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Serving Over 20,000 US Medical Transcriptionists

I think you are right. Eliminate cost. Be more competitive. Save profit margin.

Posted By: nm on 2009-07-29
In Reply to: I'm no longer with MDI but I left long - truffle

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I work for the MQ, and they save reports. I don't save them.
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VR won't eliminate the MT
As long as MTs continue to do the editing. I mean, why pay 12+ cpl for the MT to do it all, when you can pay less than that for one person do the typing (jab at overseas) and the US MT can handle the editing.

>>>In time, though, I believe it is totally possible that the software will become so efficient that even the VR jobs will be few.

As I said before, only if it is trained correctly. And I decide to log times and production this morning to show people what I'm talking about. I dictated and proofed between 4:15 and 5:45 a.m. I'm getting paid for 636 lines.

And that's with straight dictation. I never went beyond that point, although there is WAY MORE you can do with the product. There's nothing that can be done on the keyboard that I can't do with this product.



OK, I know I misspelled competitive!!!!
So shoot me!
misspelled competitive (again)! Why do I do that?!!
:|!
The more the system tries to eliminate MTs I think the more they (sm)

the more the system finds they really need the human touch in order to have a document worth the money for doctors to walk into court with.


 


However, I will say this.  As we go into this depression -- and trust me we are there -- businesses have learned they don't have to CARE.  They don't have to care about the health or well being of their employees -- and they are showing them the door rather than being decent about a work place.


 


So, they may find they need us humans in the chain of medicine - I think the courts will more and more not see law suits because nobody can afford to bring the charges.  We will all be out here just struggling to keep body and soul together.  Sad what has happened.


Are they going to eliminate the 12-hour
and going to a straight 8-hour shift or are they just requesting that you clock in and out as needed during the 12-hour window?


I think what they are doing is trying to eliminate QA jobs
I have been here for years and we have always had tons of work in QA. Lately, since they have become so hot and heavy with ISR (Intelligent? speech recognition - HARDLY!) that they are trying to get the MTs to stop using QA, there has been virtually no work in IQA. They want to make us all MT editors and pay us all peanuts.

I have seen the work that goes back to the clients and believe me, Webmedx is nowhere near good enough to send less than 7% of its work to IQA.

The clients are already complaining about quality. What do they think that bypassing IQA is going to accomplish? It just might get them a lawsuit because of some patient care error going through because an MT guessed at a medication or a dosage so that she didn't get dinged for sending the report to IQA.

I hope all companies who are trying this tactic get bit in the behind by this. Just one more way they are trying to take a penny out of our pockets to put in theirs!
No competitive website was mentioned by
name. Someone asked where something was posted and I said it was posted at another job website.

That told nothing. It could have been one in a million places.


Assign doctors and eliminate cp. I know, I know, it definitely would take some
additional managerial involvement but IMHO it would be a w/w situation. Happy transcriptionists, more dollars, happy happy happy
Anyone know what the competitive line rate is for
x
I would immediately eliminate Focus.

It is Indian run, low pay, and constant turnover.   I haven't heard much good about Diskriter either, though certainly better than Focus.  KS is good for some, not for others.  It wasn't a good fit for me.  Axolotol pays better than any of them, better benefits.   The account they are hiring for has a high percentage of very challenging ESL dictators.  The company itself is great though. 


Yes it is worth it. I have plenty of work and the pay is competitive.
I have been here for a while and plan on staying. I think it would be worth talking to them.


Stated Goal: Eliminate MTs this decade

Most are already aware (it is pretty obvious), but because some still refuse to open their eyes, I am posting the below from the Nuance website.  It is actually a timeline of the Dictaphone Corporation's history, which is pretty interesting and goes back to Alexander Graham Bell.


Still, I find it noteworthy that they state in no uncertain terms that they want to "eliminate most manual transcription for healthcare in North America this decade."


"A major development took place in February 2006 when Burlington-Massachusetts-based Nuance Communications announced that it would acquire Dictaphone in a cash deal worth $357 million. In a news release Nuance Chairman and CEO Paul Ricci commented on the acquisition, which was completed by the end of March, stating: 'The combined resources, experience and talents of Nuance and Dictaphone will help accelerate the adoption of speech recognition to eliminate most manual transcription for healthcare in North America this decade, delivering over $5 billion in savings to care facilities and transcription service organizations.'


Under new parentage, Dictaphone was named a division of Nuance--the Dictaphone Healthcare Solutions division--and Schwager was named its president.


I don't know why you think that's not much profit
Maybe if you only have one employee that's not much of a gain, but if you take the hundreds of employees that some of these MTSOs have, and take into account that their overhead costs are minimal, they're doing pretty good. Frankly, the 10 cpl jobs are few and far between and most run 8-9, which means the company is potentially making what I make. If I had even 5 people funneling that kind of money to me, I would probably be doing pretty good, or at least better than I am now.
Their line rates are competitive, and their bennies are among the best in the business. I'm happ

MTSO profit????
How does the MTSO make any money? If they pay the MT 9 cents, and the QA 5, the would mean charging the client at least 16 to 18 cents per line to just cover overhead and make a VERY small profit. I don't see a lot of docs paying that kind of money for transcription.
That's strange. When I received an offer, I thought it was competitive and the benefits were good
especially medical insurance benefits for family. Maybe I did not look at them very close. Could you elaborate on what you were offered? I really thought they were decent pay and benefits.
fixing issues/profit
Yeah, guess that is why Transcend had a press release that came out yesterday with a 74% increase in revenue from the prior year quarter. Here is an excerpt from that press release. "Most of the revenue increase of $2,779,000 between the second quarters of 2005 and 2004 is attributable to the acquisition of Medical Dictation, Inc (“MDI”) on January 31, 2005. MDI contributed revenue of $2,294,000 to the second quarter of 2005."
Whatever that means -- I think according to their profit for the year . n/m
x
They're not making a profit.
I work at Futurenet. I don't mind paying the 25.00. It's guaranteed by 10:30 a.m. It has only been late once and I was reimbursed the cost. It's worth it to me for the peace of mind.
Why dont you do the work for 6 cpl and keep all the profit for yourself but
I expect you cant do it so you try to hire people for 6 cpl that can do it.  I bet you didnt get hundreds of applications this time.
It gave D lots of profit?
That's about the only positive I can think for the scenario.

Sorry, I wish I could be more positive but we've been in a losing battle to get our lines and enough money to live for at least 2 months now, and ALL of our cries for help or an explanation were met with dead silence.

The suspicions were indeed 100% correct, which also confirms that they were reading this board and not with any honesty contest that which was being speculated.

Like I said, yeah, really classy, MDI-MD.

Great way to trash all those years and hard work building up that reputation.

I now rank you right up there with Heartland, the Q, Spheris, and those other MTSOs that outsource their work and pizz all over their MTs on their way up.

Classy, guys, really classy.

Up yours...I'm walking. Best of luck on your new 'venture', and I hope you all sleep well at night on your pillows of fresh greenbacks.

Actually, I kinda hope you suffocate in them.
You file a Schedule SE on your profit income.
and you pay social security and medicare tax .  While you have to pay the full amount on the social security tax and medicare you can deduct half that amount to your adjusted gross.  I really need to find out more about this because if I have been paying too much on my social security tax I really want to know.  Does anyone else know about this?  Are there any IC contractors who are not paying social security tax or only paying 7% as you would as an employee and not an independent?  Perhaps it has to do with how you set yourself up.  Thanks for any info....
I think they are making a much larger profit on the backs of MTs...
Think about it. Do you think it is costing the clients any less for their transcription. How would they even know it was VR? If the MTSO charges the same, they are making more money (half of what they used to pay the MT).
I get 10-12 cents a line from clients so I can only pay 6-71/2 to make any profit.
There are some clinics/hospital that will pay more but they also want you to do a lot more secretary stuff which the management staff does and you do not see.  I know some of the huge nationals are raking in the profit and not spreading it around to well deserved transcriptionists but us smaller nationals or local companies are not getting those huge accounts that pay 16-20? cents a line.  There is overhead too to pay like your utility bills, dictation equipment and upkeep, long distance phone bills, advertising, paper, printers, ink, faxes, health insurance, etc and then the income for the management team, proofers, and computer techs.  I am not trying to take up for the huge companies that rake it in but if you haven't had your own business in the field then you really can't speak about what goes on after you turn in your work because you have no idea.  Making comments to ad that can't offer more like me does not help anyone.  I find plenty of experience transcriptionists happy with the pay, workload, and TAT.  I wish I could offer more but when you are only making 3-4 cents of profit and still have your overhead that is not greedy.  Your checks are nearly the same as the transcriptionists. If you don't like the pay find your own account - you do the leg work and don't respond to if it does not interests you as it does to a lot of people.
I wasn't rude. All I said was that if I was trying to profit from recruiting people, I would
have left contact information. I didn't get called out and was never rude. How is stating FACTS rude? I'm also not offended because your logic makes no sense to me. I speak the truth. But it doesn't matter. If we have anything negative or positive to say about ANY company whatsoever, we're either recruiters or disgruntled ex-employees. I didn't get called out because there was nothing to call out on. Please, take your senseless accusations elsewhere. The board administrators know exactly who I am, so they can back me up when I say that I'm not a recruiter. I'm (GASP!) a happy employee FINALLY after ages of searching for the right company!!!!
Save it for QA, please.
xoxoxoxoxoxox
Save
Might be a good idea to save a copy of the old manual before it's replaced for comparison purposes.  Just a thought.
Thanks for the info--you will save someone

Obviously not soon enough to save the reputation of
the company and possibly some good MTs.  If there are more like her around there, no wonder they get such bad comments. 
They save millions
by offshoring our work. We may not see the big picture when we think about the penny difference, but pennies make dollars, and dollars make millions. They are saving and pocketing a whole lot more than what they pay editors to fix the junk.

As someone said later in this thread, why not just open up your doors to U.S. newbies who are begging for jobs and ten times better. It is all about mighty greenback, as is everything in this country.

Nobody is stealing our jobs. The U.S. government is allowing MTSOs to hand them over. I don't blame the people who take them at all. They would be crazy not to while living in country that has no jobs if they have a family to clothe and feed. It is all about greed as usual, greedy MTSOs who have no pride and have given in and given up.

The roof will come tumbling down on everybody's heads one day. It's just a matter of time!
My discipline in being able to save

was what I was able to fall back on in order to survive while I worked for them.  I had hoped my job with them would work out in spite of the line rate being so low, but it didn't.  I found the lines very hard to get.  But I'm glad it happened.  I'm in a much better place now, having no trouble making my line count and am being paid much more by a company that deducts all taxes.


I didn't realize at first that they weren't taking out my state taxes.  I know it was my responsibility to go over my pay stub with a fine tooth comb, but it didn't occur to me that they wouldn't take out my state tax; evey other company I've ever worked for did. 


When I discovered it, I requested them to do it, and they refused.  That's when I quit.


I just love people who condemn others as having *no discipline* when they don't know the circumstances of the situation or the person involved.


You have to go out and come back in. Save it as if
you are going out of the shell, but then go right back in.  I used to do this after every paragraph.  I do not remember actually the exact F keys to use to perform that, but you should know from typing in there currently how to get out once you are finished typing.  Just go back into the same document.  Hope this helps.
Save the file...
To say they belonged to MQ would be like saying you can't take your phone numbers out of your cell phone if you decide to change services - or save your bookmarks in IE and use them in Firefox.
Save yourself and get out of there ASAP.
NO COMPANY IS WORTH SHEDDING A SINGLE TEAR OVER, ESPECIALLY AN MT COMPANY -- THEY BARK AT US LIKE DOGS AND PAY SLAVE WAGES.
You are welcome. Just trying to save you some headaches.
I know you realize I speak the truth, because if you search the archives to about a year ago, you will see the same wording and rah, rah sounds. Then, take a look through the year at at more recent posts, you will easily get the picture. Truth comes out no matter what. There are a few good companies out there and you can find them if you do your research. Good luck to you.
I save all my reports
I'm required to do so. You wouldn't believe how many times I'm contacted to send them this note or that note because they lost it. I also use previous reports as a form for typing previous reports on the same patient as my doctors tend to use almost the exact same report every time (I only do office notes).
If you don't save them, I would assume one
would be out of a job if required to by employer.
It is all about the pennies they will save.
Let's face it, the bean counters really don't give a crap about quality, just how the finances look on the books. Transcription is a thorn in their side, nothing more, nothing less. However, without transcription, their reimbursements would be gone. I don't get why transcription is not valued they way it should be. It goes hand-in-hand with coding and reimbursements for the hospital.

Some things will never change, no matter how hard we try.
Save Our Jobs!

(Note:  OP, please correct me if I'm wrong)


In reading all of these posts, it is apparent that the OP's intent has been lost.  This is not about AHDI, it is about we as citizens of the United States of America exercising our rights.  The OP meant that we should not just bellyache to one another in case that is all we are doing.  The meaning was that we should act.  We should contact our representatives.  It is stated that the OP does not support AHDI, and that the intent is that we write letters using the convenient contact information provided at the website.  I intend to do just that!  I hope all of you will also. 


No, so save your lecture for someone else sm
I meant to ask the company only allows you to type 1200 lines a day?

My goodness!

This board has quite a reputation across the Internet, and I can see why.
Save those emails and

contact an attorney.  What they are doing is false advertising/fraud.  If they want to openly state that they will not take work from the American MTs, then I say let them put their money where their mouth is. 


Keep those emails and contact an attorney.  Show them the numerous press releases where they state their position on offshoring.  If an MTSO can sue an MT for posting what they feel is libelousinformation, then the MT should certainly be able to sue in this case and, honestly, should win.


I did save emails
I saved all of the emails that would prove it, HOWEVER, they all have the confidentiality statement at the bottom, so my fear is that if I send them with my appeal letter I could be in violation of confidentiality.  What do you think?
I know. I usually save my "extra" typing for when
they call and/or email begging me to work. Virtually every weekend, my PS offers extra incentives on top of what we usually make.

I know what I am NOT going to do...I will NOT say, "Oh, I shouldn't work even though you need me because I read on a forum that some people don't have any work." I will NOT do that.

I work everytime I'm asked to even if it is for just 500 to 1000 lines extra.

It's too bad that when the going gets so tough, the tough don't get going but start pointing at their own coworkers.

I think it is unfair for any MTs to be out of work, period. But I don't see any way to change it. The only thing I know to do is use that information. Still won't change the unfairness but at least I will benefit some from it and my PS will too. I like her. I don't want to disappoint her. She's counting on me and I count on her a lot.
Here is what you save because I work from home

The average cost per square foot of commercial real estate is $6 to $13 per month.  A cubbie for my work area would run about $864 a year.  You want me to give up taking off any time for the first year except for a couple of days.  HOW MANY DAYS DO YOU GET PAID TO TAKE OFF?  Oh, that's right.  Your job doesn't bring money in, does it?  I save you electricity.  I save you the resources you should supply me under IRS rules such as books, CDs, etc.  You should be paying 100% of my internet expense, provide a computer at no charge if you are an employer meeting IRS regulations and I worked on site.  You should contribute to my state unemployment fund regardless of what state I live in when you run out of work and I am left without an income (oh, that doesn't happen to management, does it?)  You should provide an email server to keep from cluttering my personal email account and causing me to spend extra money to keep all those informative emails that require server space.  You occasionally want me to fax something.  Did you provide me with a fax machine?  I'm getting further away from the definition of an employee aren't I?  You want me to be 100% responsible for my own health insurance.  What if it's so crappy I would rather find my own?  Do you contribute to my health premium costs, say $35 twice a month NOT to take your insurance  (like employers I've had in the past)?  If I am hit by a drunk driver, where is my short-term or long-term disability benefits?  Oh, that's right, you cut out those expenses because you didn't think we would need them and wouldn't notice what you did.


Lastly, do you think I don't notice that my wages have been going down instead of up over the last 7 years because of forces beyond my control?  My knowledge, skill sets, resourcefullness and employment values increases yet I make less money.  Is this how it works in management?  About that retirement fund, thank you for offering it and contributing to it as I am going to need it when I retire from MT at about the age of 72 because I can't make it on what I'll be pulling from the federal government if I try to retire in my 60s.


Gee, I'm glad you cleared up what you offer me.  I honest hope you can see my point too.


I hope this point does not get pulled because I think these are valid issues that ALL MTSOs should be aware that MTs think about.


Did I leave out anything?


Very interesting. I am going to copy this and save it. nm
:+
I'll save you the trouble - sm
I have over 20 years of experience and got offered 8.5 cents per line, the same as someone I know worked for them who had 3 years of experience and also got 8.5 cents a line. I mean, why do these places even test when they pay everyone the same anyway??
Who cares? Save the trees!!
xxxxx
Okie. Just trying to save someone a few dollars. nm
s
Why couldn't you just save your negative
comments for your own post?

JUST get out of the business if you hate it so much.
I know with Yahoo you can save messages
to your computer.  You would have to play around to find it, but I know it's there because I can see all of my past msgs and they are time/date stamped.