After you record a long interview or meeting, transcribing the resultant file is likely not high on the list of things you want to do next.
Turn to a transcription service instead.
GMR Transcription produces results consistent with other human-based services in testing, and it offers a good variety of services, too.
On the other hand, GMR Transcription costs more than competitors, has no web editor, and offers poorly designed web and mobile interfaces.
Editors' Choice Rev is a more modern, cheaper, and intuitive transcription service.
Transcription Costs
GMR Transcription's base tier costs about the same as other human-based transcription services I've tested.
It charges $1.25 per minute for recordings with two speakers and good audio quality, given a 3-5 day turnaround time.
However, the costs go up quickly from there.
Adding the verbatim, time-code, or corrected-grammar options each add $0.50 per minute to the overall cost.
As opposed to the standard option, verbatim transcripts include all non-word vocal expressions, such as a cough or laughter.
The base cost goes up to $1.75 per minute for difficult audio.
GMR Transcription defines difficult audio as any recordings that include background noise or speakers with heavy accents, as well as those that require significant time stamping or include complicated medical or scientific terminology.
Shortening the turn-around time also sends the price up.
For example, Next Day returns cost $3 per minute at a minimum, while Same Day orders cost $3.50 per minute.
GMR Transcription's Video Transcription service costs more than its audio offerings.
For videos with clear audio, the standard rate for a turnaround time between three and five days is $1.75 per minute.
GMR Transcription is unique in that it offers a text-to-text transcription service, which you might use if you want to convert a scanned document to text.
This is similar to ABBYY FineReader's optical character recognition (OCR) feature.
You can also copy text from an image in Microsoft's OneNote, so only customers with a high volume of documents should consider GMR Transcription's text-to-text service.
For comparison, Rev ( at Rev) costs $1 per minute of audio and returns files of under 30 minutes in 12 hours.
Time stamp and verbatim options only add $0.25 per minute each.
Scribie's regular service, which has a 36-hour return window, costs $1.20 per minute and includes auto time-stamping.
Transcription Panda's standard option, which returns files in two to three business days, costs $1.20 per minute and charges an extra $0.25 per minute for time stamp and verbatim options.
For simpler files or quick transcription jobs, an automatic transcription service may suffice.
These services are typically much cheaper.
Otter, for example, gives users a 600-minute recording and transcription allotment per month for free.
Scribie also offers a completely free automatic service.
Get Started and Transcription Process
Signing up for GMR Transcription is not as simple as with competing services; registering for an account is a four-step process.
The first section requires contact information such as your name, email, phone number, and occupation.
Next, you enter a password and have to provide an address.
The last step before the confirmation page is to pay a $1 registration fee.
No other service we tested makes it so difficult to sign up for an account, nor do any charge a registration fee.
GMR Transcription gets credit for explaining its privacy policies and transcription process in plain language.
The company says it uses your personal information for contact and personalization purposes, but never distributes your data to external sources.
GMR Transcription uses an SSL-encrypted server to ensure the security of files and communications.
All of GMR Transcription's employees are under a strict nondisclosure agreement (NDA), and the company deletes your audio uploads from its database after the transcription job is complete.
Transcriptionists do not have access to your contact information.
Web Interface
GMR Transcription's web dashboard is functional but dated.
Sections use antiquated iconography, options are duplicated, and many of the buttons feature an unattractive artificial bezel.
Its color scheme is drab, with dull yellow, gray, red, and blue highlights.
GMR Transcription divides settings across four modules (top to bottom): Upload File, Manage Files, View Report, and Manage Your Profile.
In the Upload File section, you can add an audio file for transcription, a text document for translation, or pay and access transcripts.
In the Manage Files section, users can view the status of transcription jobs, as well as pay for and access completed transcripts.
The View Report section hosts options for accessing and downloading your payment history, order history, and paid transcripts.
The last section, Manage Your Profile, is where you edit profile settings, your password, and payment details.
The Edit Profile area is pretty basic and you can't enable two-factor authentication.
All transcription services should include a two-factor authentication option, but unfortunately none of the services I've tested implement this security feature.
One security concern I noticed when I changed my password is that GMR Transcription did not hash out my password when I typed it into the entry field.
GMR Transcription does not include a web editor for making changes to transcripts online.
This is a considerable limitation since you likely will need to make changes to the transcript at the end.
A representative from GMR Transcription noted that the company had never received a request for such a feature, but as our accuracy tests show, no service produced perfect results.
Your best bet for services that don't offer an editor is to copy the text into a free tool, such as OTranscribe and make any changes there.
From experience, correcting a transcript at the same pace as the recording plays is difficult, especially if you need to frequently move between programs.
The top transcription services feature web editors that combine text-editing and playback tools into a cohesive and intuitive interface.
GMR Transcription is also missing robust collaboration tools, although it does support invoicing and team accounts.
A few transcriptions services, such as Sonix, let you assign roles with different permission levels for each user.
Order Options
The layout issues affect the order experience as well, with poorly organized and cluttered options.
To get started, you click the Upload Audio Files button.
Next, you either set up the default processing settings for every upload or choose options for the current file.
Both options bring up the same interface, with the only difference being that the former preselects the Set These Default Setting for Future Orders option.
In this context menu, you select the language, file format, audio quality, turnaround time, number of speakers, and any other extra services.
You can also add special instructions or notes for speaker names, keywords, technical terms, or formatting requests.
GMR Transcription doesn't calculate the total cost until after you submit those options and hit the Calculate button.
Most others services calculate the total costs as you make selections.
The Edit button clears the calculated total instead of reopening the order selections, which makes very little sense to me.
The last step is to upload any templates or supporting documents.
Finally, you make sure everything looks correct before you agree to the terms and submit the order.
GMR Transcription sends you an email once it successfully submits your file and you can view the status of the job from the Check File Status option on the main account page along with the guaranteed date of return.
How Accurate Is GMR Transcription?
To test the accuracy of the transcription services, I upload the same 16-minute recording to each one.
The original recording of a three-person conference call comes from an Olympus VN-722PC dedicated voice recorder.
It's not an easy recording, but that makes it ideal for stress-testing the services and clearly differentiating their performance.
It's also worth noting that since there are humans on the other end of these services, you may experience some variability in accuracy results.
GMR Transcription returned the transcript in 53:54 (hours:minutes).
All of the services returned my transcript within their promised range, but GMR Transcription took the longest.
Still, this time is on the quicker end of the 3-5 day return time it promised.
Rev was the quickest with a time of 1:16, Transcription Panda managed a time of 2:05, and GoTranscript (.72 Per Minute at GoTranscript) finished the task in 2:58.
Scribie took a little over a day (29:02) for the same task, but that time is within its 36-hour return window.
Instead of comparing the entirety of each transcript, I choose three paragraphs, one from each speaker on the call.
For each snippet of the transcription, I mark an error wherever there is a missing, incorrect, or extra word.
I calculate the overall error rate by dividing the total number of mistakes into the total number of words across the combined sections.
Section A is a short introductory section.
Section B is slightly longer and uses more complex vocabulary.
Section C is even lengthier and contains some technical language.
GMR Transcription returned a transcript with an error rate of 12 percent, which is usable, though it is the worst result I got from a human-based service.
In any case, GMR Transcription's result is only slightly worse than GoTranscript, which had an error rate of 10 percent.
Rev, the most accurate service I've tested, had just a three percent error rate.
TranscribeMe and Transcription Panda both turned in results with a five percent error rate.
Peruse the chart below for the full results as well as a comparison to the automatic services we reviewed.
I retested all the automatic services with a simpler, in-person recording between two people.
I calculated the error rate in the same manner, using two sample paragraphs, instead of three.
The automatic services fared better with this task as a whole, but they still weren't perfect.
Take a look at the chart below for the full results.
Mobile Apps
At first, I could not find GMR Transcription's mobile app, since the company confusingly lists its app under the name Easy2Transcribe on the App Store and Google Play Store.
I tested the app on my Nexus 5X running Android 8.1.
The app layout is bloated, though the design is more coherent than its desktop counterpart.
Icons and colors are mostly consistent, though, oddly, the size of some elements, such as the arrow in the upload and download buttons, are different.
Both the icons and the overflow menu look disproportionally large too.
Although none of the settings on the app's main page have labels, the overflow menu repeats all the same options.
The only notable addition here is the ability to change the default delivery option.
To get started, you either take a new recording or upload a file from your local storage.
The recording interface features old-looking skeuomorphic design practices, but it works fine for capturing audio.
Once the system adds your file, you select order options the same way as you do on the desktop before submitting an order.
Easy2Transcribe offers the same functionality as most other mobile transcription apps, despite its lackluster design.
Both Trint and GoTranscript offer the same capabilities, for example, though both apps have vastly better designs.
Otter is the best mobile transcription app we tested.
In addition to recording and submitting audio directly from the app, you can also make edits to the transcript text from your mobile device.
Good News, Bad News
GMR Transcription offers decent accuracy and a rich set of features.
This is counterbalanced by a convoluted sign-up process, a dated and confusing web interface, and the lack of a web editor.
GMR Transcription is fine for people who simply need a transcription and nothing else, but other services are cheaper, just as accurate, and more intuitive.
Check out Editors' Choice Rev for a better human-based transcription service.
Otter is a good automatic transcription option.
