I called 6 agencies from my local yellow
Posted By: Call local insurance agencies on 2005-12-27
In Reply to: Can you share where you get this insurance? sm - Not OP
pages that said in their ads they sold health insurance. Each one sold the very same insurance, but premiums ranged widely. We currently have a cheaper insurance through my DH work and I don't remember if the private insurance covered eye care and dental or just medical. I'd also recommend looking into a medical savings account to see if you qualify.
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Look through the yellow pages of your local
phone book and call agents that offer health insurance. Make several calls. I did this when we needed private insurance and each call I made I got a lower premium, although every company had the very same insurance. Celtic is what we found to be the lowest. We no longer have this insurance as we have insurance through DH job, but we had no existing conditions, no regular meds, nonsmokers, so I'm not sure if these were covered. I'd keep calling about COBRA. The company has to offer it. If you go 45 days without insurance and have a pre-existing condition you are in trouble, unless things have changed since we got insurance. There is a temporary insurance through Fortis that is very cheap, but the deductible is very high and it doesn't cover pre-existing conditions.
I'd stay away from the association for the self-employed or whatever it is called. When I called them their rates were double what I could get a private policy for and it was the same insurance.
Go through the yellow pages of your local phone
book and call insurance companies that offer health insurance. Call several. I called 6 companies when I was looking and all the quotes were for the very same insurance, but varied as much as $200/mo. Celtic was the best insurance. For a family of 4, nonsmokers it was about $335/mo. We don't have the insurance now as we have through DH job. I can't remember if that included dental/vision/maternity coverage. There is also a temporary insurance through Fortis, that depending on what state you live in is good for 1 year. It is not renewable and you cannot get it if you have a pre-existing condition, or have been without coverage for a certain time period, can't remember but I think it is 15 days. We could only get it for 6 months in our state and I paid the premium for the entire coverage and it was $403.00 total for the entire 6 months. The deductible was $5,000. This was basically catastrophic insurance, did not cover dental/vision/maternity. We are all healthy and on no meds so for us it was the best option. You can check e-insurance website and get some quotes to get an idea of coverage available, though it will not likely have everything that is available included, which is why I suggest calling local agencies. There is a self-employed organization that offers insurance, but I found to be very expensive, about what you are paying now.
Check into medical savings accounts. I don't know that much about them, but I believe you have to qualify for them. You basically put $$ into an account much like an IRA and get tax breaks.
Dept of Labor and All Other Agencies
PAYROLL ISSUES: Visit the web site of your state DOL. The federal DOL has hired 3,000 to handle the overflow of complaints. Complete paperwork for a complaint, send registered mail, then give them a followup call. They DO follow up.
EEOC: Discrimination by disability, age, gender, race, religion, etc. They have hired thousands of new mediators to handle case overload and are approving more cases for trial than ever before.
RETIREMENT FUND FRAUD: Visit the ERISA web site; they act fast and audit anonymously and take this issue absolutely seriously. They also represent you legally.
SOFTWARE LICENSING VIOLATIONS: Illegal software installed on your PC by employer can get YOU in trouble. Contact the BSA (Business Software Alliance) with any questions. They take online complaints either anonymously or, if you want to be placed on the reward list, they will audit your computer and if there is a licensing violation, reporters receive from $5,000 to $100,000 in rewards for reporting illegal or unlicensed software use. BSA investigates for Microsoft as well as any other proprietary NON-public software.
INSURANCE EXCLUSION/FRAUD: ERISA and state DOL. Also, look up the consumer protection agencies in your state; there may be an additional Insurance Commission.
Keep a diary, keep good, accurate records (dates, times, calls, emails); this information will prove to be priceless :)
Does anyone know of any large billing agencies that are for sale?
If you are aware of a large ($1million + annual revenue) medical billing/transcription agency/company that is for sale. Please reply here or email me.
Yellow flame
Can somebody please tell me what the yellow flame means?
Can someone please tell me what the little yellow thing is ....
that is next to some of the postings? Actually it almost looks like fire. What does it mean?
TIA
Check out magic yellow (sm)
It's free yellow pages. Look under transcription and there might be companies in your area that you can contact. Not all of us pay to advertise (I'm not hiring employees because I'm just a small company) and you might just find a nice small local company who could use you.
If you're near a large city, look in the phone book. My suggestion is to try a smaller local MTSO rather than go with the larger companies. You'll probably find the working conditions, terms and cpl amount a lot better. :)
I personally don't advertise in the Yellow Pages because I was getting a lot of sm
calls from housewives who know how to type *real good*. Or people who wanted to do this because they saw in a magazine that you can make a lot of money in your free time!
TT - ext text. Why are some voice jobs gold/yellow instead of white? nm
They have called me twice and I have not yet called them back
Per your recommendation, I just might. Thank you.
I called and called and e-mailed my STM. When that got no
results I went over her head. Got another account, but with 3 accounts still not enough work to get in more than 20 hours/week. I worked a shift that was part 2nd/part 3rd. Some days OT was offered, but then there wouldn't be work the next day.
Go Local
I would not consider editing unless the pay reflected my experience as an MT. Editors spend a lot of time cleaning up the garbage.
I think you have to go local for that.
I don't know of any that pay hourly for MT work. Many do for QA work, but not for MT.
I know around here many of the local hospitals do that, but it's usually MTs that have been with their hospital for a certain period of time. They don't hire from outside to work at home.
Also look at local
While most local comapanies have an onsite group they will sometimes hire people who have worked out of their homes for years. If you are moving from Transcend submit your resume to local recruiters and find out if there is a temp agency in your area that does transcription based companies. A local physician group still uses me per diem and while they have onsite if I need to they also support offsite - it saves them some money because they don't have to support your equipment!
Just be aware, VR is the wave of the future. My guess is that in 10-20 years everything will be run through VR and nothing will be transcribed from scratch...of course if we all stand together and demand more money than they are currently offering the market will eventually succumb :)
I know...it's sad..I used to love it at MQ when we had a local
office but everything has changed so and I just HAVE to make more money! Good luck to all MQers looking elsewhere!
Local hospital - sm
I loved Medware until they started sending so much of their work to Medware India. I spent my days editing the offshore work. Its incredibly frustrating. It doesn't matter how much feedback you give, the same errors are made. A person cannot go day after day after day doing that without getting down. I made the decision to leave and have been so much happier. I only have to worry about my own quality now. 
local offices
what is the best way in getting starting for working for local doctors? Get business cards made up, show them a resume? I have often thought about this and afraid to take the leap. is this reliable work? I'm sure they can let you go whenever they want but I guess that's the case anywhere. please, any info would help.
I agree - go local. (nm)
.
Local Hosptials in GA
Greetings
I reside in ATL and wondering if by chance if anyone knew who handles the transcription for Atlanta Medical Center, Grady Hospital, St. Josephs Hospital and any other local hospital here. I seem to can't get anywhere by calling. I am a newbie and is not having the best of luck with MTSOs right now. Any help would be very much so appreciated. Thank you.
I had a local MTSO try to do that to me...
...I was ready to sign the contracts after meeting with them in person, until I heard I'd have to pay a one-time nonrefundable charge due lump sum for $600.00 for the FTP software. To add further insult to injury, they also advised me they didn't pay for spaces and required me to transcribe a minimum of 1200 lpd.
I couldn't run out of there fast enough.
What would I do with their FTP software if I quit? It would be useless to me, and I'd have paid for it.
I steer clear of companies asking me to pay for use of their software, I'd suggest you do the same.
Call your local DOL
You are entitled to minimum wage if you are an employee. So make sure you are punching a time clock or otherwise keeping track of your hours and your pay.
You can also file for partial unemployment.
That s/b local OR 800#. no text
gourdie - do you have a local - sm
news station that exposes these type of injustices? they love the david vs goliath type of stories...
Our two local hospitals do just that.
Management is at the hospital. MTs have a choice to work at their medical records departments or work remotely from home. Benefits are excellent. Health insurance rates are very reasonable. Pay is hourly - guess what, always on time. They are always offering CPR classes free, movie tickets and group travel plans at discounts. ACTUALLY GIVE RAISES.
I would love to see all hospitals go back to this. More personal employment, keep it local, smaller group of docs that we actually might know, not as much BS as working for an MTSO. I think this gives the MT back their feeling of being a professional and the hospitals treat us fairly, like an employee and no BS about OT and line rates. Enough already with the greedy MTSOs who can't seem to get their act together with their overhiring, then low work, no work, then begging for help if you stay and most everyone else leaves.
Our local hospital...
has closed the entire top floor, and the nursing students from the local college are lucky to get 1 patient for their clinicals. They are asking the older seniority nurses and other personnel to retire early. Another hospital has the healthcare workers down to 32 hours per week. I am in OH, and my area is really bad economy-wise.
Do you work for local doctors?
If you do, how many do you work for to make that kind of money? Do you charge $.15/line? Thanks.
One more thing to consider: Local taxes
Don't know about you, but I have a local tax I think it's 1.5%, where I live. They don't deduct that from my pay like my state and federal taxes are deducted. I asked them to but they refused. So I'm going to have to come up with that money next year to pay my local tax. I can't afford to save it now. Those of you who have a local tax whrere you live better check your pay stubs and make arrangements.
A local cc (NC) costs about $1200. The
local state supported 4-year university now offers an on-line MT program too and I think it is about $1800.00. The cc arranges internships and helps with job placement, don't know about the 4-year school as it is a relatively new program and I am not familiar with it.
Then a small co or a local hospital SM
would be better. You are not going to find an MT service of any size that doesn't have a bunch of ESL dictators. That's just the way it is.
Do they take out for all taxes or just the Federal and you pay your own local? nm
s
Is there really an advantage to staying local? Most
It doesn't seem there's any more guarantee of stable work from local MTSOs than the national ones.
If you do want to stay local but work at home, also try Southern Transcription Services, located in Taylorsville, I think. They have a good reputation. Google them for their web site.
A local nephrology office - NM
NM
I know of two huge accounts local to me
One is a huge hospital system and the other is an ortho practice that I used to contract for and left due to the physician retiring, but they have 10 physicians. They are very unhappy with the quality of reports from C-Bay. Not surprising that they are not needing as many MTs these days since their reputation is very poor.
JLG did work for our local hospital when I was there.
They charged us $3.50 a line. I saw the contract. I was shocked. We paid ICs $1.50 a line. And the work was horrible. Everytime they uploaded reports, 2 of us spent most of the day correcting them. After about 6 months, we fired them.
Go to the library in your local town. I do.
nm
My local area rates seem to run 9-12 CPL sm
If you want benefits as mentioned in your first posting, you'd need to become an employee. Some of the bigger companies offer a good competitive rate for ICs, 10-12 cpl (without benefits of course).
how does one find out what local rates are?
Also, how do you figure what rate you should charge if you land an account not in your area? Do you go by THEIR local rates? How do you know what those would be?
Once, while working for a local hospital
I was also working PT for the service that the hospital used. The only conditions made for that were that I could not work on my hospital's account as that could be considered a conflict, i.e., less work for the hospital so more was available for the PT job. I have yet to have a problem working for 2 companies. Currently I work for a national company FT and a local company PT. They do not have the same accounts, so therefore no conflict.
In our town, we have a little local pharmacy or many
I tried to stick with my little local pharmacy, but started having problem with insurance issues, which miraculously didn't happen at CVS. Something about CareMark is my insurer for meds. So, I switched to CVS primarily due to these glitchy insurance problems with my scrips. All went well for a month or two, though I felt bad ditching the little local guy. Well, then I started having all sorts of medication errors from CVS - wrong med being given in my bag, wrong dosing, etc. When I started complaining, I realized that CVS and CareMark are basically one and the same - another mass merger thing. So, I believe that CareMark deliberately gave me problems when I used anyone but CVS, and it turns out it was true. I have gone back to my local pharmacy, and he confirmed what I thought had been happening. Its like conspiracy theories everywhere these days. He said he couldn't say a word, though, as he had been threatened by lawyers not to make the connection for people - we had to figure it out on our own. Well, me with my big mouth, I'm telling everyone I know!! LOL. So, no, not impressed with CVS either, and no, they don't care about their mistakes - locally or corporate. We're all humans, after all, though some have jobs that could kill fellow humans. LOL.
I work for local clinic 17 cpl
But it's only two doctors and another MT and I split the work.
Only when hired by a local hospital - sm
It is a little surprising to hear they want you to do this. I was hired by a local hospital (an hour away) and had to come in for training there - up to 3 months, unless I got the hang of it earlier. Some folks who worked there lived a little farther away (one was 3 hours) but all were within driving distance. So I have been asked - however, I've not been asked for a place as far away as what you described. 
Offered a new local job and trying to decide. sm
The new job is MT but it is not straight typing. It is basically putting reports together from a check list with occasional regular transcription. Will also be building reports from handwritten documentation. The doctors are all available and do not mind you asking if you cannot read something. I met all 11 of them today. There is 1 week vacation time the first year, 2 years after that. Med insurace is $30 per pay check is very good. Family is around 120 per check. They have retirement as well. It is also 8-5 M-F. All holidays off and paid. Now, here is the drawback. They only start at 13.50 per hour. They do give annual raises of a minimum of 5%. Travel is not a big issue as it is only 10 minutes or less from my house. The low pay I am a bit worried about. What is your opinions? All are appreciated. Also one last thing, this is a specialty clinic and I have always done acute care but know the specialty well.
A local surgery center
I was referred to them through someone else. They have had trouble keeping a transcriptionist. Now I know why.
It's just a local hospital account, not a
national. Most of the time I do their acute care work on Chartscript; I just help on radiology in Meditech if they are backlogged. It's not the Meditech Magic version, though. Don't know if that makes a difference.
The local hospital I go to has it....I have to say it is impressive.
I have various scopes done periodically for surveillance, and for the last few years they have handed me a beautifully typed and surprisingly detailed report as soon as I wake up, complete with color photos. I recently asked how it was done so quickly. The nurse said the doc types it using a template.
Reading 095 -Local CC offers It
The lack of comprehension in reading on this board is truly infuriating. I said nothing more than I have not experienced problems finding a job or poor wages as a recent graduate. I claimed nothing of knowing more than that. Perhaps it is time to spend a bit less time chatting online and step out of the house everyone now and then. It always refreshes my perspective. Good grief.
Often it is better to apply at your local hospital. Many times they
train on-site. The training is invaluable as you can get training on acute care and radiology and you would have a mentor with you all day.
maybe she should try local doctors and clinics and hospitals - sm
it's just a suggestion. But some docs have one tape a week that they need done. It might be ideal for her situation.
Send out letters of introduction to local
physicians. Doesn't guarantee you an account, but maybe someone is looking.
Call insurance companies in your local
yellow pages that advertise health insurance. Call several to get comparisons.
Check einsurance.com.
There is a transcriptionist job listed in my local newspaper (sm)
It says fax CV to ---
Does anyone know what CV means? The only think I can think of is maybe Certificate Verification?
Thanks.
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