What determines the length of time it takes to transcribe an audio?

 

  • The quality of the recording – This can be affected as much by the recording equipment itself as by background noise which obscures the words or the recording volume.

 

  • The type of microphone being used.

 

  • The number of people speaking.

 

  • The speed at which they are talking. This may sound odd but if someone is a fast talker, it will take longer to transcribe what they are saying than someone who speaks more slowly. For example, take two audios – both one hour in length. The first interviewee talks slowly, ‘normally’ the resulting transcription is perhaps 10,000 words long. The second interviewee talks at ‘machine gun’ speed and the transcript totals 16,000 words. Same length of audio – completely different results. A fast talker = more words. More words = more to type = more time taken = more time charged.

 

  • Whether they speak in coherent sentences. Everyday speech is usually littered with ‘ums’ and ‘you knows’. People switch thought in mid-sentence or don’t speak in coherent sentences at all. In such situations, the transcriber must go back and work out where to insert the punctuation so as not to lose the thread of the whole piece. The more coherent speakers are, the less time it takes to transcribe their words. The transcriber can ‘type as they talk’ and rarely needs to go back and puzzle out the meaning.

 

  • Whether there are any regional accents. Wherever a recording is made in the world, if the speaker has an accent which is difficult to decipher, this will adversely affect the time it takes to transcribe a recording.

 

  • The amount of technical and specialized terminology involved. Material which is full of technical, financial, computer or specialized terminology which may be unfamiliar to the transcriptionist will increase the amount of time required to transcribe an audio. It may be necessary to re-listen to words, sentences or even whole sections several times in order to distinguish the words. In such circumstances, it helps enormously if a glossary can be provided in advance by the client or if words can be spelled out at the time by the person speaking.

 

It is in the interests of both the transcriber and the client to deal with recordings of the highest possible quality. A poor quality recording will result in a high number of ‘inaudibles’ and take longer to transcribe.

 

Good, clear recordings result in highly accurate transcripts. The less time it takes to transcribe your material, the lower your final cost will be.

Next: Why Hire a Professional Transcriptionist to Convert Your Audios Into Typed Text