Introduction
Since 2005, Casting Words has been committed to matching freelance transcribers with transcription customers. The online business offers audio transcription and video transcription in many languages as well as custom transcription, transcription tools, and consulting.
According to the Casting Words website, it has more than 10,000 customers and a rating of more than four stars.
Our Casting Words review is based on its website as well as our use of the order platform. Please use this information to determine if this is the best online transcription service for you.
Pricing and turnaround times
Casting words publishes its pricing on its busy homepage. It appears that the company offers four price tiers for transcription:
- Budget = $1.00/minute
- One-week turnaround = $1.50/minute
- One-day turnaround = $2.50/minute
- International transcription (Spanish or French) = $1.75/minute
Although it’s not readily apparent what the Budget option is, hovering over that icon reveals that there’s no guaranteed turnaround time. So, if you have no deadline for processing your transcript, this is a great value given the 99% accuracy guarantee.
Upon registering and placing an order, you’ll see from the dashboard that add-on services do cost extra. Those include:
- Difficult audio = $0.75/minute
- Full verbatim = $0.30/minute
- Trim audio = $1.00 surcharge
- Timestamps = $0.10/minute
- Subtitles = $0.50/minute
So, although the add-ons could be considered “hidden,” the pricing is certainly fair and not too complicated. We like that.
Web interface / dashboard
The web interface at CastingWords.com consists mostly of one long, scrolling page, which might look slightly overwhelming to some users.
Creating a user account is easy enough. Just enter your first and last name, your state, and then add your email address and create a password.
The order dashboard is pleasantly designed, with unusual warm colors and supersimple choices. You can upload a file directly from your computer, add a link, or link to a Dropbox file.
Once you’ve added your file, you can give it a title, list all the speakers’ names, add your own notes, and select tags. You’ll also indicate your add-on services at this stage.
The next step is simply to review your order and pay.
Accuracy
Casting Words guarantees 99% accuracy or above on all its transcription services. And if you know the transcription industry, that means human-generated transcription only. Of course, this is evident from what we reveal in the introduction about the owners’ desire to match transcriptionists with customers.
However, this online transcription company does use some automated steps between transcribing and editing to make the process as cost-efficient as possible while maintaining high quality.
Conclusion
Casting Words appears to be a popular online transcription service with respectable reviews. The company offers live order tracking and fast support via email. Because clients of Casting Words include the Wall Street Journal, Microsoft, and NASA, you can be confident that you’re going to get good results by using this service.
Summary
Since 2005, Casting Words has been committed to matching freelance transcribers with transcription customers. The online business offers audio transcription and video transcription in many languages as well as custom transcription, transcription tools, and consulting.
