A community of 30,000 US Transcriptionist serving Medical Transcription Industry

i am so depressed with my company lately. VENTING big time. - anonymous for now

Posted: Apr 29, 2010

First put us on VR. Hey, good deal! I like VR. Then then cut our pay in half and make us use a new program. No big deal. It's supposed to be the best! I can live with it. I should still be making the same if not better.

Uh-oh. Problems with the program. Support can't straiightens it out but, hey, I'll live with that! Just gotta learn to get around the quirks.

Oh, wow! No work. Pay going downhill. Hey, new accounts coming on line. Yippee! Maybe I can finally get my lines/hours.

Uh-oh. Hiring again. Back to square 1. No work, problems with the program that no one seems to care that I'm having, even the company that MADE the program. I'm so depressed.

Evidently, you can work for a company and be loyal, but they don't care. Emails are not returned. Support doesn't want to hear from you. The company who made the software blames some other program even though you pointed out that everything works fine WITHOUT their fantastic VR program.

So, where am I? Still working for the company. Have to, need the insurance. Need an operation but can't afford to get it done because I'm too busy trying to get my lines and hours. Can you say got me over a barrel? IThis is the third company I have worked for and after a certain amount of time, it seems like they just don't give a hoot. Can you say "got me by the ba..s? Yessiree, they do.

MT is not what it used to be and I've only been in it for 20 years. I would advise anyone thinking about this career to think twice. There may be some other way to make money without the hassles we are all going through right now.

BTW, I used to make $1500 NET a pay period. I'm lucky to make that much GROSS now. It absolutely sucks.

Done venting. Sorry for laying my problems out here but I have no one else to "talk" to about this.

That's Okay - MT

[ In Reply To ..]
Go ahead and vent. I am with my second company and things aren't much different. I have decided if I leave this company, I'm getting out of the MT biz for good. I'm not going to chase companies hoping things will get better. It's quite clear the industry is down the tubes for good MTs. We all worked so hard for so many years, thinking if we did that, we'd always have a job. Well, okay, we have jobs but it pays peanuts now.

Vent all you want - tiredoftyping

[ In Reply To ..]
a lot of know exactly where you are coming from. I too am on my third company and have in this biz for 20 years, only I am school to get out. I watched my pay get cut right in half with VR, even though I like it, it doesn't pay, and insurance, well even though I am full time, I can't afford it. I tell everyone I know that is thinking of transcription to run in the other direction!

Ditto to all, I am so down I cant hardly standing working. nm - me2

[ In Reply To ..]
nnn

Boy, I hear ya on that one. I call it the yo-yo syndrome - - sm - Rocky Raccoon

[ In Reply To ..]
Hope springs eternal, doesn't it? I'll just be starting to pick up speed, and WHAM! The Powers That Be throw a spike-strip under my wheels.

I started with a medium sized MTSO a number of years ago, one with a squeaky clean reputation for quality and for treating its employees well. So I hired on with them, and of course was slow at first, learning new platform, BOS (old job didn't care what BOS said), accounts, doctors and specialties. I limped through the next few months financially, going broke paying $400/mo. for COBRA. Right about the time I finally had insurance, and was up to speed on my accounts, WHAM! My company got bought out by a bigger company.

I almost quit right then and there, when I heard the company offshores most of its work to India. But, not wanting to have to pay for more COBRA, I decided to give the company the benefit of the doubt. After all, they said things would be even better now. Better insurance. Better pay. Better production on their fantastic new software they were rolling out in a few months. So, I tried to be hopeful.

Unfortunately, my account was lost, and I had to start all over on a new one. Back to being slow and getting microscopic paychecks again. But, of course I figured as soon as I gained speed on the new accounts, I'd be on my way to making a decent living again.

But NO. Right about the time I got dialed in to the new account, I got put on the company's so-called new-and-improved software. Which was a joke. But, I decided to be optimistic. I've been able to get around software burps in the past, so of course it should be no problem to do so again.

BUT, each time I got comfortable with, or had found a way to get around the stumbling blocks built into their new-and-improved software, they would "upgrade". (i.e., have their techs in India fiddle around with it, and make it worse.) Over the last several years there've been quite a few upgrades, and each one is worse than the last, and each stumbling block is harder to overcome. But, my hope for better times kept getting renewed every so often, whenever my speed improved enough to increase my takehome pay a little bit. (Of course, I was in denial of the fact that each time the pay amount dropped, when it went up again, it would never go up to the level it was just before the most recent drop. So it's been a gradual downward slide.

One step forward, two steps back.

Then, out of the blue, our entire MT staff was hit with a major pay-cut. I was already not getting by on what I was being paid. But now I was REALLY not getting by, not by any stretch of the imagination. At this point I started looking for a better job.

For a while, the prospect of finding something else was enough to make the situation seem brighter. Only most of the time the jobs paid even less than I was making after my pay cut. It was also difficult to even find the time to job-hunt, because I had to work an additional 2 hours per day, above and beyond what I was working over 8 hours already. Overtime pay? (Snort!) What's that?

And so it has continued. Little upward leaps of the heart and my mood whenever I find a job that's even worth applying for. Sending off my resume, being sure this time I'll have just what they're looking for. Then, the disappointment when I get no reply. Or on the rare occasions that one of them does reply, and tells me the job has been filled, then I look online the next week and see they're still advertising for the same position.

I've got exerience up the wazoo in most specialties, but I know what it is they're looking for that I don't have. That quality is inexperience and naiivete. Even if I shave everything but my most recent job off of my resume, I've been at the recent job too long, as well, so it's impossible to hide the fact that I've been in this game long enough to remember when MT was an actual career, and not the work-at-home scam that it is today.

It's hard to say where all this will end. I may have to move back in with my parents. That would suck, as I'm in my 60s and they're in their 80s. At this stage of their lives, I'm supposed to be starting to take care of THEM, not the other way around.

Meanwhile, I just sent off another resume today. So, just like when I very occasionally waste $1 on a Lottery ticket, it'll give me a couple days of enjoyment from that small glimmer of hope. Inevitably, though, that hope will be dashed, just like when they read the Lottery numbers, and they don't match my ticket, when I don't get even so much as a rejection letter from the company or hospital I applied to.

Meanwhile, they're getting ready to "upgrade" our transcription software again. Shoot me NOW.

So sorry for you. You are not alone, I feel the same way these days! - shortcake

[ In Reply To ..]
..

that stinks - sm - sssdt

[ In Reply To ..]
As for the support for programs, I think that happens everywhere. Had the same thing happen to me both at MT school and at the job I'm at now. Their programs stop working but they blame me for it and then stop answering.

Good luck, I hope work picks up for you.

What program are you having problems with? - IAMT

[ In Reply To ..]
Maybe if you mention it and the problem you are having some other MT might be able to help you. I know I have got mine up and running myself without "tech support" from the company. We have pretty much all been there.

Hope things are going better for you today, I truly do.

Its All Good - Sassy Pants

[ In Reply To ..]
Its all good. I feel exactly the same way. I've been a newbie MT for 2 years as an MTSO with my 2nd company (based in WI) and I am going thru everything you stated above. I am looking at another profession too. The first FT paid-by-the-hour no-BS job I can find I'M GONE!!

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