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Lines are 65 characters.....

Posted By: No Name on 2006-06-08
In Reply to: osi - anderson

Not based on the actual line you see on the page.


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And my lines were often over 80 characters long. NM
x
He is going to pay 8.5 for 70 characters

which is more than 9 for 65.  There is definitely something wrong with his math.  If he paid 9 for 70 then it might be the same as 8.5 for 65.  


 


65 characters
I've ALWAYS been told it means characters AND spaces.
and which characters... sm
print in white exactly, I wonder?

TIA
black characters?
Sounds like no spaces counted to me.
I love those little characters! sm
Where does everybody get those? I have to have them! I love the pot disturber! Too cute! LOL!
I have got to get with the times! (Yeah, it was a good laugh, huh?)
55 characters with no spaces
Using the Apex platform, I found this calculation to be a major rip off.  Not sure why.
Maybe it's not 65 characters per line???

1600 lines is a lot.  It doesn't mention vacation time though does it?


55 is better--less characters for a line,
therefore more lines UNLESS it is black character only--i.e. not counting spaces. Some companies do it this way instead of paying for 65 character line (spaces included).
To the IC's is 10 cpl based on 65 characters a good
rate for an IC, even with having to pay your own taxes, social security, vacation, sick time and all.   How does this all pan out in the long run.  I'm a single parent and tired of all the crap I've taken the past 28 years as an employee - but too afraid to step out and work as an IC for fear of not being able to meet ends, covering for my own insurance and all.  Any and all feedback would be appreciated.
Pay is based on 65 characters and includes

spaces.  Line rate is based on experience, if you have CMT, and shift.  There may be some other things too.  I don't know 100%, but I'm pretty sure they offshore.   Get conflicting stories about accounts depending on who you talk to.  I think pay is average, PTO is accrued based on lines and is available immediately.  You can take in $$ or time off I believe.  Not sure of other benefits because I had already decided after talking to them that I wasn't going to take a position with them, so didn't pay attention to benefits. 


Black and white characters

I worked for a company that used the DQS software and I never could get my line counts, even though I typed like a fiend! In an 8-hour shift, I could get maybe 800 to 900 lines with that program. The way my company said, is Black and White characters, which means no spaces.  I didn't get any credit for the ADT screens either.


Hope this helps.


line count/65 characters
Is it possible to change the number of characters that are a considered a line, i.e.
Could you redefine the line as being 50 characters. Or is this just stuck into the program at 65/line. You may E-mail if you like CTighe3568@aol.com. Your help would be greatly, greatly appreciated. Thanks so much!
black characters=without spaces.
nm
Visible black characters help!?!?!?
So I'm trying and cannot figure out for the life of me how to compute what a proper rate would be once the switch goes over to visible black characters. I want to get this figured out, so that when the call or email comes about my adjusted line rate, I can either accept it or not.

Does anyone know, at a line rate of 8 cpl right now, what an equal VBC line rate would be? Is there any way to figure this out?

And does this mean we can stop the double spacing? I mean, if it won't affect the company's pay (because apparently they only bill on visible black characters), it's more in keeping with the new standard of only one space after periods and whatnot.
sounds like "black characters" only

which is no spaces.  I wouldn't automatically rule it out.  I know you probably already know this, but if you have an account at 8 cpl and the work is pretty easy and the platform is good that is MUCH better than the hideous ESLs/static/cumbersome formatting/slow platform of an 11 cpl account, right?  Maybe you should ask more info or give it a try & maybe it might be worth your while?


That being said, 3 cpl VR will NEVER be worth my while, unless it requires almost NO CORRECTIONS - still, I'd rather transcribe...


$1.35 per 1000 characters. hiring process is too sm
daggone long.  they SNAIL MAIL you a tape to transcribe for testing.  DUH!!!!!
Transcribing = 9 cpl 65 characters including spaces.
Good company, great people. Give them a try.
75 characters per line?? Today I called about a job
and the pay started at 7.5 cents a line ----- but 75 characters per line.  Has anybody heard of that before?  The job is acute care with high amount of ESLs.  What will they think of next? 
Depends. How many characters make up a line?
.
It could mean that a gross line will not exceed 65 characters. nm
x
by my calculations, 10/78 character is equal to 8.33/65 characters - nm
 nm
usually 55 does not count spaces and that's a lot of unpaid characters. NM
.
Not paying for spaces can be okay if the characters per line is shorter.
55 characters without spaces is roughly equivalent to 65 with spaces.
About 5 years ago was offered 10 cpl including spaces, 65 characters. sm
Don't know about now. That was doing all acute care, mainly op reports with full benefit package.

I declined and have my own accounts, but it was a good offer.

Good luck.
I pulled a report I did today. I get paid 65 characters.

At 65 characters it was 110 lines and at 55 it was 130.   If the 65 is employee status and there are other benefits that would be the one I would choose.  If you don't have benefits it would probably be 6 of one and half-dozen of the other.  


Sorry couldn't be more helpful.  Having to make a decision too.  One job pays more per line but no benefits, no bonuses.  The other job pays a little bit less but has incentives and good benefits.   Sounds like a no brainer but it is still hard to decide. 


I would look at how productive you could be.  I know you probably don't have any idea if you aren't familiar with the account.  I'd also look at the stability of the company.  There are no guarantees, but if there is a mom and pop company, versus a 300+ MT company, that may play a factor.  Check the boards on both companies (I'm assuming it is 2 different companies but maybe it is just pay scale difference) and see what others have said about them.  Tons of ESLs, hard to make lines, very inflexible with schedule, etc.  


You can take job #1, but there is no law that says you are there for the next 2 years and maybe job #2 will still be willing to hire you.  


 


To my own knowledge, it is less, B&W character is just the actual printed out characters..sm
that appear on the page, NO SPACES, etc, so it could really add up, I have never taken a jot with those specs, perhaps someone out there doing this could say how they made out? But I have talked to recruiters about some of these jobs and it does seem to lower the line count.
80,000 characters a day is equal to half a ton of weight on finger muscles. . .
So, why no spaces paid? The left thumb takes a major beating, and your spine, eyes, hearing, circulation.  We were not even made to type all day!
Cquence pay is 65-character with NO spaces, only black characters which equates to
approximately 1.5 to 2 cents per line less than 65-character with spaces.
Can we recommend companies that count all the characters and don't have you omiting periods, etc.
s
Pick a relatively short report and do a manual count of characters

including spaces if your company counts them.  Then divide the total by 65 or whatever your lines are defined as. If there is a discrepancy between your manual count and their systematic count, you have a problem. 


I did this recenty on ExText and find I am getting shorted about 1-2 lines per report. 


It means characters that are printed in black and white - no spaces included. nm
x
Used to use this in a hospital setting, admin could change the number of characters per line (sm)
at one point they had us typing an 80 character line. Talk about zapping your line rates down. Of course we worked for an hourly rate so it really didn't matter, just management's way of pushing us to do more. They only required 800 lines per day for a FT MT so they were trying to get their moneys worth I guess.
Keystrokes accounts all count the expanders as characters printed with spaces, not the abbreviation.
I have checked it, but we use Shorthand. What are you using?
1800 lines is easily achieved. I average 300-340 lines per hour. nm
x
10 lines per minute = 1500 lines for 150 minutes - average. nm
x
I average 1200-1400 lines per day with a national, and am only getting around 600-800 lines per day.
It's been this way since the day before Thanksgiving. I've been doing this for almost 30 years now, and more often than from Thanksgiving until the new year is the slowest time of the year. I have some months where I am swamped with up to 2000 lines per day. I stash that little extra money, and take advantage of a handful of extremely slow days this time of the year to actually cook dinner, decorate for Christmas, or do Christmas shopping. I actually anticipate this slow time every year and have grown to enjoy the breathing time. Any time I have attempted to pick up extra work with another company to supplement these slow times, the minute I get adjusted to the new accounts, etc. I have no time to finish all of my work because my full time job with national gets slammed again. Hang in there if you can, and hopefully your work will pick up significantly around New Years.
They work with you to make sure you get the lines required or the amount of lines you want...
I have never had a problem getting more work
Minimum lines for FT used to be 60,000 keystrokes a day, about 925 lines. Pay was good. Just not a
s
Yes it is possible to double your lines. I cant type 460 lines an hour but I can get those with VR
x
Regular lines, not weighted lines
was what I got paid for....
12K lines payperiod is 6K lines a week.
nm
0.8 x 1000 lines = $80.00 - 0.8 x 1500 lines = $120.

I would think that black and WHITE means they pay for both black characters and spaces.
There is no such thing as a white character. But I would definitely clarify this in your interview.
It's not 1600 lines -- it's 16,000 lines...and
I've got my contract right here and have already gotten 2 checks and YES, I am getting 9.5 cpl base rate.

I don't know what other people are getting. Don't really care. I work for MY paycheck. Gosh.
Why would they "fix" lines? The more lines you
transcribe, the more you make, the more you make, the more you make. It wouldn't profit any company to put a lid on line counts.
A gross line is not based on characters. A gross line is
anything on the line constitutes a line, so if you only have 1 word on a line it is still counted as a line.   A gross line at 8 cpl roughly translates to 10 cpl/65 character. 
lines
My lines have dropped too and I thought it was because I was slacking off or something - my checks have been 300 dollars less for the past 3 pay periods....hmmmmm
300+ lines?
can you email me - I want to know HOW you do it? tanks! myfingershurt63@yahoo.com
Like I said--how many lines do you do?
A whole lot of people don't like it--a whole lot more than do.  How many lines are you able to do?  Care to share since you love Transcend so much.  Is it more than 400 lines an hour typing and more than 600 lines an hour editing?  If not, you can't understand my situation at all.
How do you get 1-1/2 lines?
On my account, I never get that, the most I'm offered is 0.05 a line extra.