate was again just a mistaken cpl rate quote from the interviewer, and they were sorry for the SMALL mistake again. 

After a month or 2 with this company, I had already experienced numerous broken promises, lower paychecks, surprise equipment rental fees, incredibly rude supervisors, unanswered e-mails and questions, etc.   One of the big problems, besides being completely lied to regarding cpl rates and pay in general was the communication, or lack there of, in this company.  Iwould send e-mails with questions regarding specifics of an account, how to do something for a particular account, why I wasn't getting paid an incentive, etc.   Supervisors and higher management just simply would not respond no matter how many times you asked or re-sent an e-mail..some of them never.  So, I would take the time to call certain supervisors, get their voice mail, and leave a message, but I never heard back from them that way either.  A few times I called the supervisors' supervisors, go through the same ordeal, never hearing back from them either!  It got ridiculous, always working in the dark because you had no clue how to do particular things and no one answered your questions.  The only time you did hear from them was if you did something wrong (usually something that you had asked a question about earlier and didn't get a response)!   

I do try very hard to find the good in something, even if it's mostly bad, and the only good thing I can come up with on this company was the initial training week and the lady who trained me on the system.  I cannot remember her name at the moment, but she was very kind and extremely helpful.  She made learning something a lot less difficult and was a very good teacher.  Too bad there are not more people like that working for the company.

I did not list everything  bad about this company because I didn't want this to go any longer than it already has, but I obviously do not recommend them at all.  In my experience, they are very shady, for the most part incredibly rude, and they are definitely not concerned about the success/failure of their MTs or what they think.  Good luck to you...I hope you do find the company that you are looking for that is a right fit for you, but I really don't think Transcend is it unfortunately.