wanted to share something from my 15+ years experience....

When I first started out, I graduated from a business college.  Nine months, five days a week, four hours a day of schooling.  When I finished top of my class I thought I was ready.  I struggled to find a job; not too much outsourcing back then.  I begged a medical records director to hire me on, and he did.  I literally was not ready for what was to come.  Luckily I was mentored by a lady who knew it all.  She was great.  After six years at the hospital, I broke away and started with my own accounts.  I have raised four children (youngest in kindergarden).  I have been a team mom for baseball, board of director member for local little league, and never missed a school function.  This has been an awesome profession for me.  Some days are better than others as far as pay is concerned, but on average I am pulling $200 a day....not bad. 

There is a book out there that might be of help to you new graduates.  It is called The Medical Phrase Book.  That book helped me very much.  The other thing that really works is using a telephone book A-Z to jot down new meds and words you learn. 

Good luck to all of you.

• wanted to share something from my 15+ years experience.... - lilworried
  • in addition to the phone book - zippitydoodah
  • Love the idea on using a phone book A-Z for writing down - words, use a note pad now- sm
    • I second that! Wonderful idea! - daylight
  • dear lilworried - poor

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How are newbies supposed to get experience?

Does anyone know of companies who hire newbies?

your offer is more than fair.  with all the new MT's on this forum saying they can't get a job, this is a fabulous offer. 

my hat is off to you for taking the time to train, and pay 7 cents a line.  I started out at minimum wage 17 years ago...just grateful for the opportunity.

Does anyone out there know of any at home entry level MT jobs. I just graduated and I have had 2 people call me to set up testing for a job. When I let them know I just graduated this month, they sound a little worried. Any tips or advice. Much appreciated! 

Tiffiny

Is there anyone out there who will give this newbie a chance? JUST GRADUATED AND LOOKING FOR WORK!!!!!

Thank You

Tiffiny

I am an IC working for an MTSO.  I have a few accounts.  All of my accounts have always worked to where whatever is dictated up to 7:00 PM has to be done and back by 8:00 AM.  Well, there is a new account that I work on.  Apparently, it's pretty important to my MTSO.  They have been very unhappy with other transcribers in the past and very tough to please, but they are loving me.  One problem... 

They keep dictating later and later, and my employer keeps asking me to have it back at the same time.  I don't work at 10:00 at night, and I don't feel that I should be asked to get up at the crack of dawn in the morning.  If they are dictating at 8:00 and 9:00 and later at night, why should I be expected to do a less than 12 hour turnaround for the same 8 cents a line? 

If they dictate at 9:00, I would be happy to have it back by 9:00 the next morning, but the MTSO is still expecting that I will have it all back by 8:00.  I feel this is unreasonable.  I am doing it right now, but I feel like it is really cutting into my life-work balance a lot. 

What say you? 

I went to Google Local.  Clicked on "find businesses".  I then put in medical transcription in the "what" box and my City, State in the "where" box.  I sent a resume and cover letter to every hit that looked good to me.  I also went through the yellow pages and sent a resume and cover letter to every listing.  I sent out more than 50 resumes. 

I had about fifteen calls back.  I had five offers.  I accepted one.  I have been getting calls ever since.  In fact, I left my first position about three months after I got it in order to go to another company that was offering me more per line plus incentive.  Yes, I accepted 7.5 cents from my first employer and she worked me to death and had some serious, shall we say, boundary issues.  But I got my feet wet and in the door and was on to better things within months.  I have been at my current position for about seven months, and it was a position I got based on yet another one of those resumes that had been received, kept on a desk somewhere, and acted upon months after I had sent them out. 

One thing that no fewer than five of the fifteen callbacks said was that they were very impressed by my resume and my cover letter.  One lady said that she was amazed by the number of people applying for jobs as medical language specialists who cannot even manage to put out a resume and cover letter that is free of spelling, grammar, and punctuation mistakes.  So, do a professional resume and cover letter and make sure it's PERFECT. 

I love my job and feel very blessed that I never experienced some of the awful newbie troubles I have read about here.  If you have any questions or anything, feel free to contact me off the list or reply here and I will get back to you ASAP. 

Elle

Okay, it is time to let the cat out of the bag on how you are going to be successful as a Transcriptionist out of school.

The first thing I am seeing is that these schools promise that you will be working from home making in upwards of $40,000 a year. Forget about that. You are new to this. If you come out of school working on a production basis you may very well fall flat on your face and make $3 an hour by the end of the day. I was a transcriptionist for almost 5 years working for a hospital and I decided I could make more working on a production basis.......I failed miserably my first year.

First off, get experience under your belt and make an hourly rate in the meantime. How did I do this? Well, I started out getting a job in a hospital, any job I could get. I started out in billing, even though I wanted transcription. I watched and waited for openings, when finally someone in the psychiatric unit called me (I made friends with everyone, the key to getting calls like this one) and said they were losing their transcriptionist and I should apply. I applied and got my first transcription job, making an hourly rate. Had I not gotten pregnant with twins I would probably still be there.

After babies were born, went back part time in the evenings. This time since I had experience and another local hospital was willing to hire me in the radiology department. Again, hourly. I watched and waited once again (I hated radiology transcription). I got to know who was in charge in the transcription department. I sent her a fax asking her if she needed any part time help (back then there was no work related email). She said, yes, I could work part time (I now had "experience"). The part time went to full time with benefits. However, I got bored and decided to work for, of all companies, Medquist. I thought with my speed I would be making at least $20 an hour.....hahahahahahahahaha, what a joke. I was lucky to make $8 an hour with them. After about a year of struggling I finally got my foot back in the door of a hospital in another state. I had to commute to the hospital every day during training, it was awful, however, now I again work from home, have the ability to make about $20 or more per hour, I own my own home, own a half decent car, I am divorced and don't take any child support from my ex, instead we share in the custody 50/50.

The moral of my story........

Get your foot in the door. Look for jobs that are front desk, secretarial, whatever. Once you are in there and they realize how great you are you can go wherever you want. My first transcription job in the psychiatric unit also involved secretarial duties, so not just straight transcription. I highly recommend getting into a hospital. The bennies are the best and lots of hospital transcriptionists are working from home with full hospital benefits. If you can't get into a hospital, get into anywhere where you can do some sort of typing/transcription, that way you have your first reference/experience when you apply to a company that is strictly work from home. Everyone wants experience, they just don't want to be the ones to give it to you. 

I am so tired of seeing these schools and companies swindle people.

If you are looking into training, I highly recommend your local community college. You will probably take some credit college courses that will be able to be used should you decide to do something else. My local community college has a course for under $3000 and there are college credit courses that are able to be used towards another degree.

I did my training as a medical assistant, transcription was only part of the course. However, now I am so bored with transcription that I am going back to school to be a nurse.

I hope this helps someone out there. Good luck to you all!

in this business.  One lost an account to EMR and the other lost a good portion of an account to "writing in charts" which is a clue that particular account is going EMR most likely in the near future and trying to save money to purchase it...  It is very expensive for the doctors (more than our pay).  My PCP uses it and he said it is very costly but he is still using it. 

Now those MTs that lost accounts are working for nationals and averaging between 6 and 8 dollars an hour because they are being thrown horrible dictators and platforms that aren't up to par. 

Everyone in this business is struggling and thankful for what they have and afraid to ask for a raise.  I have 2 of my own accounts that I haven't had a raise in 10 years because I know someone will underbid me in a New York minute if I were to raise my rates. 

I just like what I do and like the flexibility, but if I were to spend $4,000.00 it would definitely not be to become an MT, not by today's standards anyway. 

You say, "In-house jobs are being outsourced rapidly" and then draw the conclusion that there must be a demand for more MT's?  Where do you think those jobs are being outsourced? It ain't Kokomo, it's New Delhi, etc. It used to be new MT's COULD get a job, back in the old days when the market wasn't imploding.  But even then, you really needed to work in house before you could work from home. It ain't as easy as it seems, especially with ESL's.

Look I'm sorry you got misled about the field. But flogging a dead horse isn't going to help.

had a better chance at getting a job.  If you only want to hear the good stuff you aren't going to learn anything.  I feel for you, I really do, but if you had investigated before taking your course you would have been better informed.  I don't care how much anatomy and terminology you had and I don't care if you made 100% on every test, you still have not experienced real transcription.  There was one newbie MT that had a cerficiate stating she had a completed a course and she insisted she was a certified MT, which she was not.

I'm self-taught, got into the business quite by accident, but I have also seen at it for 20+ years and things were much different then.

I know you're frustrated but we're trying to educate you and you aren't open to hearing anything that isn't positive. 

My husband and I file a joint return, and my social security number was what I used in lieu of a federal tax ID#. 

It really isn't something you just go to school for a while, and then go and grab a part-time position and think it's going to make you some cash.  I have always encouraged others who wanted to enter this field, but I can tell you that after 20 years, I am only being offered 7-8 cpl and the accounts I can get on my own are few and far between with the VR, EMR, and large national MT companies taking all of the clients at low rates and offering spit shined reports and fancy platforms for easy access.

Your best bet is to go ahead and choose the closest flower shop and work the register.  It will be much easier on your heart, soul, and sanity!  Trust Me!

I'm only 38 and I'm so burned out I could scream and throw my headphones.  I make 45K a year, but I work long hours and put up with a lot of crap from the offices I service as they know they can find someone cheaper in a heartbeat.  I've had no raise in 10 years.  I worked on-site for 17 years at 13 dollars an hour with benefits only to find out I would be training my replacement (C-Bay).  I gave 2 weeks' notice and here I sit. 

My rt hand throbs, my back aches, and my stress level is high.  If you really think after hearing this that it sounds like a good idea to go to school and become an MT, then have at it, but it will have you in a tail spin and wishing you never did.

My sis-in-law thought she'd be on easy street!  Well guess what?  Two years later, and she's not an MT but has the education.  She gave up because it was too hard! 

I wish you all of the luck in the world, but keep you day job and keep your money in your pocket that you'll pay for the education because we're being sold down the river and fast without a paddle or life jacket!