Pay with Dict8 continued

[Chrissols]

Hi all........

@KAnthony Give it a few more months/years and you'll see why we complain lol, no pension, no holiday pay, no sick pay and throughout the course of the day as you take breaks etc your hourly rate decreases and those good earnings soon get diluted and you start to work full time for part time wages. You also tend to get stuck in a rut in this job as you are not using other skills so finding a different job is not easy, and you have to work long and hard to reach even the minimum wage and it leaves you too exhausted to do anything else. It's pretty much sweatshop, dead-end and exploited now. Yes it's good that we can do it from home and have the freedom to chose our hours, but even that is exploited to sell it to potential transcribers, as the pay just does not compensate, plus you are using your own equipment and utilities. Some cope of course, but mainly it's just Ok if you need an additional small income, but not if you are alone or the main breadwinner. Saying that, I am glad it exists as it can be a godsend if you are in between jobs.

@KAnthony Some do work for multiple transcription companies, but basically it's all just the same slog. Others also have other jobs in the NHS etc and do it alongside them.

*choose not chose sorry

@Gally123 No not had mine. I find them very useful too. Hopefully, turn up soon.

@Gally123

I wish someone would explain to me why when I have several specialties that I only ever seem to see one of them in my task list at the moment, the same specialty all day every day, and none of the others. I dropped one specialty as that was all ever saw and there was none of the variety of a few years ago. With the feed system that DICT8 suggest there must be a way to even out who receives which specialties so that one person does not get all from one specialty and none from any other.

@Gally123 This sometimes happens to me too. Your last sentence makes a good point. It seems the more specialties you have, the least you see of all but the difficult ones.

@Whitestar5 no holiday pay etc you should surely realise that is what you get for being self-employed, that isn’t just Dict8. I do take breaks, also take my daughter gymnastics Monday mornings and swimming Tuesday afternoons and I still manage to make more then the national living wage. Each to their own and it varies from person to person obviously but again not all negatives. Your equipment and utilities too can claim as an expense when it comes to doing your self-assessment and paying tax? Again, as with all self employment. I wouldn’t say I’m earning a small income or coping but more thriving, I’m really hoping I’m not the only one and there are others with Dict8 feeling the same. Again just trying to throw some positivity into the doom and gloom!

@Gally123 never knew about the diaries. I’ve set up an excel sheet which I track my daily/weekly earnings and it calculates everything for me. Just add a new column for each month, also generates my invoice from it at the end of each month.

[quote KAnthony]@Whitestar5 no holiday pay etc you should surely realise that is what you get for being self-employed, that isn’t just Dict8. I do take breaks, also take my daughter gymnastics Monday mornings and swimming Tuesday afternoons and I still manage to make more then the national living wage. Each to their own and it varies from person to person obviously but again not all negatives. Your equipment and utilities too can claim as an expense when it comes to doing your self-assessment and paying tax? Again, as with all self employment. I wouldn’t say I’m earning a small income or coping but more thriving, I’m really hoping I’m not the only one and there are others with Dict8 feeling the same. Again just trying to throw some positivity into the doom and gloom![/quote]
@KAnthony It's good to hear you are doing well with DICT8, but you are in a minority and for someone who has only been working with DICT8 for three months it is quite a statement of achievement as usually it takes a while to get used to the system and their layout requirements. I'm well aware that being self employed I have to sort out my own tax, holiday and sick pay and private pension, but I was stating that fact that most of us feel that DICT8 and other transcription companies do not pay enough to enable us to do this, it's not exactly a cooperative is it and we do feel we are exploited.

@amiafreakofnature: I was not' being uppity' I was genuinely responding to your query. I did state that maybe I did not totally understand the meaning of your request. If you don't want a genuine response, because it is not to your liking, then don't post ... simple as.

@gally123: I have not had a diary yet. Probably arrive in about two weeks.

@danblack87 - maybe they have cut back on diaries this year as they have previously arrived in the post before the end of November. Or maybe working from home there has been no-one to deal with this. I always thought it was odd they did not post with the December pay cheques and save on postage - perhaps they will this year.

Maybe we are getting £100 bonus instead of a diary this year.

@whitestar5: hahhahahahahahahaaaaaaaa

@Whitestar5 - That has got to be the best post I have seen on here in my 9 years on this thread . If only.

Hey guys, just did my first invoice for T-Pro. There is a section that says VAT. When I asked Tpro if I had to fill this in they replied saying to leave it blank if I was not charging VAT. Why would you charge them VAT? How would this be possible?

Do you guys normally get paid the 7th of each month with TPro?😊

@ShanJG - people who offer a service like plumbers, hairdressers, typists etc can charge VAT on their earnings once they reach a threshold, it used to be £70,000 but I think it is more than that now. We do not earn enough to charge VAT.

You should be paid by 7th of each month.

We definitely do not earn that amount haha! Type that right off the invoice lol! Thanks Gally.

@ShanJG

We definitely do not earn that amount haha! Type that right off the invoice lol! Thanks Gally.

Hmm I don't know, some on here would probably claim they could !

@Whitestar5 If that’s trying to be a dig at the people who do actually earn good money then it just comes across as very bitter and jealous and for a group of ‘mature’ people it’s very sad.

@Whitestar5 you read my mind!

No not jealous and not sad, but I do like bitter.

@Whitestar5 you seem happy/proud to be bitter? If several off you spent less time and energy making snide remarks and more tying maybe you’d be better off too! Oh well, no sleep lost here. I’ll let you all carry on with your negativity ‘comical’ comments.

I mean I like bitter beer

@KAnthony - I get your frustration. And I suspect you are never going to change some of the entrenched attitudes or unfounded perceptions on here, but actually, nor do you need to. Enjoy the fruits of your labours instead, it’s far more pleasurable. It is all about choice, something we all have but which many commentators seem to have forgotten. It is not compulsory to work for Dict8. Your early success over the past 3 months should be applauded. I have certainly enjoyed my success over the past decade. I am sure conspiracy theories, coupled with unestablished favouritism claims will fly thick and fast but I think a near decade trend gives me a pretty good baseline from which to comment - without ever taking an apple to the teacher…

Hello fellow Dict8ers
I've been doing Dict8 for 10 years now, not doing quite so much these days as I get a bit of other income. I came across your forum recently and have read all the previous posts and feel that I have got to know some of the regular posters.
It was great to hear that I'm not alone with some of the issues with Dict8 (petty, unnecessary feedback and bad dictators). I haven't even had any Well Done emails lately (but perhaps I haven't done well enough!). I get a mix of good, bad and very bad dictations in my four specialties, and I suppose because I have four I often get the tasks from each specialty that no-one else wants to do. I used to struggle through the very bad ones but these days If I don't like the 5 tasks on offer I usually go and do something else for a while and hope someone else has taken them! At the same time I feel that I've got to know some of the bad dictators' ways and tackle some that others wouldn't want to do so I don't feel too bad about leaving the ones I really can't face.
Hope I can join in now I've finally got round to registering with Mumsnet to be able to post.