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

Here we go again--threatened with "lockdown." sm - anon

Posted: May 31, 2011

Anyone else get this email from their CCM? Ugh.

Here we go again - MQMT

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I got that e-mail. I feel like we are being harassed, again!

what is lockdown - sm

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Didn't check e-mail, but never heard of that.

Just checked mine, and NOTHING - I think people make this stuff up - nm

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Just trying to stir things up I think.

No, I'm definitely not making this up. - OP

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I've worked for MedQuist for 7 years, stated as a statutory employee. Grudgingly went to employee status back when they got rid of that position.

I'm in the North region and have a nice CCM, but I can tell she's getting pressured to get us all in line. She sent us a long, detailed email about how we need to work our schedules, cannot call in sick unless we have PTO (and if we don't have the PTO available we are to be very precise in telling her when we can make up the time). But she said that really, calling in sick will be frowned upon and they want us not to miss any time and we all are calling in sick too much.

We were told there are too many of us working the day shift and so if we didn't volunteer to move our hours to evenings we would hear from her.

Let's see, what else...oh, everyone has a 30-minute leeway in punching in/out before and after our shifts, but we have supposedly "abused" this privilege and so she arbitrarily reduced it to 15 minutes. She said this will help us "get used" to lockdown when it happens.

Now, lockdown, to all of you who don't know what it is, means that we will be locked into our schedules and no deviation unless we have our CCM's approval. The system won't let us in if we try to log in earlier than 15 minutes before our shift starts, or later than 15 minutes after it starts.

They have been threatening this for a couple of years now and that is what the switch to Schedule Source was supposed to accomplish. I personally don't see how this could work, especially with people who get NJA a lot.

And no, I am definitely NOT stirring the pot here. I am a disgruntled old-time who is frantically looking for another job.

Got the same email. We probably have the same CCM as - Kiki1

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it was worded pretty much like you describe to a T.

Funny how just bc something hasn't happened to some people YET, they think you are making it up. Then it happens to them.

Kiki1- We must have the same CCM - I got the identical e-mail

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When doctors start dictating on a precise schedule is when they will be able to hold us to a precise schedule. Hogwash, As Usual. I sooooo wish they would just lay us off. Other companies do it, why not the Q? Must not have all the Indians up to speed yet...

Poster is NOT making this up...I got the same email including - Kiki1

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everything she talked about. This is nothing new. Been being "threatened" with lockdown for a while; keeps getting pushed back, but I'm am POSITIVE eventually this will be true for ALL of us, just not at the same time....slowly but surely. It will just thin the masses more like they want. Fine by me, I don't want to work one second more than I need to. Never had a problem with working the hours I said I would and already work graveyard. They can't really do much more to us short of laying us off/firing us all....

my definition of lockdown - Ang

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A bunch of shysters who do not pay for time expecting workers to follow rigid ridiculous schedules. Same shysters conjure up tons of "5-minute" unpaid tasks (always take longer than that) for same workers to do for free. If shyster-time comes I will resume looking for another job. Was doing that last time they brought up that
incredible BS.

I always thought - lockdown

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meant that we would only have 1 primary and no backup because too many errors were being made on tertiary accounts. I was in this type of "lockdown" for about 6 months a couple of years ago. One primary, no secondary. Sat for 6-7 hours a day with NJA and no backup account. All the while, the account I was on had been lost and was just trickling in a few jobs a day until their contract was up, and no one would tell us the truth until my super called and said I could be switched to another account or terminated. (Easy choice). Anyways, I switched and now have a gazillion backup accounts (thank goodness) but I always thought that was the meaning of lockdown. Either way, whatever it means, its not the best for us.

accounts/time - ang

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I kind of remember a "lockdown" that had to do with accounts but I think the original poster on this thread is talking about the one that has to do with schedules. They tried to push it through a while back and then backed off.

Nope, lockdown means you can get work during - your scheduled hours

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and then when you are "off" no more jobs will be routed to you.

Lockout vs lockdown - difference. sm

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Lockout is the schedule reservation/only able to work during shift scenario.

Lockdown is where accounts can only be accessed by certain groups of MTs.

No lockdown was the slang name we gave - lockout because it is like

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being in jail.

I remember when they tried this before, but - MQMT

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it did not work, probably because a nightmare for CCMs who needed help from part-timers rather than pay overtime and having to change everyones schedules in schedule source, and then not getting enough people to work outside their shifts because of the hassel of having to email CCM with specific times they could help out. There were times I wanted to help out, but did not know when I would have free time far enough in advance to make it work and so did not even bother when lockdown was in place). In my opinion, though, if they are trying to curtail those not working their schedule, then deal with those individuals and leave the rest of us alone. I personally like the lockdown idea to prevent others from taking my work away when they are not scheduled to work, which I think is why some see NJA a lot of the time. If a person consistently works outside their schedule, I think there are other ways of dealing with it other than making an across-the-board lockdown that causes more problems than it is worth.

Got the same WONDERful e-mail - from my CCM

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Are we talking about the same CCM? I thought lockdown went the way of extra money for difficult dictators?

LOL, your MT experience is showing - The good old days

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When you talk about extra pay for difficult dictators these days, all you get is a blank stare, same with extra for working weekends, flexible schedules, and shift differential.

Aw, the good old days...

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