Now, I am not going to pretend that making money and potential earnings is not an important consideration; it most certainly is. After all, not much else matters if you can’t afford to eat, put a roof over your head, clothes on your back, health care, and have means and transportation to get yourself from place to place. It is even more so if you have a family to provide for. So, yeah, it is important, and anyone who claims to the contrary is either fooling themselves, detached from reality, or flat out lying to you. However, as important as money is, it is important to figure out a way to make that money in a way that helps you to maintain a good work/life balance. Happiness and fulfillment, as well as doing something you are passionate about are just as important simply because anything worthwhile and legitimate takes honest work and effort and has to have value to others. If one is passionate about their line of work — their career — then working and putting in the requisite effort to make it pay dividends becomes a valued part of who you are. Work becomes something pleasant, sometimes a challenge to better yourself and become more productive, gives you a purpose, and fills you with a sense of pride and the feeling that you are contributing to something greater then yourself. Now, what that passion is is what becomes most important.
Hopefully, I have at least whetted your appetite to further expound upon that which you might be passionate about. It certainly is my passion. I have absolutely fallen in love with transcription as well as digital scoping. I am celebrating my fifth anniversary as a self-employed, sole proprietor of EJWillTranscribeIt, which is my general and legal transcription and scoping business. While I am not fabulously wealthy, I do earn a comfortable living and have no worries about putting food on my table, a roof over my head, clothes on my back, and I have good healthcare. I also have the freedom to set my own days and hours that I choose to work, and I do so out of the comfort and convenience of my own home. I have clients, not employers. I am self-employed and am the sole employee, so I do not have to deal with employees or with workplace drama, bs, or politics. Rather, I focus upon the work that I am passionate about, and that is transcription and scoping. Most of the audio and video files that I transcribe or the legal transcripts that I scope are interesting, which makes my work enjoyable. Yes, there are instances where I will get a legal case that is a dull or a general transcription job that is tedious, that is life. You make the best of it. However, I have reached the point in my journey now that I can choose the work that I wish to do.
Okay, now about your earning potential should you choose to follow this same path and make transcription your vehicle for making a living. First, set aside any grandiose plans of striking it rich and becoming fabulously wealthy. That is not going to happen. This is a legitimate career, not some false or shady promise of easy on-line riches and passive income streams. The only people getting rich with that are those who make those promises and bilk hard-earned money from those that actually work. Those schemes will do one of three things for you: rip you off and leaving you bare-assed broke, waste your time and energy, or worse yet, land your backside in jail. Anything legitimate takes learning, effort, and work. Transcription does just that. It provides an opportunity, not a silver spoon. Transcription is a time-honored and respectable industry and one that can provide a great work/life balance. The majority of our industry is performed remotely, almost exclusively from the comfort of our own homes — our your home away from home if you happen to be traveling, but this part is for a later blog. Also, as far as income, it is important to keep in mind your raw earnings versus your expenditures related to any career field. Remember what I said, the vast majority of the transcription industry takes place remotely from the comfort of your own home. You see where I am going with this? Let’s discuss this further.
It is no secret that most people drive to their place of employment and do so five days a week — some maybe four days a week on 10-hour workdays. The average American worker spends about 27 minutes on a one-way commute for a distance of 27 miles — don’t you just love the symmetry here — for a total of 54 minutes and miles per day. Oh, and gas isn’t getting any cheaper my friends, nor are the highways and byways becoming any less congested. Over the course of a work week, that can be as high as 220 miles driven. The average price of gas in the US is about $3.20 per gallon. The average miles per gallon of an American automobile is 26 miles per gallon. Basically, an average American is paying around $64 per week for gas. This does not include wear and tear expenses, insurance, tires, and maintenance. Many back east might mitigate that cost through public transportation, but that also is not free. Anyway, one can expect to pay about $200 per month in gas, and that is not taking into account gas for life outside of work. I like to compare those figures with my commute ( and the commute of my fellow transcriptionists). My commute consists of walking from my bedroom, to the kitchen for a cup of coffee, and down the hall to my home office. No traffic, other than maybe a pesky miniature pinscher; no wasted time or hassle. Oh, no wear and tear on my car. My gas expense per month is less than a third of what the average American worker pays. I often go a whole month without filling up the tank.
Besides the comfort, convenience, and lack of commuting, working from home has other cost-saving perks. My home office is a big tax write-off. My coffee and the food I eat for lunch is also a tax write-off. So is a percentage of my utilities. My internet bill, because I use it mainly for my business, is also a write-off. My software for transcription is a write-off as are my website and costs for advertising. Any purchases I have to make — headphones, printer ink, trips to the computer store for equipment are all write-offs. You get generous tax write-offs when you have an at-home business. You combine that with other expenses, and you find yourself receiving income tax refunds that you may not have been getting before. Yes, it is important to keep accurate and honest records and bookkeeping and keep receipts and invoices of all expenses. That is not difficult for a transcriptionist, as our work requires us to be organized anyway. The bottom line is that working from home adds to your bottom line. In other words, working from home saves you a lot of money when it comes to work-related expenses — oh, and the dress code is fantastic.
Prior to becoming a transcriptionist and legal scopist in 2020, I enjoyed a 33-year career as a teacher. I spent the majority of my career as an elementary school teacher. Additionally, I taught high school English for one semester and high school choir and band for one semester. When I retired in 2018, I was at the higher end of the pay scale, so I was making a decent salary. I loved teaching, but I was not enjoying the increasing workplace politics and all the hoops one had to jump through in order to navigate the changing educational regulatory landscape and the infusion of politics. Not to blather on, making a short story long, I decided to launch a new career, one that I could operate and thrive at from the comfort and convenience of home sweet home. Having a BA in liberal arts, along with a minor in English and graduate work in curriculum and instruction and writing, I decided that transcription, proofreading, and editing would be something right up my alley.
So, after much due diligence and careful research, I discovered TranscribeAnywhere — and yes, the name is correctly formatted. Being a lifelong educator, I was impressed with their curriculum and training methodology. Janet Shaughnessy, the owner and founder of TranscribeAnywhere and the owner of Zoom Transcription, along with Marsha, who is a retired teacher, built a world class, e-platform training school for legal and general transcription. When you enroll as a student, you become a lifelong member of TranscribeAnywhere, benefiting from our exclusive social media platform where other TA transcriptionists discuss all things transcription related. This allows you to make connections, get advice, and share experiences and ask questions. The curriculum is well construed, organized, interesting, and effective. As an educator with decades of experience in curriculum and instruction, I can vouch for the training and education you will receive from TA. The program is pedagogically sound and correct, mixing the right amount of theory, content learning, with practice and working on real-life transcription skills. It is rigorous, to be sure. Anything worth its salt must be in order to be effective. It is also interesting, enjoyable, and it gives you the confidence you need as you progress through the course. The course normally takes about four to six months to complete, though if you push through, it is possible to finish in two months. Along the way, you get all the help and mentoring that you need. There are people always willing to answer questions and dispense effective advice. Just one week after I graduated in November of 2020, I acquired my first private client and signed on with a busy transcription firm that specialized in employment hearings associated with the railroad industry.
In January of 2023 I began taking a free course to become a digital scopist. A scopist is a person that uses enhanced software — in my case Autoscript — that you upload audio files into, and the software than generates a rough transcript. Using specialized tools within the software, you finalize the formatting, listen and proof to audio, and make edits, corrections, and check punctuation. After I earned my certificate in digital scoping I landed two court reporter clients and have never looked back. I do not work with an agency. I have my own clients. I retain one general transcription client — and at times, I will transcribe a file if called upon — while retaining four digital court reporter clients. I have all the work I want and need to keep me busy, pay my bills, and to have enough to put in savings and for entertainment and other odds and ends. I do this from the comfort of home.
So, how about yourself? Do you dream of having a business of your own, one where you do not have to come up with a large investment of money to start and hope that you can make it pay off? There are a lot of options, of course, and you need to find what works for you. Also, you need to do your due diligence. Ignore any advertisement that promises riches and an easy street lifestyle. Those don’t exist. Study and do your research, ask questions, and decide what it is that aligns with your interests, talents, and skill set. I want you to think about work-life balance, too. You want to be happy, and you want your at-home business and career to lighten the stress in your life, not add to it. Otherwise, what is the point. Find out about the industry that you choose; find out as much as you can so you can make an informed decision before plunking down hard-earned money on courses, equipment, merchandise, and technology. Look for options that have free workshops or seminars where you can get yourself informed and educated.
Speaking of free workshops, as in the case of TranscribeAnywhere, which has a free online workshop delving into the industry of transcription and being a self-employed, independent transcriptionist, why not see for yourself as to whether or not you are suited or a fit to become a transcriptionist. TA’s online, free workshop takes about 35 minutes of your time. Janet, the owner and founder of TranscribeAnywhere and the owner of Zoom Transcription, conducts the workshop. It is very informative, and it is interesting. Janet, besides being a wonderful and talented mentor to all of us who had the privilege of studying and training under her, is also a very talented presenter. She does not believe in arm twisting or hard-sell tactics. I bet she will answer the questions that you are seeking answers to. You will come out of her workshop with the necessary knowledge and understanding of the world of transcription and will have the information and idea as to whether being a transcriptionist is the right fit for you. Then you will know whether or not to invest in one of TA’s outstanding courses.
I have provided the link that you need to go to our landing page where you can find out more information, and if you choose, take the free, online workshop. You can take it at any time that is convenient for you.
http://www.transcribeanywhere.com/a/2147542252/PnLxY5jT