Should a legal firm outsource its transcription activities?
02 October 2022
Legal professionals are busy people. And a significant part of their time is spent producing documents that can range from testimonies and client letters through to legal briefs and general legal correspondence.
Increasingly the use of digital dictation systems is helping to streamline these document production activities, but ultimately there is still a requirement for a transcription service to turn the audio files into electronic documents.
A question facing many legal firms is whether to have this transcription service provided by in-house secretarial staff, or to outsource it to an external service provider. In this blog we’ll look at some of the key factors to take into account when making this decision.
How does outsourced transcription work?
Legal transcription is actually a relatively straight-forward process that can be broken down into three distinct steps:
Audio files sent to the third-party transcription company
External transcription service providers are usually able to work with most digital dictation systems, though it is important to check that they are able to integrate with any you already use. This will enable you to upload or transfer your audio files directly.
Working to agreed templates and formatting guidelines the legal transcriptionist will convert the audio files into word processed documents. The timescales for doing so should be clearly agreed.
Document reviewed
After the transcription is complete, it will be reviewed and proofread to ensure that it is accurate and that any mistakes and grammatical errors are corrected.
Resultant document returned
Once everything has been proofread and double checked, the document is sent back in the desired format. Depending on the level of integration this can be via email or available to download via a web portal solution. If you handle a larger amount of documentation, a dedicated workflow solution can be very beneficial to always keep a good overview of the tasks.
Benefits
Getting started
Outsourced transcription services can be particularly attractive for those law firms that don’t have the necessary in-house skills available. The services are available immediately without the need to recruit and train new staff.
Cost efficiencies
Opting for an outsourced solution means that you don’t need to pay for the wages, overtime and equipment costs associated with in-house staff, along with their national insurance, holiday or pension benefits.
Freeing up in-house staff/support team
For those firms that already have support teams providing transcription services in-house, there can be benefits to freeing up their time to enable them to spend more time on client-facing or client supporting activities, which in turn can have a positive effect on the levels of client service.
Access to experienced staff
Legal transcription companies are experts in transcribing audio to text since this is their specialist business. Their staff, therefore, understand all legal terminology and the required layouts of the wide variety of legal documents.
Integrated processes and live updates
The use of digital dictation software, in particular the cloud-based options, can enable the legal transcription service to offer a live service to its clients. This means that as soon as the legal professional sends a dictation, it is updated on the system and processed according to the specified turnaround time (including any that need actioning urgently). Furthermore, the author is able to track online where a specific dictation is in the overall process.
Possible issues
As with all business decisions, nothing is ever black or white and there are a number of potential issues and problems that need to be factored into the equation when considering whether to go with an outsourced solution.
Security
Legal transcripts often include sensitive personal information and for this reason, confidentiality is critical. For some legal firms the need to ensure there is no unauthorised access to their documents is paramount and as part of this, the documents should not be available to anyone outside of their security controls. Such concerns can be mitigated if the transcription company is able to demonstrate the use of effective cybersecurity tools such as file encryption.
Time
Although external transcription companies typically offer a variety of turnaround times for their services, there is nevertheless the fact that audio files are being sent out of the legal firm to another company that might have competing demands from other customers. This addition of another process to the document production activity can extend the overall timescales and might be problematic for particularly urgent pieces of work.
Cost
Many legal firms already have support teams in place to provide transcription services. In cases where these services are providing high levels of service and are fully utilised, then any potential costs savings associated with using an outsourced service are unlikely to be achieved. In such circumstances the main attraction for using an outsourced service might be to assist in times of peak workloads or to help cover sickness and holidays.
Conclusions
For many law firms the option to outsource time-consuming document creation tasks is an attractive one. Legal transcription services can provide a fast, cost efficient and reliable option. Outsourcing transcription tasks is also a good option even with in-house staff available, for example for bridging staff gaps due to illness or particularly busy seasons.
