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Why Accuracy is So Important in Transcription
In today’s world of advanced technology, it’s now easier than ever to record presentations, interviews, conversations, discussions and focus group meetings, to mention just a few applications. All of this spoken data is of immense value because it records genuine facts and opinions of people that are relevant to whoever has commissioned the recording. This could be a business or organisation, an educational establishment or government body, or even individuals needing to keep recordings for personal or professional use.
However, audio content is an extremely difficult medium to search through when trying to pinpoint relevant data, and this is where the power of audio transcription shows its true strength.
Transcription converts the spoken word into the written word in an easily searchable format, so that you can quickly find the information you need. In this blog, we’ll discuss the importance of accuracy in audio transcription and look at the difference between technology and the trained human ear when it comes to transcribing your valuable recorded content.
Are ‘Minor’ Inaccuracies Really a Problem?
When it comes to transcription of recorded audio and video content, one of the most important things to consider is how accurate the finished text is. You want to be sure that you’re reading a true representation of what has been said during the recording. The meaning must also be conveyed in a way that enables you to understand it as clearly as if you’d been in the room when it was spoken.
Accuracy is incredibly important when it comes to transcription work – probably more so than you think – so it’s worth investing in a solution that can get it right the first time and every time.
At its core, a transcript is a written record of something that one or more individuals have said, in the exact words they said it. In some industries, the odd misspelling or mistake might not make a huge difference, and the only outcome might be some red faces before it’s corrected. However, in other industries, those little errors can snowball into huge issues. This can potentially cause reputational damage, or even impact the careers and lives of those involved or affected by the error.
For example, in a trial in 2012, a wrongful death verdict was pronounced against a medical facility and its outsourced companies, along with a fine of $140 million. Their transcriptions of doctors’ orders were outsourced to a firm in India, which mistakenly wrote ’80’ instead of ‘8’ for an insulin dosage, resulting in the tragic death of a patient.
Even something as simple as the placement of punctuation can change the meaning of a sentence and therefore needs to be chosen carefully to ensure that the transcript is an accurate reflection of the tone, as well as the original intent, of what was being said.
All of this means that if you’re having transcriptions done, you really do need them to be accurate. If there are lots of mistakes, then the transcript becomes useless because it doesn’t accurately tell you what was said. If there are small mistakes, they can cause big problems. Ultimately, accuracy is critical because mistakes cost time, money, and reputational damage for everyone involved.
How Accurate Are AI Transcription Tools?
Since transcription is essentially taking audio and turning it into text, it’s no surprise that technology has caught up and provided some solutions. What may surprise you is that this technology had its origins over 70 years ago! As early as 1952, Bell Labs developed ‘Audrey’, which was a computerised speech recognition system that could recognise spoken digits and was used primarily for limited vocabulary tasks.
It was another 30 years before dictating to a machine became possible in 1982 with personal computers, representing a significant step forward in making speech recognition accessible to a broader audience. Now, more than 40 years after that second breakthrough, advances in machine learning, deep learning, and artificial intelligence have propelled speech recognition technology to new heights.
Speech recognition software can turn an audio file into a text file in a very short space of time, but it’s only in recent years that Artificial Intelligence transcription tools have become a part of the wider market. As amazing as this technology sounds, the problem is that these tools are often not accurate enough to stand up to any scrutiny. They frequently struggle to differentiate between speakers and can’t understand context or strong regional accents. These AI tools often misunderstand words spoken, use commas and other punctuation incorrectly, mix up names and places and does not understand nuances. This means that despite their incredible capabilities, AI transcripts are often full of errors.
While it may sound like a quick solution to use AI transcription tools, the effort of correcting these errors can often lead to frustration and many wasted hours of your time.
How Accurate are Human Transcribers?
Human transcribers, on the other hand, are far more accurate in all of those areas, so while we can’t process an entire recording in 5 minutes like AI can, transcripts are of much higher quality. One of the reasons for this is because a trained human transcriber has a wide knowledge of many different industries and fields of study, knowing when to use acronyms and brand names appropriately, and understanding how quoted speech and other aspects of a transcript are to be formatted and represented. When a professional human transcriber listens to a recording, they can reflect much more in the transcript than just the words spoken. Emotional responses such as laughter or crying, the tone of speech (humorous or sarcastic), and even subtle nuances and expressiveness such as whispering or shouting, can all be conveyed accurately by a human transcriber. This reflects the true nature of the words spoken and gives you a truly accurate representation of the original content.
Our article, ‘AI Transcription – Sent From Heaven Or A Tool From Hell?‘ talks about the differences between human and AI transcription.
How Do You Guarantee Accuracy?
If you need incredibly accurate transcripts, how can you ensure you get them? Using an AI transcription tool only gets you about 50% of the way there. You will still have a lot of work to do, such as checking the transcript and editing it to make sure that everything is captured accurately, with correct spelling and capitalisation, as well as applying the correct formatting to the document. This defeats the point of using AI in the first place – you want to reduce the time you spend, not increase it. You could do it yourself, but the time and energy you need to invest is enough to make your head spin. You have better things to do with your time!
Instead, we recommend using a professional transcription service to handle it for you. More specifically, an experienced transcription service with a team of highly skilled transcribers and a dedicated quality control team on board. If you need accuracy in your transcripts, outsourcing your audio files to a proven, reputable transcription company really is your best option
At McGowan Transcriptions we pride ourselves in providing high-quality, accurate transcripts to a wide variety of businesses. Our skilled team are experts in understanding how vital accuracy is to you and your industry, and your transcript will go through rigorous checks to ensure it’s the most accurate it can be before it’s sent on to you. We’ve been transcribing since 1993, so you can be sure we have the experience and expertise to provide you with the most accurate transcripts possible for your business. If you’d like to know more, please get in touch with the team today by calling 0800 158 3747 or drop us an email at office@mcgowantranscriptions.co.uk.
March 2024
