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

Just wondering...has anyone ever actually gotten - Kiki1

Posted: Jun 01, 2011

gotten their pay docked 3 cents a line for critical errors, over 5% QA submission, etc.

I haven't heard anyone actually say that happened to them. Is it just a threat ? I know they would LIKE to dock our pay.

The reason I ask is that I've been having a bad past few weeks.....extra difficult/bad sound quality reports plus stress along with that has caused me to have to sent more than 5% to QA plus I make two what they call critical errors (I saw them as errors but NOT critical but that's neither here nor there)....Anyway, my pay hasn't been docked that I know of yet.

Do they have to tell you if your pay is going to be docked or do they just do it?

I'd like to hear from anyone who actually has had their pay docked. Can you apply for unemployment for the week (s) that your pay is docked I wonder? I'd like to just quit but I'm not giving them the satisfaction of not paying unemployment. But at the same time I can't afford to have my pay docked. But wouldn't they have done it already, I've given them ample opportunity as of late. ????

My opinion - Ex-MQ

[ In Reply To ..]

I used to work for MQ years ago, but not since they implemented all these draconian rules.

If you find out that they actually do dock your pay (I may get blasted for this), if it was me, here is what I would do.

If I started getting really bad dictations starting during the first week of the pay period and things did not look like they were going to get better the second week; and if I was afraid they would dock my pay in any way, I would just slow down to a crawl and spend as much time as needed to leave the least number of blanks I could. (I have been an MT for nearly 40 years, and I truly believe that sometimes taking the stress out of the situation actually makes it easier to understand difficult dictators.)

That would probably mean that I would not make minimum lines, which would mean that they would have to pay me minimum wage to make up the difference. If they are going to dock me for sending blanks, then they are going to have to pay me minimum wage. In effect, I will probably get the same amount in my paycheck, but I will not be stressed trying to avoid being docked.

I would also take the time to copy the really bad reports into my personal Word or Notepad file just to be able to show what they looked like when they were sent to QA, so I could compare what I sent to what QA’s final report looked like – just in case.

Just my personal opinion.

Hope things work you for you. Good luck.

Yes, I sent a long cardiac cath report to QA. It had no - JJ

[ In Reply To ..]
blanks. My question was on formatting a table that was only partially used by the dictator. It put me over the 5% and I got docked. Sucked because it was a formatting question and it was left as I sent it to QA, untouched.

Wow - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
That is terrible. Personally, I wouldn't have sent it to QA. I would have just figured the table the best I could according to the CP and sent it on to the physician. If anything was said to me about it, I would have told them to speak to the physician about learning how to dictate properly. I also would have put a QA note in when sending report to client stating that I did the best I could with formatting due to dictator quality. Just me.

Dock - SS

[ In Reply To ..]
I only know this practice to be illegal. If I were in that situation, I would call my state's DOL to confirm either way.

Our convoluted salary - CA-MT

[ In Reply To ..]
Have you ever tried explaining to anyone not in the MT business how they calculate our income? I have and I can begin to see a glazed look come over the face of the listener. I also once tried to explain it to someone in the unemployment office, trying to see if I qualify with my ever-decreasing salary. He made a lot of incorrect assumptions, seemed clueless as to being "paid by the line." At the end I still don't think he fully understood it all. I admit it isn't easy and sometimes they even short-change us without us knowing it unless we have a background in math. Anyway, how much is it for one of us to hire an employment attorney?

You have actually figured it out? I haven't. - dnr

[ In Reply To ..]
Good grief - a line is a line! It shouldn't be so difficult to multiply lines by rate for each set of lines. If, by any chance, you did overtime, multiply by 50% the lines during that hour or, easier, average the earned wage per hour for that day and add that number to the wage for the day. Don't even need a computer to do that!

Yes, docked - None

[ In Reply To ..]
In was docked when I was still in training. I had worked for tis crappy company for 10 years and was being trained on DocQ. They docked me 3 cpl for every line I did. Needless to say, that was the last straw. Inam worth way more than minimum wage. They do things that are illegal and many, many people are looking elsewhere. Best decision I ever made the day I left them. Their goal is tomsend all work to India and pay any remaining US MTs minimum wage! They are going down like the titanic. I really hope that management reads this board. It probably won't matter, but they have got to know that they have the worst reputation in the business. I anyone says they are happy here, they are liars or management trying to look good on here. I know more then 50 MTs all looking for a new company, all HATE MQ. Yes, they will dock your pay!! They are criminals!!!!

Never been docked but only because I refuse - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
to send more than 1 or 2 reports per pay period to QA. No way I'm getting paid less than my measly per line rate to listen to these garbage dictators, foreign dictators who can't speak intelligible English, etc. Seems illegal to me to pay someone less because of lousy dictators, sound quality, etc.

Same here, I do not send anything to QA except - MQMT

[ In Reply To ..]
on those rare occasions when I need a sample or if there may be some kind of new instrument, medication, etc., that I cannot find.

We are allowed to send blanks directly to the client, so I don't understand why people are sending to QA and getting docked?

If you cannot hear something - Second set of ears

[ In Reply To ..]
With the accounts I'm on, even my 20+ years of experience doesn't help decipher what some of the ESLs say. It's not for my lack of experience. I tried sending in bunches of blanks to the clients, specifically only one that was the worst. I even had access to multiple samples for her (Indian by the way). That "M.D." got upset and I was put on probation for all of my work. Coincidentally, I'm one of the higher paid MTs/MEs, been here for 11 years. Never had an audit, but because my work was not immaculate, I was audited for 3 weeks. I squeaked by with 98.1% quality, but now am terrified, just waiting to be demoted to 3 cents a line. I've been looking elsewhere, but it looks like some companies start you at that, and there's no telling how much you can really make until you're in too deep working for a few weeks with another company.

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