Re: Doc always seems to be on vacation on previously proposed paydays

As you said, they breached the contract first! I sure couldn't deal with the deadlines you do, I know that for sure. I can't imagine how a conference could really be needed that stat, at least not for the same money!


DJGordon wrote: 
Warning, this is long!!!

That's what they're always telling me, Rae. I'll be honest in our little corner of the world here on how I came about this account. Normally, I'm a moral, ethical person and still am, but I guess this would have to be judged on the way this happened. And may name names if I screw up the courage.

I had just absolutely had it with my lazy deadline missing attorney of a boss and Halloween of 2000 just didn't even go in to work and sent him a letter of resignation by fax as I had just about cried the last week every time I crossed the threshold. Plus Justin had just been diagnosed 9 months earlier and nurses were watching him while Keith and I were at work, so I just said to hell with it, I'm smart, I have an education, I know computers inside out, I will find something at one of the online job sites.

I had been playing around for a while looking at some of the stuff and had gone to www.workaholics4hire.com which at the time was a great site to look for careers. There was a job listed with (oh I can't do it after all) a small company in Tennessee, owned by a preacher and his wife and I thought, oh, I can do this and it must be legit. Well, it was a transcription job, just general transcription but it was typing conferences, medicolegal, you name it...oh, yeah, it is the same thing I do now 5 years later. Anyway, tested for them, they said wow, you're hired. I had to take it, even though she would/could, who knows, only pay me I think it was $1.50 a page....and a lot of you on here know that my pages are 1 inch margins, full text every line, single spaced, no hitting enter...just one big paragraph. Well, I had to have money (Keith was working temp jobs at the time and here was Christmas coming up) so I took it thinking $1.50 wasn't so bad. HA! I'm smarter now.

Anyway, this is November 1st mind you, yep I was only without a job one day. Well, I worked and worked and worked (one of the first lectures I did was 6 hours, 70 pages long for the Canadian Psychiatric Assocation) thank goodness they dropped them as a client--whew, can those people talk. Well, December 1st came, no pay. I'm told that they are having trouble with the client paying them. I say, so? And that affects me how? Remember, how naive I was. January 1st, nothing. February 1st, nothing. All the while stupid ass me is still typing away. LMAO Anyway, at this point I do start threatening lawsuits and finally around mid-February I get paid and they say they no longer have the account. Imagine that. Well, I knew who the client was and I contacted them saying I've been doing this for a while, I really enjoy it, can you put me in contact with the company you are hiring to replace this one? They do, she's thrilled, I'm hired on the spot. Another MT company out of Tennessee -- Boy would I love to reveal this one's name, but I still better not because of what comes next.

Well, they have a whole bunch of people working on the account and so my workload is not near enough, but for someone who'd only been doing this for a few months, they started me out at I think 8 per gross line. I don't think that's too bad. Pay is still once a month, and very, very rarely did I have to ask where my check was. Well, anyway, I guess it was about the end of 2002 and work was getting few and far between. I start asking questions. They finally tell us that the client is looking at bringing in another company to "compete" for the contract renewal. Well, it was a 30-day contest. Of course, remember, I'm telling this from what they told me. Thirty days came and went and they told everyone they would have to take a pay cut if they wanted to stay for some reason or another. Well, I had no other options, I stayed. I was the only one. And it took me the next six months to beg, plead, threaten, and kiss ass my way back up to 7.5 cents, from the down to 6 cents they cut us to. Well, also during this six months, instead of getting any support I need from the company I was subbing for, they keep saying, contact the client, they can help you, quit sending me the assignments and expected me to go to the website and get them myself even though they were notified by email about them. Well, the production manager at the client's office started talking to me about just how much they loved my work, but hated the company I worked for and were thinking about getting rid of them. I mean, this company was making me do the whole account by myself, and for those of you who have helped me out, can just imagine how much fun I was having.

Anyway, Justin got put in the hospital one of his last times and it was for a empyema (sp), oh hell pleural effusion, and had to have a chest tube drain placed in June of 2003. I have my laptop with me so I can work from the ICU room which I always did, but the client and I are having negotiations on how to keep me, get rid of the contractor, and nobody get sued. Well, finally, I contacted a lawyer, told him what had gone on, found out that their contract wasn't worth the paper it was written on because it stipulated that any breach of contract voided it and after all they had pulled on me, it was definitely a breach. And so conference calls down in the lobby of Kosair Hospital, many contract negotiations later, here I am the owner of that account and loving it. They are always telling me how much they love me, but dangit I still just don't feel I have the job security. I mean, I look at it this way. I am a small little TSO (probably not even that) and they are a multibillion dollary company and sometimes I have to tell them too bad, that deadline won't fly. What happens if they decide to find a company who can make it fly? It scares me to death because I would honestly go bankrupt if I lost this account, no doubt about it. So there's my story, and while not 100 percent proud of it, it gave Justin an easier life, me a less stressful one, and while I'm not rich, I don't need any state aid anymore, we don't hurt, and we even have a little nest egg building a little at a time.

Dani






"RaeMorrill" <RaeMorrill@xxxxxxx> wrote in message news:ShFAe.140822$g5.23212@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I'm SURE they would have ahard time replacing someone of your caliber. If quality matters to their clients, they are screwed if they can't find a contractor who can deliver it.



DJGordon wrote:

I have seriously thought about it. If I wouldn't lose my house over losing this job I would be so tempted. But this is my bread and butter account and while I don't kowtow, I am a bit deferential to them. Of course, here lately I've noticed they are (no other way to describe it) kissing my feet for some reason. Heck, got this last check on the 2nd. They've been super nice about me saying they aren't going to get some of the files when they say they want theme. They got burned by the first two companies they used when they got started and swore they would never have just one transcription company on retainer again and have been using that Indian (now U.S.-based of course) company that I have mentioned for things that don't need to be back within a month and crappy QA.... but all of a sudden I notice they haven't been given anything since March, so I'm wondering if they think the same way I do and we're both just too "scared" to talk about it. I can't risk losing their account, and maybe by some small chance they actually think they could risk losing me. Nice to think of, they are always sending me thank you notes, cards, goodies in the mail, etc. so maybe I just worry too much.

Dani

"RaeMorrill" <RaeMorrill@xxxxxxx> wrote in message news:jNCAe.33842$0i3.12487@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


Wonder how they would feel if the check was late and you decided to hold work? Just amazing that companies are like that especially when you know they have the money.

DJGordon wrote:


Amen. My main client used to be wonderful. I turned my invoice in on the 1st, my check was cut within two days and sent out. Then they decided I had to turn them in by the 23rd to get paid by the first. Well, check started getting later and later, sometimes after the tenth. I would email and complain and now they say that their other "vendors" have net 45 days. I said, well, that's fine and dandy but I'm not other "vendors". Now the promise is I turn in on the 23rd and it is cut sometime between the 6th and the 10th, best deal I could get. I still have to get on them sometimes about remembering me and there's always an excuse. The sad thing is that my client is a multibillion dollar audiovisual production company and I happen to know that they are always late paying bills such as their Earthlink internet account. Truly poor accounting going on. But, oh boy, like right now, they sure do want their files back on time if not before time. They send them to me, then a day later say, oh yeah, those are rush, we need them yesterday. And these aren't 5-10 recordings. These are 149 minute conferences on pediatric epilepsy, clinical trial training, everything under the sun....oh woe is me LOL I'm just feeling sorry for myself since the main subs I use all decided to go on vacation at the same time and I'm working 18-hour days to stay caught up. {sigh}

Dani

"Gisele" <Gisele.1s10wh@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:Gisele.1s10wh@xxxxxxxxxxxxx



My big client does not sign his own checks, and I get 'em like
clockwork.  I let go a client a couple of years ago because she was a
doc signing her own checks, would never stiff me on an invoice, but I
always had to send the invoice, wait X number of days, call/email to
inquire if the dang thing had been paid, and I just got sick of it, so
I gave her 30 days' notice.  She was also dictating all over creation
on a cell phone, and I just got tired of listening to the static, so
those two problems combined made me happy to give her up.  What I tell
them is, they don't have to ask where the transcription is (it's
delivered every day!), so I shouldn't have to ask where my pay is.


--
Gisele





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