matthew m.

I should start by mentioning that I had done a lot of research into the notion of working from home before finally finding Speechpad (well, before my fiance found it for me, that is - credit where credit is due, right?) I couldn't even get past the test file at Rev. Mind you, transcription is nothing new. I've been transcribing for many years and have had clients varying from doctors and lawyers right down to college professors wanting their lectures typed out. I've worked in-house, from home, as employee, as contractor, and as freelancer. Most every other site I've been to for transcription has been, at best, a poor choice to fall back on. Most either maintain an impossible expectation of an adherence to their standards (which can often be contradictive of themselves,) or simply don't pay well enough to fathom undertaking such jobs - like 7 cents an audio hour unless your grade scores at or above a level 7 on their scale, then it's 12 cents an audio hour and you get a 3% bonus if it's done in x amount of time and... wait, what? No. Speechpad is simple and straight forward - You know what the job pays and how long the audio is. And if you click on the sample audio icon, you even get a feel for what that job is going to sound like. If it ends up being too much, you return it with no penalty (other than not being able to work on it again, but someone's going to grab it before you would have been back to it anyway.)
Payment is via PayPal and is always on time (sometimes even early.) It's fair compensation for the jobs provided and often even better than fair (have seen and worked jobs at $0.60 per audio minute and $0.75 per audio minute.) Just this last weekend I pulled a job that was one hour twenty-one minutes long and paid $49.03. The audio was clean, the review was fair (below the threshold even, but I was expecting that as I was seeing double near the end - I accepted it at midnight, worked it through 5AM, requested the extension I knew I'd need, took a nap, woke up, woke up, and polished it off with time to spare.)
Regarding the complaints about reviewers I keep seeing on these review sites - Let me put it in perspective for you: They are users just like you. They strived and toiled to get and keep their rating up, worked on and with the stie for a good time, had all the same hiccups each of us have at one point or another, and then refined their skills to a point that the Speechpad team felt they were qualified. They're still human. This is still spoken word being recorded as written word. This still leaves much to interpretation. Regardless, the staff has always taken the time to address any issues I just couldn't let slide and either explained where I went wrong or explained where a reviewer might have gone wrong and then adjusted the score accordingly.
There's a "Send Feedback" button at the top of the site - use it, it is your friend.
Now, mind you, if you turn in subpar work, don't expect employment and payment on par. But this is no different than with any other employer or freelance type project out there.