We are fortunate to have benefits.
Posted By: Gracie on 2007-08-10
In Reply to: that all seems so unfair - mandy
The problem is that we have a person who can transcribe their required line count in 6 hours or sometimes under that. When there is extra work to be done, she will get on and get her line count in about 6 hours, then get off for about an hour, then get back on and do extra to finish her shift. When there is not extra to be done, she gets on and off so that she covers her shift. This Transcriptionist always produces more than the others when there is extra to be done. We have other transcriptionists who cannot transcribe as fast, but they make appointments in the middle of their shift and take off and come back on and transcribe their remaining lines. The ones who do not transcribe as fast complain about the one who gets off and on, but in reality, they are doing the same thing in the name of appointments or errands, just not getting as many lines. All employees have a base hourly pay. The required line count is 1000 lines per day. The lines are calculated at 125 lines equaling one hour pay. All transcriptionists work in the same pools so the work is distributed evenly. If a transcriptionist transcribes 5375 lines in a week, they are paid 40 hours at base pay and then paid time and a half for 3 hours, even if they have not actually "worked" 43 hours. The lines are registered in minutes, with one minute of dictation equaling ten lines. We would like to go with a straight line count, not minutes, with an incentive program, but our system counts headers and footers and blank lines. Not sure what the solution should be.
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That was with full benefits, which are the same benefits as an in-office employee for the QA staff..
However, I hear that their current QA staff are being asked to reach numbers that are out of sight and goals are basically impossible.
I have been very, very fortunate....
as mine only flares up a couple of times a year, so far, but you change see the changes in my fingers, etc. I'm very stubborn about everything in my life, like Frank Sinatra.....I did it my way.....don't take meds, don't follow any particular diet, etc. I do live in Florida which of course helps with the Raynaud's which was a problem when I was in Virginia a few years ago. Medications do not like me at all, they always cause some kind of problem, so when the pain is really bad I'll just take good ole Bayer aspirin that seems to help a lot. I'm about 60 years old now and one day will probably have to do more but for now, just aspirin and ignore it. Stupid maybe? Who knows. Look at all the bad things they are finding out about certain meds now. I'd rather just trust in the Lord for now; will do meds when absolutely necessary. As for typing, it takes an hour or two before my fingers really fly anymore but they do still have wings!!!
Do as I say and not as I do....make sure your friend has a GOOD rheumatologist...they can do wonders for those who find themselves really incapacitated!!!! If you are in Florida, go to Dr. Norman B. Gaylis in Aventura, Florida. He really helped me with my first flareup before I moved!!
consider yourself fortunate
/
I am very fortunate!
All my docs thank me at the end and sometimes will even after a particularly long report will say "Say, I am ready for a cool one--how about it?" After reading all these comments on board, I feel very lucky.
Fortunate IC.
I know very well the difficulty of taking vacation and while I do not take a vacation every year, I have taken time off for a cruise for my 20th anniversary and for three major surgeries.
I have taken my laptop with me on trips and done what I can while away but it's not the same quantity as when I'm home. I tell all my offices several weeks in advance the dates that I will be gone and that I will do what I can while I'm out but they will have to wait until I return for my undivided attention. I have not had any problems with this arrangement. I did not take the lapto on the cruise and everything was waiting when I returned. Yeah, it's kinda of tough getting caught up but I consider it even tougher not getting away at all.
When I had the surgeries, I made arrangements to have other friends take some of my work while I was recuperating; all of the offices have been very compassionate and understanding so I've been very fortunate in this regard.
It's not easy to take a vacation but I have found that if I explain what is going on and give them plenty of notice, they are very understanding. Everyone in the office gets a vacation, including the docs, so they understand when I'm due for the same.
Sorry, that should have been "I am fortunate to have"
Some of us were fortunate
to get started in this field when it was possible to be hired and trained on the job. Some of us started right out of high school in the transcription department of a hospital where OJT was offered.
After retiring from another career, I took an aptitude test given by MRC, and did well enough that they basically let me train myself in medical transcription. I spent the next several years with my nose in books, looking up every other word and for the first year listened to every report twice just to make sure my work was okay. It took a long time to train my ear for ESL dictators. It was slow going and not very profitable at first, but eventually I began to make fairly good money at it. I've worked for MTSOs ever since, and currently make $20-$25 an hour - depending. But now these companies are really putting the screws to us.
Many employers now demand a ''certificate'' from a ''school'' for serious consideration. Some years ago, with over 10 years of experience with MTSOs, I interviewed with a local medical practice (the type with a staff of physicians and a stuffy professional practice manager). He did not really understand how I could be doing this without any ''formal training.'' I offered to demonstrate my ability, but once he realized I had no ''degree'' I was not allowed to test for a position. I have sent my resume to other local practices over the years, but never got an interview. So it was much easier to keep working for MTSOs, who at least would hire me based on experience and testing.
Anyone who has been in this profession very long realizes that it takes years of experience to become any good at it. However, I don't think a newbie has any way to get a foot in the door without some silly piece of paper from some funky school nowadays. Am I missing a way that the neophyte can get hired, work at MT and ''hone the craft'' without attending some rip-off school?
Again, here, I've been fortunate...
5' 5" and weight fluctuates between 105 and 115 pounds....so I don't have a problem with weight. Why in the world doesn't she try a different rheumatologist? Are you all in a small town? Believe me, it would be worth the drive to go 2 to 4 hours to see someone who can help her. The pain is no fun at all; it is deep within the bones; you can't touch it to make it better; all you can do is wait and know that eventually it will improve. It sounds like she has a really advanced case. Maybe you can help her find another rheumatologist, no matter how far away; I have seen many patients improve to the point where they CAN enjoy life again....she just needs a good doc!!! I'll be thinking about her. Tell her she will not get better until she does something to improve the situation and the first step is finding a good rheumatologist. She probably needs some help here as right now she probably doesn't care too much anymore, especially if she is drinking too much....I know just went through this with a neighbor. She was in the deepest, darkest pit of depression, didn't want to live, drank constantly, lost down to 60 pounds and was totally jaundiced. I called EMS and put her in the hospital for a month. She was angry but only for about two days. Now she is a very happy person and looking forward to life, although with some liver damage. Guess sometimes we just have to take them by the hand and lead them to where they need to go.
Well I at least I am fortunate to have a job I guess
So many newbies can't find work and I have tried in house in my area, gues what they mostly outsource their work, I know Spheris does a few hospitals in the area, So I will try this IC for awhile but I am deffinatley going back to work, I cant live off of this yet and I am not doing this for (stay at home mother) I do not have children... Yet...
Just wanted to give this an honest effort
make that -- If I ever am fortunate
it is very late and I am very tired. Darn it -- where is my spell checker. LOL
I was fortunate enough to have an account
where my Expander stats were running 65% consistently. That meant I was only typing about 35% of each report. Expanders are definitely worth the money. I use ShortHand and love it.
I had one doctor I could do 440 lines per hour on. Unfortunately, those are the accounts going to voice recognition or offshore, so I'm unemployed yet again.
I hope your 70 MTs know how fortunate they are (sm)
Your MTs are very lucky. A lot of us would give anything to have a decent-paying job with someone who cares.
IC positions offer no benefits, employee positions off full benefits, so if you do not need
benefits, then IC would be best.
You are fortunate to call shots. Most MTs can't
MQ doesn't give a care about cell phones, noise in the background or whatever would keep you from doing the report. Just do it and don't send it to QA but if QA picks it up randomly to "grade" you, you take a cut because your report may not stand up to QA standards. It's win-win for the companies and lose-lose for MTs.
I was fortunate with community college
I took courses through my local community college's continuing education program. The instructors were people who worked in the medical field during the day and taught at night. By doing exceptionally well in the classes and being a model student, I was recommended by a couple of the instructors and got a start at the office where one instructor worked before I even finished my transcription class.
Once I got my foot in that first door, I've been working steadily and successfully ever since. I had only a couple of classes under my belt!
The approved schools are probably the best chance for work after graduation, but opportunities can arise wherever you train.
Also fortunate enough to have a separate room. And
s
Fortunate enough to have a DH who has a very good income, plus...
the fact that we have no debt but our house. There are those people who just have to have everything right now, no matter what the cost. We have 1 fairly newer SUV, paid for, and DH drives a paid for, older commuter Subaru that has over 200,000 miles that he drives 66 miles a day round trip to work. We don't have kids at home anymore, don't pay for college, still manage to save a bit. I'm always amazed at the couples with kids who have an SUV or mom van, a big truck for dad, boat, RV, flat screen TV, etc, and all the payments to go with them and then complain that they are broke. If people lived below their wage there would be no problem. Our next big crisis in the US is going to be credit cards...imagine buying $100 worth of groceries and paying 19% interest forever!
I envy you! But I am very happy at your success! Wish more of us could be as fortunate! :) nm
nm
How fortunate that someone took the time to answer your question.
I was merely pointing out that it was possible that you don't need to spend the time or money to do all of that since I apparently wrongly assumed that you knew what you were doing. So much for the assumption that you were totally aware of all that the process involved. You're lucky that after reading your response to the original post that someone even wanted to bother answering your question.
You're extremely fortunate to get those lines. Too many of us deal
s
You're incredibly fortunate. Many of us aren't even getting offered 8.5 cpl for years of exper
m
Right Now, we do get benefits
but MQ is trying to change that, of course. They are trying to get our hospital to outsource everything to them, which would then mean i can work for MQ or leave. I hate MQ. I want to see them exposed for what they really are and I want to see everybody that have hurt, be compensated.
You can do that with benefits too, ya know.
:)
As long as you're happy, it pays your bills, and you can make ends meet at tax time, that's all that counts. :)
Is that with or without benefits
Do they have Editor positions as SE?
If you don't need benefits, look into
doing house cleaning for individuals on a weekly basis. Lots of under-the-table money to be made from what I used to see when I worked at a bank (and saw deposits of gals doing housekeeping). Weekly house cleaning is no longer limited to the well off professionals.
I was in QuickLube, or whatever it's called this week, and a 70-something lady was talking about her work as a home aide - light housekeeping and cooking and companionship - no medical stuff. She got her referrals through her church and was charging $10/hour.
Unfortunately, some of us need benefits.
Not even in the salad days did I make anywhere near that. In fact, most of the services I know don't charge that.
It's all about the benefits
Hospitals don't want to pay the benes. The hospital where I used to work was sold and the new owners threw us all out plus the service we used. My benefits alone costed the hospital roughly $5000 per year x that by 15 transcriptionists. Plus they provided everything for us, equip, desk, computer, etc.
Apparently they contracted a service for X amount of dollars per month/year to do it for them. No messing around with line counts and they always know what it will cost them.
Can you name some benefits for
the American MT to become certified? Please tell me how AAMT has changed the average MT's job security, satisfaction, etc. All I see is that they have given up on us and moved overseas to start programs and gain overseas members.
well, there are some benefits to having your own
was asking you to go away. A blog serves a similar purpose and in fact you may find a wider range of readers, interactions and help than what you may get on this web site. Yes, I have seen others here say they would start their own blog and have seen a couple of them, so it wasn't an only you thing (at least I didn't see it that way).
Benefits can add up to $10,000 though. (nt)
Tax benefits
I guess I just like knowing I own my own business and I made it what it is today. I like getting out and delivering. Talking to the people in the office making personal contact. Working as much as I want. I also like the write offs and paying less than $1,000 taxes per year. To each their own. To me this is the answer. Most on this board all they do is say that there is no way to make 50K a year and I simply gave an example of how you can do it. I am not knocking you, you seem to have done it I just like doing it "my way" as Frank Sinatra would say. Best of luck to you.
If you do not need benefits then you would
there is more leg work involved especially when first landing an account. The other problem is that even when you have a contract with them they can break it any time for someone who charges less. So you must remain humble with your pricing. When you have your own accounts, you have cut out the middle man, BUT, you must chase down your money. In my experience, the Transcriptionist must get paid LAST because most weeks, I have to ask nicely or do without. Have a safety net, an account to borrow from until you get paid because a lot of the time they pull OOPS, forgot your write your check, or OOPS doc needs to sign it or you just wonder when you'll get it. Just SOME things to consider, but good luck on whatever you decide. 
IC - No benefits with this doc
I was total IC before. I dropped my other accounts and went the employee route for the bennies and so taxes are taken out. Now I get days and holidays off, too. That's a first. Worked 9 years 7/7, 12-14 hours a day, 3 days off a year for family.
What no one seems to realize that in my area, money is tight and so I can't charge the same as someone in a city or heavily populated area can charge. Jobs just aren't here.
Benefits
They cannot give you benefits if you are an IC. If they did they would have to turn you into employees. This is not just my opinion they are IRS rules.
My pay is okay - just no more benefits
It has become a matter of taking a higher cpl w/o benefits or lower cpl with benefits in this industry...as well as those employers who want (example) 7 years of experience for 5-6 cpl. Anyone accepting that should be ashamed to call themselves an MT. I make only slightly less than I did 5 years ago. Now I make 11 cpl on a 65 line count versus 11-12 cpl on a gross line - the difference though, is that I had paid benefits then which I don't have now. The other difference is that when I could work in DOS and create all reports into one file to send at the end of the day, I could routinely produced over 350 lph (and never, ever work more than 6 hours a day, 5 days a week!). Now that I have to work on a platform that requires individual reports being submitted, I've really taken a hit in how many lph I can produce. I still work less than 40 hr/wk, though.
I truly believe in working smarter than harder. If a company offers a platform or dictators that prevent me from making a minimum of 200 lph or more, then I don't work for them. If I can't use my abbreviations that I've built over the past 10 years, then I won't work for that company. If I can't have benefits paid by the company AND the cpl I want, then yes, I will be an independent contractor and take all the tax benefits I can. Last year, I only paid $268 in federal taxes for the entire year.
I have to work around my child as well (I am single) and I am fortunate that my training days are well behind me. I still have a good life and good income, but I am choosy about the company I will work for. When I am older and things change significantly that I make less than $40k/yr, then I will go back into coding and have a job with good pay and benefits. I can't see staying in a profession if it doesn't benefit me the way I need it to.
About benefits
After I wrote my last post I was just thinking about the benefits. I was with Keystrokes for a while and you can be an employee with them and still get the flexibility of 24 hour TAT and therefore you can get the benefits. So it's not impossible to get benefits and flexibility. I know the Keystrokes ortho accounts offer 24 hour TAT, not sure if it's all of the ortho accounts, but I know some of them do. I'm not sure if they have other specialties that have the 24 hour TAT. Good luck.
Benefits
The only "benefits" an IC gets is being able to make their own schedule. We do not get any medical, dental, retirement. We furnish our own equipment, do our own taxes, and do not get paid vacation or holidays.
benefits?
I know people who would change bedpans, just to get a hospital job because of the great benefits package. No judgement on types of jobs some of us would or wouldn't actually consider doing, but bottom line for some people is a steady paycheck and health insurance.
benefits
They do have good benefits and I did look into the kitchen job a bit more. I have not called HR yet. I guess my main point is I am surprised that the HR person did not follow through and let me know there is not an MT job. She did not indicate that when I met with her. I am also surprised that the application went to another department but if that is the way it is done, ok, fine. I do not feel I am a prima dona. I would have understood them passing the application on to perhaps the business office or something else in the medical record department. The job asked for an experienced MT so I was just responding to that particular job.
No Benefits
I'm an independent contractor and so I don't receive any benefits. The reason I stay as an IC is because it allowed me to obtain one degree, and now I'm going back to obtain my nursing degree, and so I like the fact that as an IC, I can set my own hours and that kind of thing...so unfortunately, the penalty for that is not having insurance, paid time off, etc., but I hope it will all be worth it in the end when I'm a nurse! And, I don't mind answering any questions at all...so feel free to ask.
Have a good day!
CMT benefits
Company I work for pays 1 cent per line more for CMT, also provides gift certificates for several webinars a year so does not cost me much.
Benefits
Just found out benefit premiums are going up over $100 more a month. I am hardly getting by as is, let alone when benefits go up. I have to carry the insurance for my entire family (husband is self employed). If someone works for a company that offers good coverage (deductible $1000 or less and copays $30 or less) and cheap premiums (i.e. less than $500/mo for family coverage), could you please let me know. I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you.
Benefits (sm)
115V AC
3-prong grounded plugs
dust cover provided
I have benefits.
I am an employee though, so make less per line than an IC, and don't get to choose my schedule. Worth it to get benefits though. You just have to find a company willing to hire you as an employee.
do we get benefits?
What's a benefit????
No more benefits, either
I didn't either think about benefits when I posted. I got two weeks paid vacation a year plus paid health insurance and matching taxes deducted through paycheck. Now as an IC, I don't get any of those things. The one thing I have now that I did not have even in 2002 was cable internet, but didn't really need it as much then.
Have you added in the other benefits
The company has great benefits that can add up to several thousand a year. Paid downtime. Paid holidays. Vacation/PTO starting the first year. No equipment rental fee. Big discount on word books. Rental library for medical education. Reimbursement for continuing education. Decent insurance. Might make a difference.
ICs don't have benefits, so you'll have to get
outside insurance. I don't know of any insurance that will cover pre-existing conditions or if they do your premium will triple. Go to e-insurance.com and you get rate quotes there. You can also call insurance companies in your yellow pages that write health insurance policies. BC/BS is one of the cheaper ones. You might want to look into just a major medical policy, very high deductible, lower premiums, basically only good in the even of a catastrophic event. You can also look into a medical savings account to see if you qualify.
Whatcha got? Pay? Benefits? SM
How does your deal work?
Benefits Question
I am curious as to if anyone has found a company that pays benefits after 90 days. I have heard horror stories of companies who don't. Thank you for your input.
What are the benefits of IC status? nm
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