When you type “transcription services” into Google, you’ll get a slew of results. Even if you search for specific services like ‘interview transcribing’ or ‘conference transcribing,’ you still get a lot of results. So, how should customers go about making a decision?
When determining whether a firm is a good fit, there are a lot of variables to consider. Your decision should not be based just on price. There are a few inquiries that should disclose whether or not a transcribing firm is professional. The following sections go into further depth on each of these topics, but to summarise:
* Is there enough transcribers on hand?
* Who is responsible for transcribing?
If so, how many times have you listened to it?
Do you know how much time the transcriptionist will devote to research?
Do you have a copy-editor?
* Do they provide large-scale project management?
Transcribing service providers should include all of the following in the pricing of their service.
Is there a sufficient number of transcribers?
Do they take on more than they can handle? The number of experienced transcribers accessible to transcription businesses should be taken into consideration. Large projects with short turnaround times might be risky for firms if they don’t have enough transcribers on hand. Hundreds of freelance transcribers are forced to write hurried transcripts for customers. There would have been very little effort spent on minimizing questions, and it is possible that no proofreading was done at all. The sheer amount of information that the transcribing firm takes on implies that not everything in that project has been examined by any supervisory hand at any point in time. When a transcriber accepts more work than they can handle, they risk sacrificing quality.
Who is the person responsible for the transcription?
Only highly skilled transcribers should be used in this project. An audio typist who has worked in an office for a few years is not capable of transcribing. Excellent grammar and language skills are required, as well as great accuracy and proofreading abilities. However, each transcriber must have the capacity to ‘think’ and recognize grammatical anomalies in the spoken word, as well as contextual mistakes.
The following question should be asked: Is the transcribing outsourced, and if so, to whom? Is the quality of the outsourced transcriber sufficient to meet your needs?? No matter how many people disagree, we feel the transcriber should speak English as well as the recording’s original language. Translators who are fluent in a given language should be able to translate the recording into a different language. Clients in the UK, for example, should consider carefully if the grade of transcript offered by abroad agencies can ever approach the same high quality provided by English speakers. Accents, dialects, and slang phrases may vary widely from nation to country, and this can be a challenge for transcription accuracy. Some of the errors may have been disastrous, such as submitting the erroneous medical information, when we were requested by customers to amend transcripts done overseas.
Is there a second listen to the audio?
All recordings should be listened to again once the transcript has been finished, according to our opinion. If you want to be sure that any inaudible parts of the audio are captured, you should listen to the whole tape against the transcript after it has been done, not only during transcription to make sure that any inaudible portions are captured. Clarifying any doubts and making sure that the transcript as a whole is conveyed in its entirety may be achieved by using this method. There are many ways that incorrect punctuation or incorrect emphasis on words may alter the meaning of a phrase, and it’s frequently only after listening to a speaker’s whole sentence that you can determine what he or she is trying to convey. Some of these intonations are missed when transcribers just listen to a few words here and there, which is undoubtedly what they do while they’re typing. Although transcribers might be quite certain that they’ve caught everything precisely the first time, we feel it’s necessary to listen to the recordings again. Some words, even after a second or third listen, maybe misunderstood, especially in the context of the whole paragraph. If you’re an unskilled transcriber, you’re more than likely to fall into this mistake. It’s expected that a reputable company will be aware of this and will do this additional check at no additional cost to customers.
It’s important to know how much time the transcriptionist will devote to research.
In most recordings, the transcriber will encounter unfamiliar names, locations, or terminology. To avoid unnecessary questions, each service should be prepared to spend extra time verifying that these names and terminology are accurate. A client’s list of names or keywords might be beneficial in reducing the amount of time spent checking, but transcribers should be providing this research as part of the service offered, again without charge. Google is a great site to look up names, locations, phrases, and even terminology. In any case, transcribers should be aware of the risks of merely consulting one or two Internet sources, as the veracity of various websites varies greatly. Each website that a transcriber consults should come from a reputable source, and any reference books that are already in the office should be used as well. Upon receipt of the transcript, the customer should have complete faith that the spelling and grammatical accuracy have been double-checked.
Is the transcript checked for accuracy?
It is critical to properly check all transcripts after they are done to ensure they are error-free. This is the only method to find typos, inconsistencies, or anything that doesn’t make sense in the context of the rest of the text. The next logical inquiry is, “Who proofreads the work?” The second set of eyes should go through each transcript before it is finalized. When you look at the fine print, you’ll see that the proofreading is exclusively done by the outsourced transcriber, not the transcribing company. Their transcripts have never been seen by a project manager or anybody else in charge. Mistakes are unnoticed, and any missing or ambiguous terms are left unclarified. They may just be the consequence of one transcriber mishearing an individual name on a tape, while another transcriber may have picked it up more clearly on a different one. These corrections and gaps will never be filled in, resulting in an erroneous and incomplete transcript, unless one supervising mind both re-listens and proofreads.
Does the company provide project management services for large-scale endeavors?
Project management for major projects should be included as a standard service for all transcribing businesses. As a result, customers may focus on their project with the assurance that the audio transcription is being handled. Transcribing businesses should work together to ensure that the customer only has one point of contact for the duration of a significant project. Audio files should be converted to a suitable transcription format, digital audio files sent to their team of transcribers, and ensured that all transcripts are produced in time to meet deadlines when transcription services are required to do these things Many transcribers take enormous projects without the necessary project management abilities. In the absence of an in-house proofreader, recordings are not listened to a second time to address any issues that may have arisen during the recording process. In other words, since no one person is in charge of all the transcripts, the quality is quite inconsistent.
So, what else can customers expect from a skilled transcriber in addition to accuracy?
Transcribing any audio may take a significant amount of time, and this should be taken into consideration by transcription services when setting their prices, turnaround times, and staffing numbers. So that a customer’s expectations aren’t unrealistic, they should be prepared to explain this to the client in advance. Customers need to understand that transcribing an hour of audio doesn’t take an hour. There would be no need for shorthand or stenographers if we could type or write as quickly as we talk. One-hour recordings may take a minimum of four hours to transcribe if the quality is bad or there are a lot of participants. If you require a Complete Verbatim, Intelligent Verbatim, or an Edited Transcript, your timeline will be affected accordingly.
At first glance, it should become obvious whether the transcribing firm you’re working with has the right amount of expertise to provide the service you need. For experienced transcribers, it is common for their work schedules to fill up fast, but this should serve as a good indicator of their service quality (in the same way as an overflowing work calendar raises doubts about the quality of their service). Transcription services should be reserved as early as feasible by clients, ideally well in advance of a significant project. Trying to hire an expert transcriber on short notice once the assignment is done may be problematic. A significant block of vacant space at short notice may not be achievable for the majority of professional transcribing firms, many of which have a lengthy list of regular clients. The transcribing business should be booked in advance, much like interviewers and locations. It’s best to get in touch with a transcription service ahead of time to get tips on how to best conduct your job. Experienced transcribers know exactly what it takes to produce a high-quality recording, so take advantage of their expertise and utilize it to streamline your workflow.
