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Isn't Wal-Mart the company that lied/replaced labels several years back with Made in USA? nm

Posted By: Some Americans need more dignity! on 2007-09-12
In Reply to: NAFTA - anon

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Why should I go back to making 9 cpl when I make 11 cpl now?? I made 8 cpl over 12 years ago.
nm
It was a great company before othey sold out to Medquist years back.
Now it's crap.
OSI lied when a company I worked for outsourced to OSI and .......
The gentleman representing OSi was present offering five of us a job with OSI. I point blank asked the gentleman if OSI outsourced their work, because I did not want to work for a company who outsourced overseas. His response was, No they did not; however, if they ever felt the need to do so because a client specifically requests them to do so, they would have to consider the client's request. I had just cut out an article not three days before that meeting where an OSI executive stated they were outsourcing accounts to overseas. I did not have it with me because at the time of the meeting, we did not know that the meeting was to tell all of us we were outsourced, no more job, see ya or I would have shoved the article in his face after his answer. Of course, I had no intentions of ever working for them, but just wanted to see what people like that say when directly asked. Oh well, if that is how they run their business, it will catch up with them eventually.....
Go for it. I made the move a little over a year ago and have not looked back.
Plenty of work, nice people, decent pay. All in all, one of the best decisions I have made.
I would go back. The factors that made it difficult to work there before are no longer there
Clear expectations, documented style guide, friendly and helpful staff from the top down, consistent QA. They put in writing what they expect and if you do your thing within those expectations, you will thrive!
(I'm only a lowly MT, not anyone in a position to profit from these statements!)
You are too much...I made almost 60k five years ago
working in a similar recruiting/QA position for a small company. It varies widely. And it is a whole lot nicer position than MTing..well just about anything is IMO. Stop being so envious.
I made upper 40s with them 6 years.
My insurance was around $350 a month family coverage. I have been gone from them about a year.


I made $13/hour 14 years ago
nm
I made 20.00 an hour 3 years ago -
Even that was not enough money for all the garbage I had to correct.  I went back to straight typing.  Make more money now with lots less stress!
I have been doing this for over 30 years .. I made more in 1983 than I do now . sm

However, I still make a decent living.  What burns me is when I see these cheesy ads telling women they can take their course  (and spend $$$$) and instantly make $50,000 .... you know that doesn't happen.


I was lucky and had the advantage of being trained on the job when I was a junior in high school (my mom was a lab tech and friends with the director of Medical Records).  No matter how good the at-home course is (or is not), to me, you just can't beat the hands on experience of having the benefit of someone else's ears .. but I guess those days are gone like the wind.


I don't know much about painting gourds, but I thought about sitting on a beach in the carribbean and selling cheap crap to tourists .. care to join me?  


I made in the low 50s at Spheris 4 years ago.
Yes, you can.



Sorry, but I made more than that as a grocery cashier 7 years ago (nm)
x
I've made in the upper 40s and low 50s for several years now.
From 2 top nationals. Yes, it is possible.

Can everyone do it? No. Some people are better at it than others. Some can put their headset on, hit that pedal and keep on until it's all done. Others cannot sit still, don't have a very good skill set, are easily distracted or listen to too many complaints by others. Never let others help you decide how to feel about YOUR job.

Some of it will rely on your skill set, your mindset and your self-discipline. Some of it will depend on working for a company that you are comfortable with - comfortable with their set up, how work is divided, their base and incentive pay, etc. If you're upset, you'll not perform as well. If you're unhappy, you'll spend more time being upset than working and being productive.


Are they kidding, made $1.25 per report over 20 years ago. nm
x
I've made $35,000 for the years I worked there. SM

I would have to kill myself for $50,000 and I don't choose to do that.  I give you credit if you were able to achieve it. 


The pay rate has been lowered there now, due to SR.   The rate of pay at MQ has always been higher, but this field is dying out where ever one goes. 


What about those who made 12 cents a line only a few years ago
you have no problem with reduction in pay, are you serious? making less money is truly okay with you because you sympathize with those poor administors and owners of the companies who should have the money instead.

I respect your talking about bad work habits but what type of transcription to you do, what percent ESL may I ask? You do realize it is not humanly possible to jump through all the hoops just right now to make that kind of money, not unless you are lucky enough to work on 'good accounts' which are usually saved for those who also do QA, and for new people or whoever gets or however they get it I have no idea.

you must type so many lines a day, but your quality better be 98-100% or you lose benefits and pay and also you must never complain or speak up about anything or you will get the worst dictation on the system only to have your work gone over with people who are paid hourly so they can pretend quality is what matters when we all know what really matters is the hospital saving money for the CEOs and their families.

if anyone cared about the patients, I mean truly cared about the patients as we are expected to do, the whole system would not have gone to capitation and nonprofit to a for-profit business. Halls in hospitals would not be filled with patients who have no one to help them and who lie there moaning and groaning while the nursing staff is cut back to less than skeleton crew, or any kind of ancillary service is outsourced and moved out of the hospital to save money, no matter that elderly people suffer because they may not be able to drive all over.

I could go on and on but it no doubt will be lost on where you are at.

This country seems to be becoming more 'sadistic' and less compassionate day by sorry day.

where were people like you when the money was flowing freely, were you protesting for lower pay - do you want to take lower pay right now because I am sure your boss will oblige...
Yikes, I guess that says it all for this field....I made that over 15 years ago!
Guess it's time to move on :(
Yikes. I made 8 an hour 9 years ago starting. nm
x
I made 8 cpl when I worked for them 3 years ago. The ESLs were really horrendous, though.
Even the English speaking docs were bad.  I just couldn't make any money with those accounts.  Maybe things have changed in 3 years, but it was not a pleasant experience for me.  It was my very first MT job.
They have not had ICs in 5 years but the decision was just recently made to have PT employees. sm
There are pretty strict guidelines they are adhering to with regard to part-timers. They must have a set schedule of 8 hours one weekend day or 8 hours both weekend days and 4 hours at least 3 evenings per week. The days have to be the same every week.

So if you are looking for say MWF 6-10p and all day Saturday, it would work well for you. If you are looking to work whenever you want, it would not.
Maybe QA made the decision, not the company, and the company managers are not aware of it. sm
I started with a company that did the same thing. When I went to the manager outside of QA, she fixed it right away. Turns out that the QA manager had made a decision to do that and had not told anyone else.

It does make sense to do that though. Find out if it is a few days or longer and base your decision on that.

Can we ask which company or at least which state they're out of?

Unfortunately, I am going to be looking AGAIN due to offshore.
I worked there for abour 4-1/2 years and made excellent money.
I hated to leave but I was only scheduled PT but allowed to work up to 40 hours a week as I wanted. Certain family obligations made me have to choose between FT at Spheris or my local accounts and I chose my local accounts.

I was pulling in about $40,000 a year.
If you made a graph of all the things taken away by Edix/Speris in the last 5 years.....
You would be shocked, although it has been 6 years since it started.....

first charging for errors, about 6 years ago (they stopped that), then insurance changed for the worst, regrading hospitals to their advantage so you would make at least 200. to 300 less a pay period, the list is long, long, long. I can go back 6 years up to 2 years ago when I finally left.
In REPLY TO: What do you call 6.5 cents?? - Geeze, when I started out 15 years ago, I made 8 c
6.5 was the offer for one place and the second offer was 9 cents. I chose the second offer :). Rough out there indeed! There are even places paying per report now... I saw 75 cents, $1.10, $1.15 and $1.25. Ain't good for Rad.
Made 1200-1600 per week paid on a gross line for 5 years!
It CAN be done. The key is either a really high line rate or canned text over and over again with very small accounts. I had a little of both and then some harder stuff thrown in. It also helps if you work like you are on fire most of the day. Needless to say, that gravy train ran out of juice and now I am back to *normal* pay of around $750 per week at another company. SO many variables out there with the *how much do you make?* question.
They were doing that years back when I sm
worked for them.  Same as you, though.  The CPU was new, monitor brand new.  The speakers were new.  Then they sent this grody keyboard and a pedal that wouldn't even go down because there was some kind of hair (??), maybe cat hair, under the pedal.  I am really allergic to cats, so I had to call them and tell them to send me something without hair.
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.


back some 15-16 years ago when I first started
MT, wasnt the AAMT at the heart of changing the name of 'typist' to 'medical language specialist' and werent they involved in raising the pay scale etc, because cant we do that now what they did back then? How did they do it? I remember the old typewriters and being taught by a CMT, and they told me it was not more a few years beforehand that they were just a typing pool but when I started they already had their own office, their own 'respect' in the hospital. However that happened, we need to do that again because I feel we have regressed, even past that point of a 'typist' -

My last couple of years working in the hospital setting (which then I could not wait to work at home!?) are filled with memories where especially at holidays the doctors would send flowers, gifts, candy, toasters, I mean they treated us pretty good.

Now we are treated less than human beings, this has to change. I realize the doctors do not control the money anymore, and that is a big part of it because in my opinion I think they spread the money around a little bit more than the insurance companies/government who now control it. We will never see any of it...

I would not mind getting involved, either, if you have any ideas.

Know what you mean about the coffee - speaking of which, gotta run and get mine too!
I worked for them a few years back
Never had any problem. I was on a surgery center acct, loved my supervisor. I ended up quitting to go back to an in-house job.
worked with them quite a few years back...sm
owner and her husband were great people and fair. Plenty of work all the time. I just could not get used to NOR did i like that EMDAT platform. it was taking forever for my lines to add up. I detest Emdat.
I applied a few years back
..... what an experience.  I have been a psych Transcriptionist for 20 years.  I tested, with basically no instructions.  I formated the report as I would my other psych reports.  No errors as far as terminology, English, punctuation, etc.  However, she said I did not follow directions (what directions?????) as far as my formating went.  She said if I could not follow directions she would not hire me.  She is a trip.  I wouldn't work for her for all the money in the world.
I worked there a few years back.
There are good and bad. My experience is from a few years back, so I can't say how they are now. First, they have EXCELLENT trainers and support staff. Very professional and the owner is very kind. I really liked her. The bad was that I think when I left I had about 4-5 accounts and still sometimes ran out of work. They would just keep throwing another one at me. I would learn it, and it would be low. This may not be a problem still. I don't know. You have to set a schedule and work that exact schedule if there is work but flex if there is no work. You have to have a time clock, which I did not like at all. I think they only give about 4 days off the first year and you CANNOT take unpaid time off, so I did not like that either. They may have ironed out some of those things. They are very nice people though. Hope this helps.
I took this to LD's a couple years back and
x
A few years back I worked for

an MTSO that asked for suggestions from all its MTs on how to make our working experience better.  So I made a few recommondation, one of which was for some kind of forum where its workers could get together, get word help, share tips on the platform, accounts and difficult dictators, and kvetchz some.  The response that this has been considered but voted down by management because such forums tend to become negative. 


My idea had been that if it were a company-sponsored board the comments would be more constructive than anonymous bitching and ranting on a board such as this;  then management would have a handle on what was bugging people, and could respond and maybe remedy some things.  Apparently their fear was that people would be frank about problems they were having, others would agree,  and the suits would then have no way to claim they were unaware of problems.


So we had to turn to a forum like this and management definitely monitors what is going on, yet can deny that knowledge and not feel obliged to respond or fix anything.


EVESDROPPERS SELDOM HEAR GOOD OF THEMSELVES. 


Or - perhaps you are afraid of being replaced
x
A little cocky eh? ANYBODY can be replaced ...
and they know it.
Were you replaced once VR was implemented?
I have worked on VR now for about 4-5 years and still needed to check through all parts of transcription. Why are people so running scared about this? Best thing since peanut butter and jelly.
No, replaced by offshore MTs. nm
;
Has anyone ever left Keystrokes and gone back? I left a few months ago and realize that I made a

nm


I worked for them a couple of years back sm
Nice bunch of people, all IC. Nice platform. Always had plenty of work and I think they paid 7 cents a line. I did weekends and always had work. I'd go back to work for them if I could. They had lots of radiology and acute care and tons of cardiac.
I have 15 years editing exp. they never called me back.
I'd not even try there again. everyone i know who is there is miserable.
I worked for them a couple of years back... SM
They are a pretty good company to work for.  Pay always on time.  Work flow waxes and wanes sometimes, but pretty consistent.  I liked them.  Only reason I left was to take a job in the office which didn't work out.  I'd go back to them in a heartbeat if I didn't need bennies.
Be careful, this is how it started with MQ a few years back
when they cut VR pay. I saw a tremendous cut in pay and I did leave after really trying to make it work for me. I think the only ones who are able to earn the same or near are those on a different VR system than MQ and have extremely easy accounts with easy formats and extremely clear dictators. I actually think you need to be a more experience MT to do VR reports well and I'm sure lots of inaccurate info gets through because of just reading and not really transcribing. I did it for many years and it sure didn't progress for me, only less money to do it.
And to think a few years back, I considered moving
Interesting that they're being fed the same line: 'Not enough medical secretaries in the UK' to do the work. (They must have attended that 'MTSO-For-Dummies' workshop in India, as well.)

This Indian transcription error totally cracked me up and made my day: Below knee amputation became baloney amputation.

I sure as he11 hope I never have to have a baloney amputation......

MP Count has been replaced with MPTools....
*
They replaced the offshore managers
still offshore transcription work
I worked for a company that sent us something made

in China with their logo on it every year, most of which I've Freecycled or tossed.  I'd rather not get something at all than get something like that.


KS pays me very well and while they aren't perfect, they are a very good company and have lots and lots and lots of work.  That is worth a lot more than a $25 GC at Christmas.  I wouldn't send it back if I were to get one, but a decent pay for the other 11 months is a much better gift. 


How does a company know if you are using a template you made yourself?
I don't think they can, can they?  If the doc dictates an appendectomy and I have the procedure in my Expander and pop it in, how does the company know that?
Abosolutely satisified. Been IC for 18 years - hopefully will never go back to employee. nm
x
I live in NY and sent resumes twice over the years. Never heard back. nm
s
I'm back in college part-time after 24+ years
I figured this is the only to get my foot to the right job. My daughter will be 11 soon and by the time I finish my school that I did not finish after 24+ years, I could definitely be making 2 or 3 times more money than 7 cents per line. I can work at my local Starbucks part-time making $10.00 an hour with excellent benefits!!!