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About MT at home

Posted By: CLK on 2006-04-09
In Reply to: I love my job!! - NC Newbie

I am - or hopefully soon to be - was on eof those recruiters, and I coul dgive you a heads up on what they are thinking when they advertise, and what they really expect.


First, not all companies are making 14 cents or more a line with so much off shoring - BUT that doesn't mean they coud not give more. I have been asked to low-ball on many occasions. What a company needs to realize is that without MTs, there is no company. After soul searching, I will be leaving my inhouse job for an at-home MT position NOT WITH THEM. Now that I know what they do, I am hoping to cope, and work around it to make what I need without the stress. Cause the stress is making me physically ill, and I am too old and too professional and too qualifed to be treated the way they do. AND I wont be a part of their antics with the MTs. I mean how many times can a bank possibly make an error. MTs are smarter than that. Them leaving would only make my life more stressful in the office.


 




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In the early days, MedQuist said working at home was a benefit, therefore at-home sm
employees did not receive as many benefits as those working in-house.  As I believe, it was something like at-home employees got 3 days off a year versus 10 days for the in-office employees -- WHAT?!!!  I told them it made no sense to me, since by working at home I was saving them money -- no need to provide office space, equipment, references, utilities, etc. -- yet I get shafted.  I was only part-time when they took over the previous company with their great policies, and I told them to kiss where I can't. 
did that at home...
worked for a court reporter service typing depositions at home for a while. The biggest problem was that it seemed there were often 2 or 3 people talking at once and it was hard to tell one from the other. Things had to be verbatim to the letter, with absolutely every word spoken included in the report. I can see where it would be easier to do that in an office setting where you would be able to ask questions about things you were unsure of. The pay was excellent, but I found it really difficult to do it at home.
Yup. Only 2 at home still, 12 & 17 NM.
nm
FLOATING HOME - PLEASE
No houseboat just a floating home with the sun rising and setting over Mt. Hood. 
PT at home with benefits
Does anyone know of a good company to work for part time at home that offers insurance?
New at home based...

I would like to get some feedback on a few companies.  I have been offered positions from AccuScribe, Cymed.  I am an IC now and have been in a hospital setting for several years, now at home working for a local company that does not pay well. 


This newbie really needs some help! 


Thanks in advance!


Carly


At home positions
DTS America Brentwood TN has at home positions awesome management group there.
Used to work for them at home--sm
You don't work for any certain facility. They now have the MTs working on all their facilities depending on the region you are in. They have heavy ESL.
Thanks. I am used to working at home
and not having to deal with this.  This hospital has opened up a new surgery center which is its own entity and that took away a lot of our transcription plus a good majority of our radiology has gone to templates so in other words we are now very over staffed.  They pulled some of us in-house to work on other stuff when transcription gets low which it frequently does so when I work on other things I get paid an hourly rate.  I make more typing.  Some of the other transcriptionists refuse to do anything else but type and one of the supervisors made a comment that that is not the right attitude to have.  I have considered the nationals mainly due to my pay cut and gas prices and of course this coworker doesn't help, but am afraid of jumping out of the frying pan into the fire.  I have read horror stories on this board.   Its hard to decide what to do.  There is little opportunity for transcriptionists around here.  The ones that have a job are holding on tight.  One of the local multispecialty clinics outsource to India  and another one of our big multispecialty clinics do voice recognition and templates. They still have transcriptionists but let a lot of them go.  I live in a remote area also and never thought I would have to worry about India, templates, VR since big city people claims we are soo far behind but it has happened.  Oh, well thanks for letting me vent.  I feel like I did this on the wrong board though, probably should have been on the main board.  Sorry.   
radiology at home

MDI-FL pays 10 cpl for radiology and acute with Meditech experience.  Good company.


 


Trying to adjust to home

I've had a tough time working at home.  It takes more discipline than in an office and I applaud anyone who can do it and make money. 


Hospital at home now.

Please forgive me but I really need to vent.  I think  I am at my lowest now.  I have worked in local Hospital Radiology dept. for 10 years and was told I must work at home, or no job.  I must provide high speed internet and pay for it, I provide space in my home and desk and chair, must show proof that my homeowner's policy will cover their computer equipment, and must show picture of area in my home showing a door for HIPAA compliance, they say.  I get 9 cents per line, only what I type, one line each for headers and footers.  They won't tell me how they determine a line, they won't say if macros and normals are included. I went to personnel and they say my department head determines what and how she pays and they won't interfere.  I have a one year old mortgage so can't say no, and my pay is down to 8-9 dollars an hour, and that is before I deduct what I have to pay to work at home.  When I told my supervisor that the new program they put in is not Transcriptionist friendly, she said, no it's not, it is mainly designed for Voice Recognition.  I can't check my lines, they give me a paper with total lines for the last two weeks on it with my paycheck.  I feel abandoned and abused.  I called local labor board and they said if I was getting minimum wage and overtime pay as required by law, then I should be thankful I have a job!


I am about to default on my mortgage, and have three kids to worry about too.  Can it get any worse than this?


Will likely still pay hourly, even at home.
But I agree; 1200 lines will be required at minimum.
Working at home
If you compare working at home to having to get up and go into an office somewhere, rain or shine, that is a big plus. The only drawback to this profession is the declining line rate. Guess thats really up to the MT I guess. They will pay what you are willing to take. Just have to keep shopping around until you get what you want. Much better alternative than getting all nasty about the company you work for, there are plenty more out there, and they all pay different.
You would not be sorry to work for them. Like any @ home job, it is a job and to be taken serious (
The pay is good, it is based on a line rate and bonuses for tier levels. You would not be sorry. A good group of people, excellent technical support and communications within the management!
Staying at home
Hi: Our children are grown and gone and I still choose to stay at home. I like the flexibility that I have working as an IC. I like making as much or as little as I would like to. I like being off when my husband is so that we can spend time together, go see our children, travel. I even take my laptop with me when going to see kids so that I can work if I am scheduled. I could not do that working in an office environment. I agree with the other poster. You take the good with the bad. You pick your battles. Also, after working at home for so long, I'm not sure I'm a candidate for working in an office environment! That would mean wearing a bra every day! Hope you find the answers you are looking for.
At-home Transcribing
I have been working from home since July 2002.  I absolutely love it.  I have worked for Spheris, MedQuist, and now I am at Webmedx.  The company I am currently with is the best.  Spheris is also good, but they do not have bonus incentives.  All 3 of these companies have PT positions available.  You pay a $250 deposit for the equipment (which is better than using your own cuz if anything goes wrong they pay for it and not you!) which is split into $50 from each paycheck.  If you ever leave the company you get that back.  Also they have full medical, dental, 401K, and vision, and PTO time.  I work FT and absolutely love it!  My take home pay is around $1000 every 2 weeks.  That is TAKE HOME!!!!!!  So, if you have any more questions please feel free to ask me.  Good luck in your job search!
other at home jobs

I know a few days ago there was a post from someone on where you can get other work at home jobs.  Can someone please tell me where to find these.  I remember them saying there was a web site on Good Morning America.  You can email me directly.  Thanks in advance!


working at home
I work for a local hospital that has been promising us to go home for 7+ years and still be employees of the hospital.  We have Dictaphone and recently got speech.  We are in the learning phase.  We were told they (hospital) cannot decide if we will use their equipment or your own equipment.  I and another co-worker also work for a service.  That threw up a red flag for us both.  Our own equipment - independent, no benefits or possibly every thing outsourced and then possibly lose the job.  We both figure with the speech recognition coming and possibly having to use our own equipment, it would be easier for a service to take over.  Any thoughts to that?
This is why I like working at home - ALONE. nm
x
May have a home office in tn
But definately is affiliated with the Phillipines, know the person who runs it.
Not like they are going to come into your home to check.nm
nm
Home vs. office
Well, I've done both but did billing in between. Each has benefits. Our local hospital pays more per hour if you get over the req. amt. of lines. Pretty cool. However, they're small and don't often have openings. They have a good starting wage too.

OTOH, I like being at home, working in my sweats, and having my 3 cuddle babies (my 3 pugs) at home with me. We are trying to breed our 2 black pugs (just once to carry on the line) and I wouldn't have been able to do that if I had still been doing med. billing at an office. I had a TAH last May and had to use all my vac. days. I have to be home with my female if she has puppies in case something goes wrong and with the puppies in case she abandons then litter. Home trans. allows me to do that.

So, I guess, to each his own. At first, when I left an hourly paying job, I wanted to run to the local hosp. and beg them to hire me. Now, I'm more secure in what I can do and I feel comfortable at home. :-)

I know......been IC at home for 18 years. sm
Yes, they are my own client(s).
Is TT home of the unprofessionals?
x
Work from home
Does anyone work from home doing anything other than transcription? If so, can you share what your doing?
I do dog-sitting in my home. $15 per day.
x
Many at home will be on production...
which may be harder to compare. It would really depend on your production in those cases. I average around 300 lph, but that is pretty high production. Of course, if you start on a new account or get accounts you're not familiar with..that number really drops. I think $17 an hour is fairly reasonable and seems to be along the lines of QA pay at MQ.
hospital vs at home

 


i would love to work at a hospital again.  i've been working from home for not quite 2 years now, and the ONLY advantages for me are the hours that i work and being able to be close by in case of a family emergency.  and of course, the price of gas. 


other than that, i now understand why all the people i know who tried working from home went back to their in office jobs.  the pay was so much better, you have contact with people who will answer your questions, most of the time you know your dictators, or at least have the same few, and if you have questions you can actually walk up to them or call them and ask them.  at home jobs just leave you clueless and payless, basically.   thats just my experience obviously.  lots of folks love working from home. 


Happens in the home setting also
More than you would imagine. Tons of management paid to slough off their work to the idiots who take it.
finding a job at home
I have nearly 8years experience, acute care, most reports and specialties.  I applied to a company, and I have not heard from them at all. What did I say wrong?  I did say I was GOING TO buy the books...and I will as soon as I get work. I also said I would not work Sundays - that is why I have to quit my current in-office job...help!  Thanks
FINDING A JOB AT HOME
There are plenty of people hiring and with you having 8 yrs experience, you shouldn't have a problem at all. Do agree with other poster to not tell them anything they haven't asked, but then again, you don't want to waste your time talking with someone who has to have Sunday coverage.

I would say to apply to more companies and you will definitely get called to at least test. Remember that they get a lot of applications and sometimes it takes a while. I've been contacted up to 2 weeks after sending my resume.

Hang in there!!
oh and I do both jobs at home
/
moving to home
You might want to find out who your hospital is outsourcing to and check into them since you already know the dictators at your hospital well.

There is a lot of difference between companies. You just need to narrow down what you are looking for and which companies offer that. You need F/T with benefits, so that narrows it down some. Some companies pay just a base rate (per line) and others with a base rate with incentives depending on what time of day you work, what volume of work you do, or others. If you have any way of figuring out how many lines a day you type, or at the very least, how many hours you work and at what speed (and maybe someone on here can give you an estimate on lines per hour), then you can compare pay plans. You also need to make sure you find out how a line is defined at the companies you apply to. The standard is 65 characters per line. If a certain company defines a line as 55 characters per line then they can pay less per line because it doesn't take as many Keystrokes to get a line. Hope that makes sense. Most companies do go by 65 cpl, though.

There is no one-fits-all company, so don't be discouraged if the first company you go to doesn't work out. The second may.

Here are some companies that generally have good things posted about them and have benefits (as far as I'm aware): Keystrokes, TransTech, Webmedx... I'm drawing a blank on others. I would recommend staying away from Medquist, Spheris, SPi, Softscript.
coding at home sm
Would you care to share what state you are in?  I assume you do the coding via computer and have computer access to patient's records.  Do you code directly into the hospital system?  I only had exposure to coders back when they had no computers.    Do you have coding certification?  How many years experience do you have?  I want to get into coding and I would love to work at coding from home.  I've taken classes and really enjoy it and have done well, but am not certified and I heard its really hard to get into coding.  I do have lots of MT experience though, 33 years.  Thanks.
It is home-based. (nm)
x
Why has your take home fell to this much
That is unreal, what has changed, the line rate, ability to type more or just what?
You are right, I DO WANT to work from home (sm)
and I chose this profession so that I would not have to send my kids to daycare. Money saved.

What is wrong with expecting to make a lot of money. I am in a profession that requires schooling, continuing education regarding medicines, their spelling; continuing education in operative procedures; computer knowledge, program education and yet I do not get paid top dollar, because the MTSOs are running a business and are in it to make money. What do you think I am in this for? A hobby? Ummmm.....no. While I love this profession, I do this to pay bills, get ahead and provide for my family.

Plus, let us not forget the MTSOs who want you to be an IC and then dictate when you will work. How is that right/legal. If the company I am working for cannot provide the work when they want me to work, I should be paid no matter what. I do not get paid to sit at my computer waiting for work to come in. In case you have not figured it out yet, that makes it impossible to schedule anything, even doctor appointments for yourself. Should I take my laptop with me to the doctor's appointment and transcribe while I am sitting there and during the exam? No. That is what I mean by having a life.

The offshore companies are willing to do it for a lot less money (and there will always be someone willing to do it for a lot less money), is because they are a poor country. I personally know of women in Costa Rica who work 10-hour days and only make 60 bucks a week. I hate to tell you this Toto, but we are in America - not some third-world country.

I have always worked extra and helped out when needed, but that does not mean that should be my regular schedule. It does not mean that I should have to change my entire family's schedule around to fit what an MTSO or a doctor wants just because they are having a power trip. They can wait 8 hours while I get some sleep.

It is just amazing to me that it is okay for doctors and MTSOs to have appointments, take their kids to soccer, dance, or piano lessons, but us - the low ones on the totem pole, are not afforded that option. We have reports to transcribe and every single one of us should be sitting at our computer typing all the time. I don't think so. And if that makes me a prima donna, then so be it. I am one.
I always wonder what these people would do if there were no at-home MTs...
nm
I have 1 child at home
I used to try to work very early, but my accounts have no work early any more, so now I work through the day around nap times or whenever I can squeeze a minute in. It is not easy at all, but the alternative is paying for daycare, so I keep struggling through. I keep hoping it will get easier.
I have 3 kids at home with me...
I have had my 7-year-old, 6-year-old, and 8-month-old home with me all summer and I've been okay.  Luckily, I work as an IC and the lady I work for is VERY flexible.  I take family time during the day if I need it, but mostly it works out okay.  It'll be better when the kids go back to school, but I'll still have the baby home.  I wouldn't recommend working as an employee where you have to sit at the computer for a set schedule of time, though.
I could not have worked at home when my
children were young. No way. My 3 boys along with their friends and then neighborhood boys were the rambuncious (sp ?) kids you ever saw and were usually at my house. At any given time, there were 10 boys in the house. I worked outside the home out of necessity and to keep my sanity. My husband worked days and I worked afternoons so it cut down on babysitter expenses immensely. Now I work at home and believe it or not, I miss the days when I had the 10 boys camped out in the living room, stepping over them just to get to the door,LOL.
And we who work at home are
so very ''screwable'' because nobody has to look us in the eye and nobody fears us storming into their office and causing a scene.  It's all quite remote and sanitary this way.  Send out a couple of e-mails, do a no-information informational conference call or two, ignore phone messages.  Hey presto!  No mess!  All done! 
Have any of you ever worked out of the home?
Or worked in anything else other than medical transcription?   How many of you have actually worked in the corporate world before?  I mean in an actual office?  Have any of you ever owned a business?  You guys don't have a clue.  I am not management or anything, but this post is really childish and shows how little you know.   You all sound like a bunch of old housewives who feel important because you type for a living and you know you can't do anything else.  You would probably pee yourself if you had to talk to the owner of the company in person.  Feel big and important doing it on a anon board.   No professionalism at all.  Hilarious! 
Why are you working from home?

If it is so expensive, why are you doing it?   Some people will complain that the sky is blue.  No wonder you can't make any money with that poor wittle me attitude.   Boooo hooooo!


Hospital versus At Home

The hospital I work for has finally said I could work at home.  I am wondering if there are experienced people that can tell me the cons of working at home.  I am looking forward to it but need to know if I need certain things and what kind of books to buy. 


It is grand to work from home,
get certain things in writing, such as work times, how down time will be handled (server down), and if you will be required to go into the office to work for shortage coverage, meetings, etc. Been here, done this. Get it in writing or you will probably regret it.
Happy working at home

I love working at home for a hospital.  I don't have to share work station, books, equipment with anyone.  You have to teach family and friends that you are really and truly working, and to leave you alone during work hours.  It's easy to allow intrusions but set rules from the start. 


I had to work in the hospital med rec/MT department for a month and while I enjoyed the people, I hated being there in a windowless dingy room.  At home, you create your own work environment.  My two coworkers at home are two cats who keep me company.  Good luck!


Anyone know who does Baylor's MT or if the THS has at home employees?

Yep. Go to the home page for MTStars
and click on TOS/Disclaimer (it's on the left toward the bottom of the screen).

I did go home from an inhouse MT service
5 years ago where there was no flexibility whatsover, we worked every stinking weekend if we got hired for that shift and after 5 years of weekend and holidays they told me it would always be that way for me. Now with this company 6+ years I am going to be forced to work my holidays again? Just for insurance? Blood money I say. There is no flexibility in this new play either. Why are we home then? I would rather be in house, at least when I walk out I am done with it.