Hello Everyone,

 

I am a student in court reporting and will be changing programs to become a scopist.  I am wondering what some of your opinions are on such a change?  I don't want to do be a reporter because I do not prefer the machine work.  My Theory Professor thinks I should continue on to be a reporter.  She says that it is very difficult to break into scoping without experience.  I am also concerned with getting paid and if scopists have issue receiving payment from reporters.  Any info/opnions would be greatly appreciated!

 

Thanks!

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The amount of money I make isn't a huge factor.  My husband supports our family and my current job being self employed is only an assistance to our household...  BUT I do need to make some money...

I know one scopist I use on a part-time basis makes around $50,000.  She does a ton of daily work, however.  That's how she makes her money because it's double the regular rate.  I only use her when I have dailies or immediate delivery.  I think $30- to $35,000 is an average for a busy scopist on regular work, I'm guessing.

I could care less if a scopist is "certified."  After they do one or two transcripts for me, I know in my book whether they will work out.  I've never asked the question if someone is certified. 

In my experience of using scopists over the last 25 years, about 70% of them are not worth a hill of beans, to put it nicely.  I'm just digging to find that gold nugget of the other 30% that are worth all the extra effort I'm going through to find them.  I've found two the last few weeks that I think I can work with, which makes me pretty happy.  Now I have three, which I need because I get a lot of daily/immediate delivery transcripts and I need the backup help.  I prefer to send my transcript to three different scopists through the day so I have two or three working on it.  That way, no one gets too overwhelmed.

Kelli, this is a serious question.  What makes 70% of the scopists not worth a hill of beans?  Your transcripts are very clean I'm sure most of the time.  There is spell check so that shouldn't be a problem.  Is it not reading for context, improper punctuation, not looking up spellings of improper names?   Of course, a lot of it is probably not getting the work out on time, something which I've encountered quite often.   I've used proofreaders though, not scopists.   What makes a good scopist?

I'm wondering that too as I consider using scopists for the first time.  What are some of the errors that you see?  What separates the good from the bad?

Very interesting topic, one I'd like to get more involved in but can't b/c of an expedite (why do they wait until the end of the depo before the tell you about the expedite?  Are they afraid I'll walk out if they tell me at the beginning?.  But, very quickly, get references.  Also, I don't see any reason why reporters can't utilize the "Have You Ever Heard Of..." group to do a shout-out on a potential new scopist/proofreader.  And before any scopist/proofreader gets their panties in a knot, there's no reason a scopist/proofreader can't use that group to do a shout-out about a potential new reporter too.

What I notice is they will type stuff in and have typos, not reading for context, which is a big one.  I'll send them exhibits, which they won't bother to even look at and then type in what they think the doc said, which is wrong, even though I sent it.  That really irritates me.

I had a scopist this week had "perspective license agreement."  That should have been "prospective" and they should know that.  Granted, I wrote it wrong.  I don't think I'll write it wrong again now I know scopists miss that stuff.  They will leave stuff in the transcript that makes no sense.  She also had sea-level position.  That should have been C-level position, meaning CEO, COO, CFO in a company.  "sea-level" made no sense in the context of what this case was about.  

A good scopist asks for exhibits and reads what is actually quoted, looks stuff up on the Internet to make sure I have it  right.  A lot of times I'm doing realtime and I put in the spelling the way I think it is, but just want the name to come up somehow instead of an untran since it's RT.  I'm not online and can't look it up myself at the time of the job.  I ask for spellings from attorneys and witnesses, but a lot of times they are not correct.  Scopists should be looking that stuff up and making it correct.  With the Internet, there is no excuse for misspelled companies, names, etc.

Wow, Kelli, that is unbelievable!  I am shocked reading "sea-level" and "perspective."  I don't blame you for being irritated and mad.  When you're paying someone to do scoping, all you should have to do is proofread it for small errors, not to look up things on the internet, or the exhibits, etc.  I'm just shocked!  I still scope my own work, and I hope one day to be more busy again, and I would love to use a scopist, but I'll be sure to look for a good one, not a lazy one, that's for sure.  I agree about the internet, it's such a great tool for the spelling of companies, etc.  In the old days we had to get out the Yellow Pages and call companies to figure out how to spell a word, or a piece of machinery, etc.  Now all you need is Google.  It's a great tool to use in our field.  Again, just wow!

Yeah, I don't edit any of my own work.  I have tendonitis and so I concentrate on what I'm good at, the machine.  Sometimes I just think they want to just scan through it as quick as they can and collect that paycheck. 

Anyway, I hope that answers your question, Martha and Keith.

You're lucky to be so busy!  I'm hoping to branch out soon to other agencies since the small agency I work for is getting too slow.  Did you point out to your scopist her errors?  And if you did, what was their excuse?  I'm still shocked, as you can tell, LOL.

I love what you are saying, Kelli.  I haven't been doing this long, but I can already see that there is a huge gap out there between those that want to do a great job and those that just want to get it done and get the money.

I want to be the very best that I can be, so I take what you are saying very seriously -- and what any other reporter out there might have to say about this.  What DOES make a great scopist?  Your thoughts on the subject are greatly appreciated, one and all!

I had a job last month where the videographer actually volunteered to look spellings up on the Internet for me while I was reporting.  I thought, wow, what a great marketing tool to get reporters to refer you.

And I realized when just looking at your post I forgot about the sea-level mistake when I said the mistakes weren't that bad.  That's almost as bad as the typist who thought I was dictating "Golden Gate Bridge" many times during a deposition.  There were no bridges and it was completely out of context.  She didn't call me to ask!   The typed paper had Golden Gate Bridge, and I needed to retype many pages to fix the mistake and fix the spacing on the page - no computers back then!   She said that's what her husband heard too :) 

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