Why It is Important to Proofread Your Transcription Work

When you are providing transcription services it is critical that you carefully proofread your work. You want to make sure to give your client the absolute best, most accurate transcript you possibly can so that they know they can depend on your work product. It is so convenient when a client can trust the quality of a transcription service so much that they do not have to spend time reading over and correcting your work.



So many little things can sneak by you while you are typing that you will find when you go back through and proofread. Sometimes you may leave letters off of words, creating completely different words: I instead of is, or instead of for, you instead of your. These are all common mistakes. I know these are little typos, but they make the difference between a good transcript and an excellent transcript.



You might also accidentally type the wrong word such as look instead of book, king instead of kind, thin instead of thing, word instead of work, et cetera. Again, it is the little things that matter and help you to stand out as a quality transcriptionist.



Now there are two ways to go about proofreading your transcription work. One is to listen to the audio and follow along in the transcript, making corrections as you go along. This is most important to do with particularly difficult audios because sometimes you will be able to pick up words you weren’t able to the first time through.



If the audio was very clear you probably do not need to proof to the audio, but only need to spot check any questionable words that you may find as you read through the transcript. You can either print your document out and proofread it or proofread from the computer screen. I believe that you are more likely to find errors if you print out a copy and proofread it from the paper copy. Also, I always enjoy getting away from the computer for a little bit. You can take your printed transcript to a nice comfy chair or couch and work on it. It is best to use a different color, such as red, to circle and make proofreaders marks for what needs to be changed in the transcript. Then go back to the computer and carefully go back through the document and make the changes that you found need to be changed.