I think MT is becoming a niche business that will soon consist only of ESLs with the good docs
Posted By: being done by in-house MTs. nm on 2006-09-10
In Reply to: Yes -just happened again to me. - nml
s
Complete Discussion Below:  marks the location of current message within thread
The messages you are viewing
are archived/old.
To view latest messages and participate in discussions, select
the boards given in left menu
Other related messages found in our database
There is pretty much an even mix, but my ESLs are better than the US docs.
I am very happy with my account, my pay and the way I am treated.
A good mix. I don't mind ESL docs. I think that some U.S. docs are worse! nm
nm
I have years of experience with ExText and ESLs. These reports had holes in them, the docs were so
s
Definitely #1. ESLs are a part of our business, and if this would be s/m
a chance for you to hone that skill, it would greatly benefit you in the long run. If you would ever decide to leave this company, you will be very marketable with your ESL experience. I once had a job that I had to provide my own equipment, but when I found out that this MTSO was not a fit for me a year or so later, I was left with this computer that I did not need because I took a position with my current company (equipment provided). Just my 2 cents. Good luck in whatever you choose.
Dawn, I agree with you girl! All my good docs...
have also been kidnapped by the cherrypicker gang!
I was on an internet acct, no Cphone. ESL docs were swarming, tho', and I couldn't make good l
s
what does their testing consist of? nm
x
IMO, will always be a niche for us, but MT is victim
x
Anyone had the preliminary interview. What does this consist of?
Please tell us your experiences with this company. I know how we MT's have become skeptical with nationals anymore. It seems that they have all fallen into the big Q's MT Rewards Plan introduced a year or so ago which immediately **took away** from the MT, rather than rewarding them.
Your positivity is most welcome. So happy you found your niche!! nm
xx
Not lots of ESLs and they are mostly pretty good. It is
the American dictators that are horrible, but there are other issues with the account.
Oh, yes, and another thing, VERY FEW ESLs, good dictators!!! NM
nm
Oh, yes, and another thing, VERY FEW ESLs, good dictators!!! NM
nm
Unlike the poster below, I did not find the ESLs good dictators at FN. sm
In fact, in my over 20 years of experience, they were the worst I have ever heard. We got way more than 3 e-mails a day, too. More like 10 to 15, beginning for help and sometimes bordering on threatening. If you are really good with ESLs, you MIGHT do okay. But who wants to put up with that?!? No bennies either. Glad I am long long gone. The grass really is greener.
1100 lpd for FT, good sound quality, ExText software, LOTs of ESLs..nm
s
Yeah, and since when has it ever been good business
practice to repeatedly shuffle MTs around, off of accounts they're fast and accurate on, to ones they're going to be slow on until they learn? And once they DO learn, you yank 'em again.
Why do you think constant employee turnover is good business? No matter how much money you *think* you're saving, did it ever occur to you that the constant turnover means:
1 - There's something wrong with the way you're running the place, or with your pay, or your equipment, or all of the above.
2 - Crummy quality. Do you think your clients and prospective clients don't know that you change employees more often than most people change their underwear? Of course they do. It shows in the work they're getting back.
Oh. And BTW: Don't think for a minute that you're getting away with sneaking all that work off to India, thinking 'they'll never know'. And if they don't know, then all us MTs intend to tell them.
Maybe...maybe not...but they have sure lost A LOT of good MTs because of bad business practices
x
I don't like it, but makes good business sense (sm)
Why pay OT to us when they can farm the overflow out at a lesser rate. I know some accounts have a $ penalty involved if companies run out of TAT.
So far WMX has been fair and upfront with me and as long as they are providing me with enough work to get my hours/line I feel they are keeping up their part of our business arrangement.
Thanks. Yes I heard from others many ESLs and many very difficult ESLs. nm
:
Do you feel better now? !! Business is business, most of it should be confidential. Why post on a
x
Trying to build his business? He's been in business over 15 years!!!!!! sm
I also had a hard time, nearly impossible actually, getting paid. The owner does this on the side; he is very involved with other things.
Could be because all they can get from the docs is 11 cpl....nm
x
ESL docs
Im having a very hard time with all the discussion that I see on the boards regarding ESL doctors -- I have been in this business 20+ years and it takes time to develop an ear to be able to understand ESL doctors -- if you have a friend who is an MT, have her on instant message and ASK what the doctor might be saying -- there have been times too, with her and my experience where she has played her stuck spot back and I heard as clear as a bell what the doctor was saying -- unfortunately, the schools with their training don't do ESL doctors and this is the reason that 99.9% of the companies wont hire without experience - PLEASE resign yourselves that ESL docs are going away unfortunately
with ESL docs, you just never know..sm
You could have great ESL dictators, and at .09/line, you would be paid at least close to what a good Transcriptionist is worth (still not enough as our wages are pitiful now). On the other hand, if you have really terrible ESL dictators, that .09 could easily become comparable to making .05/line if you have to slow down to understand the doctor. With ESL's, you really don't know until after you have made that commitment. However, as a previous MTSO, I would never give one person all of the crappy dictators. Rather, I tried to distribute the work evenly to give everyone a fair shot at a decent line count. Good luck in your decision. Try bargaining. Tell them you feel ESL doctors are worth the extra compensation because often times your hourly production is decreased because they do not dictate proper English sentences, mispronounce words etc, and tell them you believe the work is worth .10/line and you will strongly consider the position.
Docs
who eat, slurp, roll hard candy or lozenges in their mouth, sniffing their nose constantly all while speaking....especially the eating while dictating drives me CRAZY! It is just like having a rude person standing right next to your ear eating smacking his food. GRRRRRRRR
the docs may not NEED it but its sm
not for you to decide. If thats what they want and you do their work, then you do it or you don't work. I don't like it either, but they don't dictate their reports to suit the lifestyle of your or me. I don't understand why people can't see its the profession, you aren't going to change it. you need to get a new profession.
As far as the grocery clerks and weekends, etc. etc. They don't all call in sick and not work. Years ago when some of these supermarket chains were union, they made good money and those people worked their hind ends off, weekends, nights, holidays the whole bit. I know because my hubby is now drawing retirement from one of the chains. Seems to me we have a whole generation of younger folks that don't want to work but like the other poster said, they just want to p*ss and moan!
Rotten docs
Dear Doctor:
While I have a great deal of respect for what you do, you aggravate me.
Please, when you are addressing a letter be courteous enough to include the CITY and the STATE, and if you spell something don't spell ROAD for me, because, trust me, I learned how to spell road in the second grade!
Don't make me search for 15 minutes to find something your lazy ### could have read off the chart, because I only made 14 cents to type that letter, and my time and skill is worth more than 60 cents an hour.
And while I am venting, how about you say pheochromatoma, instead of feo, if that is what you mean. Don't be so lazy my job is 100 times harder.
If thats all they can get from the docs, get a different account!! There are more out there
I'm tired of these companies expecting IC work for 8 cpl, have a set schedule and thats even when I'm offering to do ops mainly!! Thats disgusting. I can just as easy do the basic 4, have a set schedule and not have to pay my own social security and taxes! Dont take it!
No ESL docs, no op notes (as far as I know) SM
They are mainly consults, soap notes, some radiology. You use their templates and get paid for headers/footers.
I don't know if everyone makes the same, but I make 8 cpl (55 characters per line) without spaces. I compared it to the normal 65 characters per line with spaces, and it is equivalent to 8 cents per line with spaces. So, not too bad...just average I guess.
But the dictators are really clear and there are a lot of samples. I think the work is pretty easy. I think it makes a really good p.r.n. position.
Good luck with whatever you decide to do. :)
Chickadee
You need to realize that about 80 pc of the docs sm
practicing acute care in this country are ESL. It is what it is.
I like them a lot better than the native English speakers, who slur words, like to play with the language. ESLs learn one way to say it, and they say it that way every time. You just have to get used to it.
TransTech and ESL Docs
Well, you know...ANYONE who wants to continue to be a Transcriptionist had better become proficient in ESL docs. They are here to stay. If you had YOUR own business you would take the accounts to. I can do them. I moan a lot of times when I see a particular doctor's name come up for me to transcribe for, but it's all just part of the job. Like I said, better get used to it as there are more and more foreign doctors every day. I transcribe and I get paid and I don't feel cheated ONE bit.
All the decent docs have
TransTech did a big hiring blitz back in October last year for a new account, but the account almost immediately started going to VR, so the doable dictators left in a hurry!
The jobs that get sifted towards the MT's out of VR machine, thus, are the very difficult dictators that should be warned about their dictation habits.
The ExSpeech (editing platform) is very awkward and time consuming, so it is a catch 22 for the MT's. ExText has a good spell check and is easy platform to learn.
TransTech does not allow the MT's to check/verify our lines in the manner in which, in my opinion, we should be able to do. The CTRL I function does not give even a close line count and our pay stubs do not show it either -- just the word *piecework*. We can go to iChart; however, it does not show an immediate line count nor the jobs or line count per report -- only a total line count for a period of time per TransTech's counting method. It is a lot of trouble to go to iChart to get an immediate line count each time you choose to check your pace. We should be able to do this right from the platform/software that we are working in, IMO.
It seems our lines have been much harder to obtain in the past several months -- I suppose more to the dictators shuffled our way from VR, than anything that Transtech is doing with the line counts. I can't imagine them messing with our line counts in any form or fashion, as some companies have been accused of doing.
VR is the way of the future in order for the companies to be more profitable for themselves, so this is what we have to look forward to -- those of us who remain in the MT profession.
They use their own software. You get docs
s
all those horrible docs got you
Schizophrenic? You're like one of those people who sit in a bus & just starts telling and calling people names with no thought. All bark, no bite.
Number of docs
Are there any companies that assign a certain number of doctors? I have too many to EVER make a good line count.
Docs using PC's instead of charts sm
The younger docs are now carrying laptops into the examining room, no more charts. My husband and I had extensive, large charts (which we earned through serious stuff) and now they have been replaced by the young staff coming in with a laptop, no more charts. I was not brave enough to ask at my last visit but I will this visit, Where are our huge charts? Mine used to make comments about the large chart and too many papers. I wanted to say, Do you ever read any of those reports? Very curt, very non-caring attitude, told me last time had had input all my allergies (which are serious) into his computer. I am really worried as my husband and I have been through a lot. I think they could very easily print a H&P from there if you went into a hospital. Two of my clients used to do open heart surgery and they would ask me to print out a H&P from the chart just before the surgery. Some of those people they had not seen in years. I explained that I would not do that as the patient could have developed an illness since last seen. You gotta thank computers for replacing us. Between outsourcing and electronic medical record, we are becoming distinct as the dinosaur. Just IMHO from this area anyway.
When I was inhouse the rad docs liked it
And at that hospital those same docs were pushing for VR. Most of 'em liked to goof off for hours wandering the halls telling jokes, then wanted to read like mad when our MT staff was down to a couple night people, and whine that we didn't get it all typed for them to sign off before they went home. So I think its fitting its going to bite them in the butt.
assigned docs
On my account, I have one doc that I am assigned to. My main priority is his work for that day. If other MTs are out or busy, I can be asked to help them out. It is hit or miss. Last week I did 10,000 lines (my hands were killing me) just helping out for the MTs on vacation.
The other account I work on is a pool, so I go there when I am done with my assigned work. This week, my doc is out and I am only working in the pool. It is backed up and getting further behind, and it is mostly very short jobs (20 seconds), so I much prefer my other account.
I understand there are some new docs coming on, so hopefully this will pick up.
I love having a few assigned docs since I get to know their style and makes my job much easier.
Exams is what I mean. Docs are stretching
reports/exams out so long, I wish I was being paid by line.
Spheris is paying between 1.35
and 1.45 per exam.
Was getting 11 cent a line before but home-based hospital
employee. Much better.
I am PT. I do 600 lines/day. I share one of my two docs with
another person and it works out well. Key advice: Let your lead know if it is too much. They would rather know early than miss deadlines. I learned the hard way but now with sharing the one doc it is perfect.
NEVER whined about the hard docs...
I was offered by them when there were a lot of certain docs up they would assign me some different ones to break them up, but...I have not asked them to do that. So don't assume....
If a lot of MTs, hosp. personnel, & docs are on all
s
If you hear docs discussing it,
I'd be very cautious to work for them. Chances are, they're going to fly through that dictation faster than a speeding bullet. You might be better off with an MTSO that pays by the minute rather than a private office.
If docs would spend 5 seconds...sm
spelling another doctor's name, which they believe we're automatically supposed to know how to spell, it would save a lot of grief. But MTSOs are quiescent about this, even though they know it's a hardship on us...what the heck, it's not THEIR time. Don't want to spell a doc's name... their 5 seconds is worth more than 10 minutes of my time looking it up. Tough!! Blanks are in. Let THEM fill it in.
That is docs who think you can read their mind.
Sorry, needing a little QA on my post here!
A flyer for individual docs:
*If you're like most doctors, you never read dictated medical reports, anyway! Yours, or anyone else's! So why pay through the nose for something you'll never look at?*
*At AchooQuist, we understand the needs of busy docs like you.... men and women who laugh in the face of malpractice suits. That is why we've tailored our MT services to suit your busy, careless, greedy lifestyle.*
*When you joint the AchooQuist team, you'll pay what YOU want. (next-to-nothing). And you'll get exactly what you pay for.*
*We GUARANTEE it.*
If you go to the docs, be prepared to lose your job.
Although how much can that matter if you are not being paid anyway!!! I personally have never had this happen to me, but I can see where it could cause major problems on many levels (especially if you have automatic bank withdrawals). I would have to consider - Is it the client's fault? Is the company not managing money correctly? Does this happen often?
It is your employer's place to investigate this problem with the client, not you. I would strongly suggest that you not go directly to the client unless you have reached your limit with the company and no longer wish to be employed by them. Have they actually broken their contract agreement with you. If so, then I say it is every man for himself so to speak.
just edited a few docs & almost 1/2 was missing
If you don't know what is confidential, you have no business being in any business.
This is confidential information and should not be divulged. It is one of the biggest problems a co can have. If you have to ask...well I won't be able to explain it to you
with your attitude no wonder you cant keep a job "crappy American docs"
What makes them crappy????
They may not talk as clear as you would like, but maybe they are a darn good doctor because either they care or they are educated enough to help people.
No one said you have to talk clear to be a doctor. No one said we would have "perfect doctors" to transcribe for. They are everywhere.
"Good MTs" can work for the ESLs, the slush mouths, the docs that talk while eating, etc. That is what this job consists of. We all have to do it.
Ditto. I have 3 docs (ortho) and if one is not there or on vacation sm
I either help on other or take the day off. We always know in advance, and I plan around it. I have high volume with them, so if I miss part of a day because one of my docs is out, I catch up on errands as it does not affect my pay much.
Pay always on time (direct deposit) but was incorrect rate a few times. Took a few days to be corrected but it was and now it has been fine other than those two that the rate was wrong.
|
